Multiracial

Last week a federal government task force of officials from 30 agencies gathered to recommend how Americans will fill out census forms in the year 2000. Task force members came, they saw, they recommended.What they proposed was that when Americans of mixed race fill out census forms, they simply check off as many races as apply. Tiger Woods, he of the god-awful "Cablinasian" moniker to describe his ancestry going back to his great-grandparents, would simply check off Caucasian, black, Native American and Asian.

The multiracial five-piece band Black Kids, which has an affinity for '80s British rock, is something of a sensation in Europe. There, the band has ascended the charts, packed venues and secured prime TV spots. And in the United States, the critical praise is deafening. Of course, the musicians didn't expect all the buzz. Music bloggers and hipster circles gush over the group's tongue-in-cheek multicultural image and the irreverent neon pop-rock of its debut CD, Partie Traumatic. The album has been out for about a month, and the scruffy band from Jacksonville, Fla., is already tired of hearing about itself.

MICHAEL JOHNSON sat amid the paint cans and stepladders, his blue T-shirt and plaid shorts indicating he was ready for some serious work. Only the inscription he wore on his cap revealed his mission: "a celebration of black cinema."Johnson and several other workers were busy renovating the theater formerly known as the Parkway, at the corner of North Avenue and Charles Street. As he ascended the stairs to the second level, he explained how a cadre of "family, friends and volunteers" had taken up six layers of carpet.

When Vicky Key looks at Barack Obama, she sees someone like her - not black, not white, but mixed. "I feel for him," says Key, 20, a sophomore at the University of Maryland, College Park, where she is active in the Multiracial and Biracial Student Association. "Because of being mixed, the issue comes up of if he is trying to be black or white. I face that challenge every day. People look at you and judge you by how you look." As products of mixed-race marriages, Obama and Key are in a what appears to be a fast-growing segment of the American population.

Julie Kershaw refused to label her 6-year-old daughter "black" or "white" when she registered the girl at McCormick Elementary School in eastern Baltimore County last week.So, in what some say has become an uncomfortable rite for multiracial families nationwide, officials chose for her -- labeling Sa'sha Rogers-Kershaw as "white," to the displeasure of her parents."She knows she's black and white. She's proud of who she is," Kershaw, who is white, said of her daughter. "Her father and I are not together but he agrees with me. Neither one of us wants to drop part of her ethnicity."

IT WAS inevitable that a country founded on the ideal of equality would nourish a comforting vision of itself as a melting pot. It was equally predictable that the obstacles standing in the way of a true melting pot -- from the destructive influences of racism to the devotion of ethnic groups to long-held traditions -- would make the task difficult. Yet the great strength of this country's people has been their ability to rise to meet these challenges generation after generation.One such challenge -- whether to allow Americans to designate themselves as multiracial for Census purposes -- may seem a relatively minor one. But its implications and emotional resonance are far-reaching.

WASHINGTON -- In a modest gesture to the nation's fast-growing multiracial population, the Clinton administration is proposing that Americans be allowed to check more than one box when asked to list their race on census and other federal forms.But the administration has decided against creating a multiracial classification. And it intends to continue to count Hispanics in a way that makes it impossible to tabulate how many are half-Latino, for instance.Such issues might sound arcane, but they are of enormous importance to multiracial, multiethnic people -- and to minority groups -- as the government readies its once-every-10-years census in 2000.

THREE YEARS after the end of its apartheid rule, South Africa's National Party is at a turning point. Its efforts to forge a coalition opposed to Nelson Mandela's African National Congress have failed. Meanwhile, the party is on the verge of self-destruction. It cannot make up its mind about whether it should become a multiracial political organization or continue as the domain of white Afrikaners.Former President F. W. de Klerk still wants to organize a new, broad-based, multi-cultural alliance as an alternative to ANC. But he is against opening the ranks of the National Party to all prospective members, regardless of race.

BOSTON -- Cody Jones will patiently explain to friends that he's the son of a white mother and black father. But with all the world-weariness that a 15-year-old can muster, he'll sigh, "You are what people think you are," a fact that makes him identify more with his father. Now meet his sister, Julia Jones, who is less constrained by age-old codes of racial classifications that once compelled people with even one drop of black blood to call themselves black. When people want to know her racial background, she tells them she's black, white and Native American.

State House gathering of grocers denounces dairy price supportsGrocery representatives gathered in front of the State House yesterday to denounce a dairy price-support bill that they argue will drive up the cost of milk.The effort to have Maryland join the Northeast Interstate Dairy Compact is being heavily lobbied by grocery chains on one side and dairy farmers on the other. A Senate committee rejected the bill last month, but has indicated it may reconsider.Farmers say they could lose business to nearby states if the legislature fails to act. But grocers yesterday called the bill a tax on a basic commodity.

