The Mixed Experience

a mixed chick on a mixed-up world

  • Home
  • About The Mixed Experience
  • The Mixed Experience Minute
  • How to Listen to the Podcast
  • Contact Me!
You are here: Home / Archives for mixed race history

Mixed Experience History Month 2016: Regina M. Anderson, playwright & artistic leader

May 20, 2016 by admin Leave a Comment

mixed race historyRegina M. Anderson (1901-1993) was born of mixed-race ancestry.  She identified as “American” and was a leader in the black artistic community.

Anderson received a master’s degree in library science from Columbia University.  She worked as a librarian with the New York Public Library for more than 40 years.  Her home became a central hub for Harlem’s intellectuals and artists.

She was a founding member of the Krigwa Players, a black acting troupe with became the Negro Experimental Theatre.  Anderson was also a playwright who wrote under the pseudonym Ursula or Ursala Trelling.  Her work included Climbing Jacob’s Ladder (1931) and Underground (1932).

She is quoted as saying in 1981: “It gives me a great deal of personal satisfaction to have lived to see much of what we and other pioneers worked to achieve becoming a reality. However, we need more and more opportunities for our actors, writers, and directors.” Anderson died in 1993 in New York. –Heidi Durrow

Mixed Experience History Month is the annual blog post series created by The New York Times best-selling author Heidi Durrow celebrating the history of the Mixed experience. Established in 2007, Mixed Experience History Month is an effort to highlight the long history of folks and events involved in the Mixed experience.  Please look for archived profiles of people, places and events of the Mixed experience every weekday of May!  Thanks for reading.  And check out some of the previous year’s profiles: 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012,  2013, 2014, 2015.

Filed Under: Mixed Experience History Month Tagged With: biracial, biracial artists, growing up biracial, heidi durrow, mixed experience, mixed experience history month, mixed race history, mixed roots, multiracial

Mixed Experience History Month 2016: Samuel Cornish, journalist and religious leader

May 17, 2016 by admin Leave a Comment

mixed race historySamuel Cornish (1795-1858) was born to free parents of mixed race.

Cornish was ordained in 1822 and established the first black Presbyterian church in New York City.

He was an editor of Freedom’s Journal, the first black owned and operated newspaper in the country.  In 1833, he became one of the founding memebers of the interracial American Anti-Slavery Society.  Cornish died in 1858.-Heidi Durrow

Mixed Experience History Month is the annual blog post series created by The New York Times best-selling author Heidi Durrow celebrating the history of the Mixed experience. Established in 2007, Mixed Experience History Month is an effort to highlight the long history of folks and events involved in the Mixed experience.  Please look for archived profiles of people, places and events of the Mixed experience every weekday of May!  Thanks for reading.  And check out some of the previous year’s profiles: 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012,  2013, 2014, 2015.

Filed Under: Mixed Experience History Month Tagged With: biracial, heidi durrow, mixed experience, mixed race history, mixed remixed, multiracial

Mixed Experience History Month 2016

May 2, 2016 by admin 1 Comment

mehm16 LarsenIt’s May and so our celebration of Mixed Experience History Month begins!

This the 10th year I’ve written this series and I have managed to find some really wonderful stories I hope you’ll enjoy.

I established Mixed Experience History Month in 2007 on my personal blog Light-skinned-ed Girl as a way of claiming a history and a voice that I felt had been denied me.

Part of the difficulty of claiming one’s identity in the Mixed experience is that we have no history.  Our stories have been written out of the texts to conform to what society has allowed us to say about our racial identities.  And usually that has either silenced our experience and/or simplified them.

It’s easy to celebrate Mixed Experience History Month!  Just follow along with the posts I’ll make each weekday in May profiling historical figures and events that relate to the Mixed experience.  This year I will be posting the blog profiles on my website The Mixed Experience in their entirety and in part on my personal blog with a click through link.

If you have ideas of people I should profile please email me at heidi(at)heidiwdurrow.com.  And remember this is history so I’m only looking for people to profile who have passed away!  P.S. Anybody know who this year’s badge features?–Heidi Durrow

Mixed Experience History Month is the annual blog post series created by The New York Times best-selling author Heidi Durrow celebrating the history of the Mixed experience. Established in 2007, Mixed Experience History Month is an effort to highlight the long history of folks and events involved in the Mixed experience.  Please look for archived profiles of people, places and events of the Mixed experience every weekday of May!  Thanks for reading.  And check out some of the previous year’s profiles: 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012,  2013, 2014, 2015.

Filed Under: Mixed Experience History Month Tagged With: biracial, growing up biracial, mixed, mixed experience, mixed experience history month, mixed race artists, mixed race history

Mixed Experience History Month 2015: Wifredo Lam, painter

May 18, 2015 by admin Leave a Comment

mehm15_wifredo_lamPainter Wifredo Lam (1902-1982) was born in Cuba, the son of a Spanish/black mother and a Chinese father.  Trained as an academic realist, Lam’s art evolved to include modern aspects after his introduction to the work of Picasso and Matisse in Spain.

Picasso was a good friend to Lam and also a great influence.  But after living in Europe for many years, Lam returned to Cuba in 1942 where he reconnected with his Afro-Cuban background and transformed his work yet again.  Lam’s masterwork is The Jungle, often compared to in achievement, and once hung by, Picasso’s Guernica.

Of his art Lam once said: “… With all my energy I sought to paint the drama of my country, but most of all to lend expression to the spirit of Negro man, the beauty of Negro plastic art…”-Heidi Durrow

 

Mixed Experience History Month is the annual blog post series created by The New York Times best-selling author Heidi Durrow celebrating the history of the Mixed experience. Established in 2007, Mixed Experience History Month is an effort to highlight the long history of folks and events involved in the Mixed experience.  Please look for archived profiles of people, places and events of the Mixed experience every weekday of May at Lightskinned-ed Girl, the blog!  Thanks for reading.  And check out some of the previous year’s profiles: 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012,  2013, 2014. Copyright 2015.

Filed Under: Mixed Experience History Month Tagged With: biracial, biracial artists, growing up biracial, mixed experience history month, mixed race artists, mixed race history, multiracial, multiracial artists, wifredo lam

« Previous Page

Host Heidi Durrow

Host Heidi Durrow

Heidi Durrow is the New York Times best-selling writer of The Girl Who Fell From the Sky and the founder of the original mixed roots film and book festival and now the founder of Mixed Remixed Festival , an annual film, book and performance festival, which will be held next on June 10-11, 2016 at … [Read More]

Recent Posts

  • Season 5, Episode 3: Award-Winning Writer Amina Gautier November 14, 2017
  • Season 5, Episode 2: New York Times Bestselling Writer Julie Lythcott-Haims October 12, 2017
  • Season 4, Episode 19: Writer/Literary Critic Janet Savage July 3, 2017
  • Mixed Experience History Month 2017: Paula Gunn Allen, writer and scholar May 17, 2017
  • Mixed Experience History Month 2017: Gertrude Simmons Bonnin, Educator & Activist May 16, 2017

The Mixed Experience Minute Vlog

the mixed experience by heidi durrow

The Mixed Experience Minute

In 2007, I instituted Mixed Experience History Month to celebrate historical stories of the Mixed … [Read More...]

Guest Host Jennifer Frappier

Guest Host Jennifer Frappier

I'm so excited that Jennifer Frappier will join The Mixed Experience as a guest host on future … [Read More...]

Podcast Episodes

the mixed experience by heidi durrow

The Mixed Experience Podcast

You can find all episodes and information about guests of The Mixed Experience podcast here and also … [Read More...]

Copyright © 2025 · Foodie Child Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in