DNA Test Reveals I am not 100% White

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I am a huge fan of the website 23andme.com, which analyses your DNA.  I’ve learned a lot of interesting things from the site in terms of what my genes say about how i look (I likely have blue eyes and reddish-blonde hair!), what diseases I am likely to face (BRCA negative, but it looks bad for Restless Leg Syndrome), but the most interesting thing I’ve learned about myself has been about my heritage.

I was unsurprised to see that I was more Neanderthal than average, as that’s fairly common when you’re European.  But I was a little surprised to discover that I am not 100% European.  In fact, if I had been living in a lot of the Americas in the last 200 years, I wouldn’t have been considered white.

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In the colonial Americas — from Haiti to New Orleans to Spanish-America — race mixing was very common and, because they thought race mattered, they actually had specialized terms for those who were a certain percentage of different heritages.  I spent a lot of time researching some of the more obscure names for people of mixed-blood, to see if i could find one that got as distant as I appear to be from my nearest Sub-Saharan African ancestor (assuming it’s just one) — probably seven generations away, as I am at about 1/128th percentage.

It took a long time.  While it was easy to see that one of my great-grandparents would have had names for their percentage of African heritage, it was less clear whether I’d simply be considered fully white or just have had the one drop rule applied and been considered “Colored.”

My answer came from Haiti. In Haiti, they felt that people were made out of 128 parts, or 7 generations of heritage, and so they had the longest list of names for partial African descent.

      1. Myself 1/128 Sang-mêlé
      2. Parent 1/64 Also Sang-mêlé
      3. Grandparent 1/32 Mustefino, Quateronné, Demi-Meamolouc
      4. Great-Grandparent 1/16 Mustee, Meamolouc, Hexadecaroon, Quintroon
      5. 2x Great-Grandparent 1/8 Octoroon or Métis
      6. 3x Great Grandparent 1/4 Quadroon
      7. 4x Great Grandparent 1/2 Mulatto

harry-potter-et-le-prince-de-sang-mele
Per Haitian tradition, I am sang-mêlé, which literally translates as mixed blood.  The term is French and is used in the title of “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”.  I assume this means I am, in some metaphysical way, Snape.

Clearly I fail the one-drop rule, but it’s interesting to note how recently my family would not have been legally considered white even in relatively lax race laws.  A 1970 law in New Orleans stated that 1/32 African was enough to make you legally considered black.  Considering that my father’s mother is from New Orleans, if the heritage is from her (which seems as likely as from anyone) she would have been considered black.  One of my parents is as black, in terms of heritage, as Walter White, the civil rights activist who ran the NAACP for 25 years.

"I am a Negro. My skin is white, my eyes are blue, my hair is blonde. The traits of my race are nowhere visible upon me." - Walter White
“I am a Negro. My skin is white, my eyes are blue, my hair is blonde. The traits of my race are nowhere visible upon me.” – Walter White

All of which is to say that my father’s disownment of me for dating outside of my race is not only absurd on the face of it, but hypocritical and inaccurate as well.

I should point out, of course, that I was raised as white as one can be, and this DNA discovery doesn’t really offer any new particular insight into other people’s experiences nor would I claim it to.  It is interesting, but I am so very privileged in terms of race that I want to make sure I am clear that this in no way erases that privilege.  I may be “sang-mêlé” and I am happy to add this information to my personal narrative of myself, but in this culture I am the beneficiary of white culture.  That same culture makes me feel like I should do something meaningful with the information rather than just use it as part of some navel-gazing exercise, but I am unsure what that something could be.

On the one hand, it seems like the racial history of one-drop rule and Walter White’s example might make it a politically meaningful statement for a ginger of small-but-measurable African heritage to claim African-Americanness or even mixed race, on the other hand I feel like that’s claiming a position of oppression that I obviously have never and will never face.  I don’t know, I’m not sure there’s a correct answer, but it is the thought puzzle I’ve been given by my DNA.

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DNA Test Reveals I am not 100% White
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48 thoughts on “DNA Test Reveals I am not 100% White

  1. 1

    I’ve heard that, if you have any ancestors at all who lived in the south before 1800, the odds are enormous that you have African ancestors. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but it seems likely.

