The Tempest Archives - Mixed Remixed Festival

In My Experience, Monoracial Topics Receive More Attention than Multiracial Topics in Writing

October 12, 2016 by Maya Williams

I would like to make something clear: monoracial people of color are just as valid as multiracial people of color. Therefore, this piece is not to pit one group of people against another group of people.

Another fantastic thing to love about Mixed Remixed is how inclusive they are to various facets of identity, and, yes, that means people who identify as one race are just as welcome to the dialogue often presented.

Monoracial people of color are just as valid as multiracial people of color.

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This piece is to simply let you in on a perspective on content that you haven’t thought of before.

So, without further ado:

I have been blessed to write on platforms such as Mixed Remixed and The Tempest about my identity, and the many parts of my identity. Because I have that freedom, I have written about pieces where I mostly identified as mixed, and where I mostly identified as black.

There is one particular piece that made me realize about how more people are willing to give their readership to topics on monoracial identity rather than multiracial identity.

I have written about pieces where I mostly identified as mixed, and where I mostly identified as black.

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I wrote a piece about depression, the black community, and how, as a black person, it shouldn’t be taboo for me to talk about my experiences with anxiety and depression anymore. As a black person, I am allowed to view therapy just as valid as prayer and other spiritual practices.

There have been experiences where my mixed race identity played a role in my depression, such as seeking the best friendship groups for me without being deemed as betraying specific racial groups by doing so, or trying to figure out whether or not it was even okay for a generationally mixed person to identify as mixed.

However, white family members have been more open to talk about depression, although there have been times where it was popular to use euphemisms for depression such as “tired” or “sick,” more so than my black family members.

I didn’t have the courage to talk about my depression with my black family members growing up, because a lot of my black family members didn’t believe mental health issues were real, and they didn’t believe mental health professionals could be trusted.

It made sense for me to put that particular piece in a context about my blackness and the black community.

And I’m glad that I was placed in a position to publish that piece where I knew people would read it, and that enough people read it so that more conversations about people of color, mental health, and religion, can be had.

It made sense for me to put that particular piece in a context about my blackness

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This piece crashed The Tempest’s site three times, I have received dozens of tweets and messages of great feedback about it, and an editor from The Huffington Post even reached out to me.

However, I can’t help but think that if it were a piece that focused mostly on mixed race identity and depression, people wouldn’t have been as receptive.

This piece, and my piece on being black in a predominantly white missions culture, has more page views than any of my other pieces on mixed race identity combined. I had even mentioned being mixed race and being depressed in other pieces.

When I pitched a piece about mixed race identity to The Huffington Post, the same people who reached out to me about my piece about being black and having depression, before reaching out to The Tempest, they never got back to me.

I had even mentioned being mixed race and being depressed in other pieces.

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I am very proud of myself for writing and publishing my piece about depression. It needed to be written, and it needed to be read. It’s just interesting to me that certain things about it haven’t been acknowledged.

With more and more people identifying as multiracial, more experiences will be documented, more people will be willing to speak up, and more topics will come to the surface when it comes to multiracial experiences. It’s just going to take forever to get to that point, and as hard as I try, patience is still not one of my strongest virtues when it comes to things like that.

Nevertheless, I’m not just going to write on one topic about myself, and I’m not going to try to force certain topics about myself out of myself either. It doesn’t make my writing genuine, and it doesn’t make my writing as great as it can be.

It’s just interesting to me that certain things about it haven’t been acknowledged.

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And I still want to question and analyze why certain topics have more readership and attention than others. I still want to know what people are willing and unwilling to talk about.

I’m certain the piece I have mentioned one too many times won’t be the last piece where I wonder about where people are.

Maya Williams, Mixed Remixed Blogger

How Mixed Remixed Led Me to The Tempest

September 28, 2016 by Maya Williams

The Tempest is an online editorial with over a two hundred thousand user following that caters to creating an open space for diverse millennial women. It was originally a faith based editorial site called Coming of Faith for Muslim women, and then, they decided to expand it so that a wider range of women could tell their stories.

About a month before I attended the Mixed Remixed Festival for the first time as a panelist, I became a contributor for The Tempest. I first started out as a contributor, than an editorial fellow, and now I edit for their Race section, while also writing one piece a week.

A little bit after school let out, I decided to submit my pieces to other online forums. I have been published on the AltFem Magazine site, and I was an intern with The Black Sheep Articles and got to publish pieces on their site. However, I wanted to showcase my work where I knew I could reach a wider range of people.

