Raciolinguistic Ideologies in Multiracial Heritage Speakers and the Denial of Racial Authenticity

Abstract

This study examines the role raciolinguistic ideologies play in the racial exclusion and denial ofracial authenticity of one-white parent mixed-race individuals through the qualitative sociolinguistic and discourse analysis of three interviews. The findings show how monoglossic, essentialist, and monoracist ideologies deny multiracial heritage speakers’ claims to racial authenticity through constant racial invalidation and contestation. First, results demonstrate how monoglossic notions of a ‘perfect speaker’, ‘language purity’, and ‘proper’ education for proficiency deny them access to their racial identities. Second, findings demonstrate how the porosity of MHRSs’ ‘ambiguous’ racial ascriptions result in failed racial reductivity. Lastly, they show how the reinforcement of monoracial identities grounded in monoracist principles result in mixed-race guilt, exclusion, and the need to prove racial legitimacy. The importance of this study lies in the clear implications and consequences that connections of race and language ideologies have for multiracial individuals and their sociolinguistic identities.