The Triumph of Bi-Racial Identity

Abstract

This chapter utilises an autobiographical and creative approach that links cultural history to the education children receive in the classroom. I present a narrative account of my personal story as a child of mixed racial identity as well as mixed cultural identity to explicate the range of emotions, the expanse of experiences evoked by racial hostility and the child's response as he navigates this landscape and journey towards making sense of these experiences in the shaping of his identity. This chapter is grounded in funds of knowledge theory, identity theory and culturally relevant theory. The process of the building and resulting production of my own funds of knowledge challenge the validity of the traditional Eurocentric Western epistemologies that shaped the education I received in the British classrooms of my youth. From this investigation, I have come to the conclusion that bi-racial children have the benefit of a rich, three-dimensional, dual heritage which provides a much-needed emotional foundation that allows them to thrive even within hostile settings. Teachers face the challenge of recognising, acknowledging and tapping into this gourd of cultural capital and effectively using it to heighten students' performance and guide them on the path to academic achievement.