Perspectives from a (kinda) Child of an Immigrant

I don't know when I stopped referring to myself as "French Canadian and Black" and made the shift to "Black and white."

It was easier somehow to tell people what they wanted to hear when they looked at my hair, then at my complexion and then search my face for other features that might give them a clue.

I stopped saying French Canadian because it didn't feel like it counted. Like when white people say they're Irish and Scandinavian but that's like from five and six generations back. The real thing they wanted to know was what my race was, so I gave it to them straight. French Canadian isn't a race and nobody even knows what it is anyway.

I always had to explain to people that the French "landed" on North America too but were beat out by the English for what is now known as Canada, save a little province called Quebec. Quebecois or French Canadians are the decedents of those colonizers who refused to assimilate into the British ruled Canada. It's a cool history of resistance until you think about the fact that all European colonizers were stealing the land from indigenous folks and claiming anyone got anywhere first is complete crap. Another reason I'm conflicted in my Quebecois pride.

I grew up in a bilingual household until about the 1st grade. Mostly, bilingual although my when my English-only speaking father was home from months out to Sea he complicated things. It weird to say that because I feels like the phrase "bilingual home" is reserved for other families that don't have a white french-speaking mother. My first two years in school I attended a French Magnet in San Diego. I remember moving to Hawaii halfway through 1st grade and staring at the kids as they asked me things in English and Hawaii Pidgin. Every morning we said the pledge of allegiance and I didn't know it in English. This is a common experience for bilingual children and for many children of immigrants who may not speak English in the home. But I still pushed back against the idea that this is my identity, because my mom is white and JUST Canadian so it doesn't really count.

When I moved to Hawaii the experience of having an immigrant parent was pretty ordinary. My best friend and I would joke about how our moms (her's Japanese) always had trouble understanding each other over the phone, both speaking with different accents of a language neither of them grew up speaking. When people would ask my mom where she was from I'd always stare shocked. That's not a question white people get asked very much and she had been speaking English since she was 16, I didn't even notice she had an accent.

Several years ago my mom's youngest sister was the first one in their family to become an American citizen. My mom talked about following suit and I exclaimed "NO! You don't want to be a citizen of this trash country!" Partially selfish (I want the option of dual citizenship in case the shit hits the fan, as it is now), it felt like an American passport would make my mom just another American white lady and I couldn't stand the idea of that.

The privilege of not wanting my mother to have an American passport is not lost on me, it's one that not many folks have.

This President and his administration aren't going after my mom. My commonality with child of immigrant stories stops at the fear of my parent being deported. Because race matters in this conversation. If you look at the list of the 7 "banned" countries it's rare that people who look like my mom (blonde and blue eyed) would not be stopped for "extra questioning."

In this time it's important for us to remember that in most cases whiteness trumps all and as we share stories and signs that say "we are all immigrants" I hope we'll remember that:
1)Blacks folks who are the decedents of slaves are not
2)Native folks who have been here all along are not

3)Not all immigrants are affected my xenophobia the same. Collapsing the nuanced experience of people who have come to this country in a multitude of different ways erases the fact that my mom and a green card holder from Sudan are not treated the same.