    Chopin’s “Desiree’s Baby” seems appropriate here.

  2. 3

    Doesn’t mitochondrial eve mean that every person on the planet has a drop? Of course the types to embrace the one drop rule are also prone to anti-intellectualism and pseudoscience, but reality continues to exhibit a liberal bias…

  3. 4

    @3: It’s not merely mitochondrial Eve that makes us “one drop black”. She was just representative of our particular species — who were indeed all black.

    When the final wave of homo sapiens migration occurred out of Africa, every single one of those people were black. The change in skin tone came later.

    When I first saw the headline, my immediate thought was “aren’t we all”? But then, I remembered Ashley’s difficulty with her father over this issue, and I understood why she might want to address it.

    I think MtE would probably be considered “too far back” by her father. (If he even acknowledges human evolution and migration at all.) But I wonder what he’ll feel when he learns that he’s “more black” than Ashley is? And that his mother probably had a relative she knew that “passed white”.

    1. 4.1

      But I wonder what he’ll feel when he learns that he’s “more black” than Ashley is? And that his mother probably had a relative she knew that “passed white”.

      Good point, MtE is much easier to discount than DNA and half of hers came from him. I could see debate over which parent actually brought the offending drop, but somehow doubt that her father would be willing to actually submit the DNA to find out…

  4. 6

    Bryan Sykes (Human Genetics prof., Univ. Oxford) has a small book–called Saxons, Vikings and Celts in the US–discussing his findings in surveying the DNA makeup of the British isles. He found unquestionably North African ancestry in individuals whose ancestry semed to go back to the first populations to swim onto the beach. So your (recent–not counting 100K years ago) sub-Saharan ancestors could have come by way of Europe or even the isles. If your New Orleans ancestor is Italian–well, there was a lot of traffic across the Mediterranean in classical antiquity. US racism is a conparatively recent invention.

    … it looks bad for Restless Leg Syndrome.

    The BRCA news is a relief, though. Mrs Corva has RLS and expresses sympathy, but she didn’t know there was a DNA marker for it. (Mrs C is a poster child for autoimmune conditions in general.)

    1. 6.1

      Unfortunately, they cannot test for all BRCA markers (hopefully the recent SCOTUS ruling will change this) but it is good at least that I don’t have the markers they can test for.

      I don’t appear to have Restless Leg Syndrome, but my odds of developing it are pretty high.

  5. 7

    I want to get one of these tests done so badly. I’m fascinated with what it might reveal, since my recorded family history only goes back about five generations.

  6. gg
    8

    They were giving them away about 6 months ago. I’m still kicking myself for not stocking up, I could have gotten 10! I am black and tested my brother. Imagine my surprise to find he carries the gene for Tay Sachs. If he’d married a nice Ashkenazi Jewish girl, a doctor wouldn’t have bothered to address Tay Sachs because he is black.

  7. 9

    All of which is to say that my father’s disownment of me for dating outside of my race

    Wow. I’m really sorry to hear that. I guess I got off easy… mine just told me never to marry her.

  8. 10

    Ever notice that the word “miscegenation”, the way it is spelled it seems to break up into MIS – CEGENATION, as if someone who miscegenated was “cegenating” wrong, or at least incorrectly? But actually, if you look at the etymology it really is just “miscere” (to mix) + “genus” (kind), with no implication that one is engaging in a mistake.

  9. K C
    11

    I just discovered the same thing, except my brother and I are 1/64! I’m excited but my brother probably won’t be. I simply told him we’re Vikings, which is 95% of our DNA.

    Several months ago while working on our family genealogy I looked at my father’s grandfather’s marriage license on the Mormon website and read that they were “colored”. For one whole day I danced around in glee thinking I was black but finally decided I was just following the wrong trail. Laws against intermarriage were strict back then and I’m still not sure how anyone in the South could make the leap from one identity to the other. Now I’m inclined to revisit that mistake.

    Thanks for the informative post.