Moreover, I only talked about being mixed race on my personal blog as far as online content goes. Because of the Mixed Remixed Festival’s encouragement for me to keep writing and to spread my writing to other places, I wanted to make sure I talked about being mixed race on other online platforms.

I wanted to make sure I talked about being mixed race on other online platforms.

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I spent the next couple of weeks submitting essays and poems about my experiences to various websites. I even submitted a piece to the Huffington Post’s submission page, and, obviously, I never heard a response back.

To this day, I keep thinking that it was because mixed race identities placed into a binary tend to get more views than other mixed race identities. I could be wrong, but it doesn’t stop me from thinking about that from time to time.

I remember really enjoying a couple of articles that were published on The Tempest, so I decided to submit an article about the struggles of explaining my racial identity as a second generation mixed race woman.

Next week, I got a response from them, and it was the first time someone actually responded back to me that wasn’t an automatic rejection email.

They actually wanted my piece on their site!

It was the first time someone actually responded back to me that wasn’t an automatic rejection email.

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I got to work on my piece some more with the Race and Politics editor of The Tempest, Asma Elgamal, so that I could make it more personable and write about the things that pissed me off the most when it came to feeling obligated to explain myself as mixed race woman.

After that piece went live, I began to send Asma more pitches about mixed race representation in the Roots miniseries on the History Channel, the show Recovery Road, The Tonys, and even some of my favorite books.

Because of how often I sent pieces to her, she asked me if I wanted to become an Editorial Fellow, so that I could publish pieces on the site five times a week, and write for other sections besides the Race section.

I said yes right off the bat. I was that excited!

Being an editorial fellow for The Tempest gave me a platform to talk about what it meant for me to be mixed race in various contexts. I didn’t always write pieces about multiraciality, but when I did, it was a great way to receive feedback from others who either didn’t know that that’s what some mixed women experienced, or was able to relate to it if they identified as mixed.

The Tempest gave me a platform to talk about what it meant for me to be mixed race in various contexts.

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Also, even if the piece isn’t strictly about multiraciality, being able to include that about myself a little bit in an article, whether the topic is not mainly about race, or <a href=”http://thetempest.co/2016/07/18/culture-taste/culture/i-dont-need-to-pray-about-it-i-need-to-go-to-therapy/”I’m writing about one of my races over another</a? because the piece calls for it to do so, means so much to me.

Having my face on their site for others to see a mixed race writer means so much to me.

A bit before my fellowship came to an end, Laila Alawa, chief editor and the founder of The Tempest, decided to contact me about a position to work with Asma as the Race editor for the site.

I wasn’t even thinking that could be a possibility in my future with The Tempest. I thought I would be a contributor again once my fellowship ended.

Having my face on their site for others to see a mixed race writer means so much to me.

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Receiving the opportunity to help women craft their stories about their racial background, and being a face that stands out in the list of staff who were predominantly Middle Eastern and South Asian Muslim women is not an opportunity that is just handed to anyone. It takes a lot of time and a lot of effort to get to that place.

It was nice to see that the amount of effort I have put into The Tempest was being noticed to the point of becoming a staff member for their site.

It is such a great online community of women. The fellows, the staff, all the women are so open. Such a diverse of fellows and contributors work hard on The Tempest, and I am proud to continue to be a part of this safe place.

Maya Williams, Blogger for The Mixed Remixed Festival

How Mixed Remixed has Helped Me on My Mixed Journey and My Writing Journey

September 14, 2016 by Maya Williams

Growing up, I was raised in a home where I was allowed to process what it meant for me to be mixed; especially since a mixed race single mother has primarily raised me. However, I haven’t seen a lot of representation of mixed race people in the sense of being generationally mixed, and I haven’t seen a lot of spaces where people can process their mixedness outside of their households.

I related and didn’t relate at the same time to articles, and popular TV and film characters that identified as biracial due to having monoracial parents of different races. Other than through poetry, I didn’t know how to externally process how difficult it has been for me to engage in conversations about racial identity as someone who identifies as generationally multiracial.

I haven’t seen a lot of representation of mixed race people in the sense of being generationally mixed, and I haven’t seen a lot of spaces where people can process their mixedness outside of their households.

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From left to right, my sister Danielle, me, and my sister JC

After reading an article from Vox about things people needed to know about being biracial, and noticing how one of the points included the inclusion for generationally mixed, I became excited, and started Googling more on the topic.

