The Future of the 'Tan Generation'

Browner America: Marcia Alesan Dawkins says an increase in nonwhite births doesn't mean more social justice.

Courtesy of Marcia Alesan Dawkins




For the second in the series, The Root talked to Marcia Alesan Dawkins, visiting scholar at Brown University and author of the forthcoming Clearly Invisible: Racial Passing and the Color of Cultural Identity. She describes her extensive writing on racial identity as an expression of her interest in "how people figure out who they are and how they connect with others," and has warned against rushing to assume that demographic changes will do away with America's troubled racial past.

The Root: For the first time in U.S. history, most of the nation's babies are members of minority groups, and the census has forecast that non-Hispanic whites will be outnumbered in the United States by 2042. What might be the positive and negative effects of these changing demographics when it comes to issues affecting communities of color?

Marcia Alesan Dawkins: As with any demographic shift, there will be positive and negative outcomes we can anticipate. On the positive side, this new "tan generation" might have a broader and more progressive view of social and political issues -- such as immigration reform, education reform and civil rights -- based on changing ideas about race and ethnicity. There will also be cultural changes, as there have been in recent years with changing definitions of who or what is an American, for example.

The increased numbers of people of color also represent a larger potential pool of candidates who will be eligible to run for political office and enter fields like law, technology and education -- or start new businesses aimed at meeting new needs -- where some changes can be enacted.

On the negative side, we must know now how many of these children are born into economically disadvantaged environments and make sure that proper reforms are enacted today to ensure equality of opportunity for the tan generation. In addition, we must account for a sharp rise in white-supremacist groups who feel that they are now acting on behalf of all white Americans as a besieged minority group.