  10. 12

    You may have discovered this already, but if you choose the “Chromosome View” in 23andMe’s Ancestry Composition, you can find out some more interesting things. For instance, if most of the African parts of your DNA show up in longer, contiguous chunks, that’s indicative of more recent ancestry in that area from a single person. If they’re tiny and dotted all over the place, that may mean more distant ancestry from multiple people.

    For instance, I’m Indian and 23andMe lists me as 99.7% South Asian, but I also have 0.1% East Asian ancestry, which shows up as one contiguous chunk on a single chromosome, which according to the math suggests a single East Asian ancestor maybe about 10 generations ago. I’m also 0.1% European, but those bits are tiny and split up across a bunch of different chromosomes, suggesting I have multiple European ancestors, but they’re much further back in time.

    This is probably old news to you now, but thanks for making this post. It finally pushed me over the edge into finally getting one of these tests done, and it’s really interesting.

  11. 13

    I too was surprised by my 23andme results. I have 0.5 subsaharan African, 0.3 North African, 0.1 Ashkenazi, and 1.0 Native American (I knew this already). Of course, in addition to my various European roots. I’ve been searching for my ethnic ancestors but no luck. I want to know what their story is. I’ve read that in very early America there was a lot of mixing with black people as it wasn’t against the law. Then laws were passed against it. This makes sense because laws against things are not lobbied until it is an established societal “problem”. If one has ties to Spain, there was a lot of mixing there with all of the ethnic diversity there as well. And I’ve also read that as much as 15000 black people (obviously mixed with white) were going on to “pass” for white every year during and after slavery. So it may have been a secret to escape the Jim Crow laws. Another thing I’ve heard is that some Europeans had African DNA even before the founding of America..
    Another interesting thing to note is that all of my non European ancestry shows up in one contiguous chunk. Indicating that is is likely that it hey are singular ancestors, and more recent. All of my family lines that I ve researched thus far, which is very extensive, go back to early colonial America, some were in the first colonies and on the mayflower.

  12. 15

    As an early Christmas present I had my DNA tested. A quick way to go from 50% Spanish to about 2% Spanish. I was told my father denied he was Native American (he’s from South America). Well he’s pretty close to 1/2 NA because I’m almost 1/4. I’m LDS and the Church denied Blacks the priesthood and ordinances in the temple until 1978. Well, I found out that affected me more than I realized. I’m between 5% and 7% Black, or about 1/16th. 7% comes from the Black part of Africa where the average person is 82% Black. I also have 2% from Northern Africa, which would be Arabs and Phoenicians and Semitic stuff. I’m 62% European, most is Scandinavian. I’ve got French, Italian, Spanish, Russian and just about everything. Besides NA I also have other Asian.

  13. 17

    Is it bad to have a drop of African American Ancestry? What is wrong with having one drop? Now if I’m Black, say I look like a Black person would one drop of White blood make me white? Happy New Year. 2014 in 12 minutes!

  14. 19

    That would have to be the absolute worst thing to happen to a person, to find out you’re even the slightest part black.
    As for me, I’ve had my DNA checked, no black DNA in my blood. 100% human.

    1. 19.1

      And why is that? It’s exciting to have DNA from all races–gives you variety. And all of us have Black ancestry–some is just more recent. You would live longer not hating.

  15. 20

    How far back do most people know their ancestors? I’m approximately 1/16th Sub Saharan African so that would be a great great grand parent. I don’t even know who that person is. The physical traits are gone. I am in White culture although I look a little different with a fair amount of Native American which does show. How many of us know who are great great grandparents are? I don’t know who my paternal grandparents are. I know that’s unusual but how many know beyond their great grandparents? When you get that far back traits are going to disappear, even very dominant ones.

