Photo by Emily Brunner
Karabi Acharya is the author of the new book Multitudes: The Multiracial Experience and How to Forge a Culture of Absolute Belonging. She is also a public health anthropologist and a senior director at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
Q: What inspired you to write Multitudes, and how was the book's title chosen?
A: Multiracial people are the fastest growing demographic group in the US and yet we are largely invisible. We barely exist in research and data, and the census is only just beginning to catch up to our demographics and needs. I wanted to make the Multiracial experience visible as a first step to building a more inclusive society.
Personally, I wrote Multitudes because I had lots of questions about being Multiracial in America and I couldn’t find anyone else answering those questions.
Why is our society, our culture and our systems, so uncomfortable and threatened by mixtures? And how do I navigate that discomfort and erasure in a way that allows me to feel whole?
The title is inspired by Whitman’s "Song of Myself," which is about embracing the complexity, contradictions and multiplicity of ourselves.
Q: The journalist Soledad O'Brien said of the book, “The isolation that Multiracial Americans carry is not just emotional. It is measurable. As a journalist, I know how rarely that story gets told with this kind of rigor and care. As someone who lives it, I know how much it matters.” What do you think of that assessment, and what are some of the ways in which that isolation manifests itself?
A: The isolation that Multiracial people experience shows up in many ways. Many Multiracial people are rejected from all their racial groups leaving them without spaces to cope with racial harms. Sometimes family members discriminate or other Multiracial relatives. Without a community, without language, Multiracial people look into mirrors to see empty spaces.
For these reasons (among others) Multiracial people are at a higher risk of isolation compared to monoracial people. For me, personally, it often feels that I am transparent, fluid, and untethered.
Q: How did you research the book, and did you learn anything that especially surprised you?
A: I developed this book in a few ways, each one informing the other. I reflected on my own life experiences and my growing awareness of my Multiracial identity.
I interviewed over 30 Multiracial people. I read memoirs, essays, and social media by Multiracial people. As different issues came to the forefront, I dived into the academic literature, crossing many disciplinary boundaries from public health to psychology to history.
There were many surprises in writing the book and I’ll name two of them. One of the biggest surprises was how much my experience was often not just similar, but identical, to the Multiracial people I interviewed. All my life, I had thought I was alone.
I was also surprised by my blind spots. I was so focused on fitting in that I literally could not see ways to achieve a sense of belonging that were right in front of me.
Q: What impact did it have on you to write this book, and what do you hope readers take away from it?
A: My greatest hope is that Multiracial readers will see some of their experiences reflected back and that the book will bring the Multiracial experience into our conversations and advocacy for racial justice.
The future is Multiracial and we all need to work to change our culture and systems to harness the power and potential of that reality. I hope readers can see the connections between our individual actions and the potential for transformative systemic change.
As far as the impact of writing the book on me… it will take me a long time to fully understand that. Writing the book allowed me to see myself in ways that have eluded me all my life.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: This was a passion project that I did in my free time. I continue to do my day job in public health philanthropy, working to achieve health equity through global learning and engagement.
Now that the book is complete, I find the amnesia of the process to be a bit like childbirth—that wasn’t so bad, let’s do it again! So maybe there’s another book in me yet.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: I want this book to provoke thinking and conversation and disagreement. I hope readers will write all over it, share their own versions of these stories, and even throw it across the room when something feels wrong. Nothing would make me happier than to see photos of the book with scribbles and sticky notes all over it.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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