"More Than 'Mixed': Strengthening the Spectrum of Multi-Cultural Realities"


Multiethnic Interracial Smith College (MISC) is hosting the Sixth Annual 
Pan-Collegiate Conference on the Mixed Race Experience on the weekend of 
April 5-7, 2002 in Northampton, Massachusetts.  As the title suggests, we 
hope to give insight into some of the intricacies of various mixed-race 
experiences and broaden the scope of those experiences.  With speakers, 
participants, performers, and presenters from various backgrounds, age 
groups, fields, and communities, this yearís conference promises to be one 
of great import.  Our keynote speaker is biracial actor and writer Amy Hill. 
  Along with Hill, professors and students from a number of colleges and 
universities will present on various topics, including queer and multiracial 
youth culture, and running student organizations.

Opening the conference on Friday evening is Smith College 1992 alumnae, 
Maura Nguyen Donohue's dance troupe, In Mixed Company. They will perform 
their innovative dance piece "BOTH" meant to challenge the 'either/or' 
notions of identity politics and to reveal women as both powerful and 
beautiful. Joining us from University of Puget Sound is Jolie Harris 
presenting groundbreaking research through her thesis on multiracial queer 
youth. Professor Carolyn Powell is a Smith College lecturer in Afro-American 
Studies who will be highlighting the main themes of her popular seminar on 
"passing" and mixed-race families.

In addition to our workshops and speakers, we are integrating a leadership 
component to the conference. MISC would like to aid other mixed-race 
organizations in creating a strong foundation, from which groups may grow, 
and provide information on starting an organization for campuses without 
them.   Building a strong network of organizations on campuses across the 
country is the ultimate goal for this aspect of the conference.

Our panel on leadership within the mixed race community is being lead by 
Jen Chau, the founder Wellesley College's Fusion and more recently Swirl Inc.  
Chau will be introducing us into the post-college world of the mixed-race 
community and why it is important to stay active. Also on the panel is 
Zebulon Miletsky, an Afro-American Studies doctoral student at the 
University of Massachusetts at Amherst working on his dissertation.  
Miletsky's dissertation focuses on the mixed-race elite blacks in Boston at 
the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries up to the present day 
biracial consciousness that is now emerging. Andreana Clay a University of 
California at Davis graduate student will be addressing research on 
mixed-race peoples, and presenting her work on mixed women with white 
mothers, and its implications on body image.

Carrying on with MISC's partnership with the New England Bone Marrow Donor 
Program we have program coordinator CarolAnn Baldwin. Baldwin has spent
many years trying to increase the numbers of minority and mixed donors on
the national registry, and she will be sharing with us the importance of 
volunteering and information on how to set up a drive in your area. Tamra 
Bates is an amazing resource to the Smith College community as the Student 
Activities Coordinator, as an insider in the world of colleges and 
universities she will share with us the secrets of starting and maintaining 
a viable student organization.

Please join Smith College MISC in the annual conference and in building 
lasting working relationships across campuses.