Mexican WhiteBoy

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. Poet Charif Shanahan, who is the son of an Irish-American father and a Moroccan mother, has called growing up multiracial in America an experience that was rife with “instability.” He explains in this PBS News Hour article: “Instability is the word because there are different ways my body will be read and interpreted depending on who’s looking. . . This creates all sorts of interesting tensions and moments, in a very personal kind of way, of folks being confused, thinking they understand and not understanding.” Consider what Shanahan is saying about the experience of multiracial people in America. Unpack the meaning(s) of what it might mean that his body is being “read” by people, and discuss what he means by “interesting tensions and moments” and “thinking they understand and not understanding,” in terms of what it means to have a multiracial identity. 

Teaching Suggestion: Students may share their own personal stories of being multiracial and how they relate to the Shanahan quote. You may also elect to analyze this quotation closely and guide a larger conversation on multiracial identity and how it affects self-development.