I look forward confidently to the day when all who work for a living will be one, with no thought to their separateness as Negroes, Jews, Italians or any other distinctions. - the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Dec. 11, 1961 Tom Watson, memorialized with a statue on the grounds of the Georgia State Capitol, is remembered for a virulent racism that denigrated Catholics, demonized Jews and lauded a Ku Klux Klan that would terrorize former slaves. But Mr. Watson didn't start his political career as a hatemonger.

If newspaper headlines were the sole arbiter of what is important, then modern Ireland would be known primarily for two reasons: the "Troubles" in the North - the eternal feud between Irish nationalists and the local, pro-British Protestant majority - and the extraordinary growth over the past 10 years of its "Celtic Tiger" economy. But there is a third development, no less significant. Ireland in the 21st century is becoming multiracial and multicultural. Membership in the European Union (EU)

WASHINGTON - I guess all of that national unity and good feeling that followed the tragedies of Sept. 11 was just too good to last. A planned memorial to honor the 343 firefighters who died at the World Trade Center has sparked a firestorm of its own. Let's just say that some people don't like the way it re-colors history. The proposed 19-foot bronze statue is based on the now-famous news photo of three firemen raising an American flag over the rubble at Ground Zero. Except, instead of the three firemen in the photo, who are all white, the statue depicts one white, one black and one Hispanic.

BOSTON -- Cody Jones will patiently explain to friends that he's the son of a white mother and black father. But with all the world-weariness that a 15-year-old can muster, he'll sigh, "You are what people think you are," a fact that makes him identify more with his father. Now meet his sister, Julia Jones, who is less constrained by age-old codes of racial classifications that once compelled people with even one drop of black blood to call themselves black. When people want to know her racial background, she tells them she's black, white and Native American.

MICHAEL JOHNSON sat amid the paint cans and stepladders, his blue T-shirt and plaid shorts indicating he was ready for some serious work. Only the inscription he wore on his cap revealed his mission: "a celebration of black cinema."Johnson and several other workers were busy renovating the theater formerly known as the Parkway, at the corner of North Avenue and Charles Street. As he ascended the stairs to the second level, he explained how a cadre of "family, friends and volunteers" had taken up six layers of carpet.

State House gathering of grocers denounces dairy price supportsGrocery representatives gathered in front of the State House yesterday to denounce a dairy price-support bill that they argue will drive up the cost of milk.The effort to have Maryland join the Northeast Interstate Dairy Compact is being heavily lobbied by grocery chains on one side and dairy farmers on the other. A Senate committee rejected the bill last month, but has indicated it may reconsider.Farmers say they could lose business to nearby states if the legislature fails to act. But grocers yesterday called the bill a tax on a basic commodity.

CHICAGO -- Will the U.S. census form find a place for Tiger Woods in 2000?Will it force him to identify himself as black or Asian or white or American Indian, when in reality he is all of the above? Or will he have to check "other" on the census questionnaire, whatever that means?Mr. Woods is one-fourth Thai, one-fourth Chinese, one-fourth black, one-eighth white and one-eighth Native American. Although he is widely hailed as an African-American pioneer and a role model for black kids, he says he doesn't want to deny his maternal heritage and be labeled just black.

WASHINGTON -- The Clinton administration announced yesterday it will allow mixed-race Americans for the first time to check off more than one racial category for themselves on the 2000 census.After four years of heated cultural debate, the new policy is intended to permit a growing number of mixed-race Americans to acknowledge their varied heritage.The government's new vision of racial identification ultimately will apply to every kind of federal data collection, from the census to annual household surveys conducted by the government, school registration forms and home mortgage applications.

WASHINGTON -- The Clinton administration announced yesterday it will allow mixed-race Americans for the first time to check off more than one racial category for themselves on the 2000 census.After four years of heated cultural debate, the new policy is intended to permit a growing number of mixed-race Americans to acknowledge their varied heritage.The government's new vision of racial identification ultimately will apply to every kind of federal data collection, from the census to annual household surveys conducted by the government, school registration forms and home mortgage applications.

WASHINGTON -- An enormous number of people -- perhaps you -- are descended, albeit very indirectly, from Charlemagne.And an enormous number are descended from Charlemagne's groom.Trace your pedigree back far enough, you may find that you are an omelet of surprising ingredients.Booker T. Washington, Frederick Douglass, Jesse Owens and Roy Campanella each had a white parent. Martin Luther King (who had an Irish grandmother, and some Indian ancestry), W.E.B. Du Bois and Malcolm X had some Caucasian ancestry.