serendipityoucity

Outside- white in winter, prominent cheekbones and skin that turns golden brown in summer. Inside - Algonquin, Irish, Scottish and French, and who knows what else no one talks about! Space and time - a decade in Quebec, a decade in Ontario, a decade in Asia and a decade in a bunch of places. Languages, French; English with some Japanese and a generous spattering of international swear words. What do you - an outer casing that determines how people react to you while the internal consists of a complex biological composition associated with some cultural inheritance, geocultural social construction and the embedding of the norms and values from myriad interactions.

Grandma married white so no Indian Status (just the baggage!), grandpa gets me an Irish passport (never set foot there), birth place got me a Canadian one but I really want a Japanese one!

Hybrids have no real membership claims and are often excluded (e.g. Métis) by the so called pure, cultured or those who look or who claim a particular identity.  Hybrids are the result of pluralism, cross-polination, anti-racism, modernity, and globalization, they are often beyond tribalism and question ethnic nationalism or identity based cliques!  They also live on the edges of multiple identities and build bridges.

What benefits would DNA testing bring me?

Last September I read - Blood Feud - about the Freedmen’s quest for aboriginal identity claims. They want to demonstrate historical and genetic membership to the Five Civilized Tribes of Oklahoma (the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole) who are currently loaded with Casino booty.  When tribes were poor membership was cheap now that there are loot claims a bunch are out! The Freedmen were slaves of the Cherokee, freed in an 1866 emancipation treaty and below is how they look!

Naga Faces

This morning I read an article in the NYTimes - The DNA Age.  People are using DNA testing to qualify for affirmative action programs!  Suddenly externally white privileged middle class folks want to prove African, Aboriginal or Jewish ancestry to claim some booty:

One Christian is using the test to claim Jewish genetic ancestry and to demand Israeli citizenship, and Americans of every shade are staking a DNA claim to Indian scholarships, health services and casino money.

Ok, so… 

• Suddenly being an ethno cultural visible minority is meritous if your white?
• Those with outside white shell privileges are claiming the small gains fought for by the externally coloured marginalized? 
• Affirmative action was a remedy for the marginalized and now the white shelled folks want in!
• The historically marginalized aboriginals with loot are excluding their once were slaves?
• Freedmen minorities need DNA to re-claim their marginalized aboriginal membership?
• Black African Americans are using DNA to claim ancestral European inheritances. 

The Nagas, Penan, Ainu, and Tibetans for the moment rely on folklore & narrative combined with scattered archived documents to claim territory and identity. Could they use DNA testing to scientifically demonstrate difference from their oppressors and regain territorial & cultural claims?

What defines membership - culture, external appearances, internal DNA, history, geography?

Who decides and what is the right data?

What % of what will get you in?

Will there be rules on the combinations?

And who owns, regulates, and pays for the DNA mapping companies?

DNA tests will soon become the data to challenge socially constructed constitutions & censuses & personal identities.

Hmmm! Ireland gives me citizenship, the Canadian constitution excludes me from my Algonquin ancestry, in the winter I am white in the summer Indian and in the end I just wanna have straight black hair, wear kimono fabrics, eat sushi & drink umeshu! Would identity science DNA get me what I want?