Two search pages over came a quote from Misty Copeland that was on the Mixed Remixed Festival’s site. I became even more ecstatic!

After reading through the festival’s celebrity quote page for a bit, I read more about the site. The Mixed Remixed festival prepared for a huge event every year catering to various multiracial people’s stories, interracial couples’ stories, and even transracial families’ stories; on that note, it was nice to see the word “transracial” used properly in a non-Rachel Dolezal context.

Whether you had mixed race children as a monoracial person, whether you were of two or more races, whether you were generationally mixed, you had a place there in person at the festival, and online on their social media platforms.

I followed them on Twitter and Facebook immediately.

I didn’t even think anyone from Mixed Remixed’s staff would respond to my tweets, either, but I’m so glad they did. I tweeted them asking if they were able to find articles about someone mixed similar to my mixed identity. I tweeted them thanking them for such an awesome platform. I tweeted them questions they asked about favorite movies that has mixed race characters, and other things along the lines of that.

What I did not expect to tweet at them was something from my blog.

I don’t remember if it was prose, a poem, or a short story, but I do remember tweeting something. And a bit afterwards, I got a tweet back from them that stated, “Keep writing!”

And I totally did.

I haven’t written things often about what it meant to be mixed race in my work until interacting with the Mixed Remixed Festival. A piece of writing that gained the most feedback was a poem I wrote about what dating is like for mixed race women, particularly for me as a mixed race woman. Not only was I still writing on my blog, but I also submitted my poems and short stories about mixed race experiences for my university’s publications, and those have been well received.

It pushed me to hone my writing that would make people discussed mixed race people and mixed race identity. It eventually encouraged me to participate in video projects, such as my university’s #ECUWithoutMe campaign, and the 100% Mixed Show’s #Mixstory campaign.

I haven’t written things often about what it meant to be mixed race in my work until interacting with the Mixed Remixed Festival.

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More and more people were starting to hear my story, and most people have actually given me positive feedback for it. It was so refreshing; I didn’t expect any of that to happen!

So, what was next?

I was unsure of whether or not I would get in, but I submitted an application to be a panelist at the Mixed Remixed Festival for June 2016. After I sent my application, I kept thinking, “Oh, I probably won’t be accepted. There are published, more successful writers who are on their panels, there’s no way they’re going to accept me.” I wasn’t a “real” writer, whatever that meant.

Whether I was going to be a panelist or not, I was still going to go. Whether I was going to be a panelist or not, I was not going to miss out on this opportunity.

I wasn’t a “real” writer, whatever that meant.

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Then, I started focusing my energy on applying for my summer internship with Hillside Missions. When I got accepted, I still didn’t know my starting date, but since I didn’t hear back from Mixed Remixed yet, I thought, “Hey, it shouldn’t be a big deal, I probably won’t be accepted as a panelist.”

“I’m not a ‘real’ writer.”

I assume you know where this is going.

March came along…and I got selected to be a panelist for the Mixed Millennials panel!

Ahhhhh!!!

That’s right! I was a real writer. No, I AM a real writer!

Wait…when was I starting my internship? Where was I going to stay? How was I going to get there? How long would I be able to stay?

As excited as I was to get that email, I had to email back to say that I needed a few days to gather everything before I sent a confirmation.

I contacted my internship’s office, and was able to start on time and attend the festival. I was able to stay with a cousin. Although I was going to pay for two online classes for the summer, I paid for one so that I could pay for my plane ticket. And although I was only able to make it for the second part of the festival so that I didn’t miss my sister’s graduation vacation, I was still able to be a panelist and experience what the festival was like.

Out of all the things that could have brought me to California for the first time, the Mixed Remixed Festival did that, and I am so glad and proud that it did.

Because the festival has helped me grow so much, I was able to become a writer for an online medium called The Tempest, and was able to write pieces about my mixed experiences.

I continue to find new ways to contribute pieces about being generationally mixed.

I have been able to focus my social work research on the mixed experience in my undergrad.

I intend to apply as a panelist and a spoken word performer for 2017’s Mixed Remixed Festival, and I am now a blogger for the Mixed Remixed Festival.

It has been such a blessing to be a part of a platform that has helped me grow and become more vocal as a Black, White, and Native American second generation mixed woman.

I’m looking forward to see what’s to happen next!

—Maya Williams, Blogger for the Festival

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