  16. 22

    Hmmmm. Well, I’m 50% European (White) (my Mother) and 50% Afro-Latin (so, Black – my Father is Dominican). To everybody, I’m black – or depending on whether my hair is straightened or not – hispanic. I have green eyes and light dirty blond curly hair. Still, my skin is brown, like caramel – so I’m black. Like Obama. 50% White and 50% Black, still identifites and is classed as black, right? Well, my sister with the same Mother and Father as me. Looks exactly the same as me; green eyes, dark blond curly hair and caramel complex skin and two years ago she had a baby with a white man. Fully white. Maybe he was 0.000265% black, but we’ll let that slide. Anyway, they had a baby two years ago; my nephew. Gorgeous. Big bright blue eyes, straight European blonde hair. So blonde it was pretty much platinum. Lily-white skin, too. And he’s 25% black. Pft, I’ve seen 100% white people “blacker” than him! Haha. I’m sure none of his friends in the future would even guess his Mother is half black, or that his maternal Grandfather is fully black. Just goes to show. Look at Paula Patton and Robyn Thicke’s kid, or Soledad O’Brien…. Or Rashida Jones – or Wentworth Miller. They all look white at first glance, but actually have significant amounts of black blood. Percentage doesn’t really matter to anyone, it’s the way people look. So, really your percentage is not that important at all, it literally changes nothing to you or your racist (sorry!) Father. Still white. :/

  17. Dee
    23

    As far as I can tell from reading different sources about what race you are, I have only been able to discern that it is from DNA traced to certain areas of the world; that there is nothing in the DNA that specifies whether you are white, black, asian, or otherwise. It seems that there is an “assumption”, but no actual proof, of what color a person was from those areas. Does anyone have more info about this “proof of color” other than by location?

  18. 25

    I too was shocked to find out I was African american- not because it was a big deal for any reason of than there was no family history and my coloring… I am uber fair- blonde- green eyes. My family is from the south- owned slaves in that time period and since has struggled with racial issues- I was once of the first to have a biracial child and was treated horrible. So to find out that I am between 5-8% black was a bit of a shock in a good way honestly-all the things they said I was “wrong” for they could shut up about as their supposedly arguments that were wrong for all humanity reasons were wrong on their own point of views…

    However, back to this argument- what if you research in an academic class- and I am not demeaning personal research as they both have their positives – but I am a history major for African history and was previously for African American is that many African Americans that were light skinned enough to pass but not quite as white would say that they had native american ancestors but were white. so many of the white families that have the “native american princess” stories are going to find out that they really have a beautiful African queen. maybe if the entire US was required to take these tests the racism would start to dissipate …

    Take me I look like I could belong in the Arian (sp?) brotherhood but I am only 55% of a “white” ethnicity (Scottish) then the rest is Arabic, African and Latina… I would trip up the racists… I am sure there are others like me… it would be beautiful to all love each other for who were are.

    Dee- above- what do you mean by proof of color? If you have DNA from Africa you are African and if you have DNA from Scottish you are Scottish what are you asking? The Constitution states if you have one drop of black blood your black – for example so where in this argument do you separate what your dna says and your “areas of the world…? BUT Actually a person can decide their racial dynamic for themselves- I have always thought of myself and was raised white- though I do not live an white environment now I did not wake up the morning after this test and call myself a minority- the world around me would laugh at me. Even though my husband who is the same amount Latino as me would get accepted as he looks Latino…… It is about what you and the WORLD see you as.. BUT you are what you are… not only where you are from.. I am African, I am Latino and I am Scottish…

  19. 26

    The change in skin tones was because our ancestors migrated to different places like some of the moved to cold places and that is why now there are fair skinned people. Some of them moved to hot aces like Africa and that is why now there are darkskinned people. It seems as though we are all the same but just have words to classify us by our skin color…

  20. 27

    Yes, I agree with the earlier poster that it sounds a lot like President Obama. His father was from and currently lives in Kenya, and he was raised by a mother who was part of white culture, so young Barack was never raised in the “oppressed black culture of the Americas” that you’re talking about. So I think it’s not required that you’re raised in an atmosphere of being a “descendent of slaves” — Obama never was, and even though he wasn’t part of that culture, he claims “African-American.” So I think you can too! Wear it with pride! And thanks for sharing an interesting story.

  21. kia
    28

    Race doesn’t really exist it is fabricated. Race stands for (R.A.C.E) Royal African company of Europe they insured slaves.
    People migrated all over the world by necessity,desire or force.
    Have you ever noticed on job applications they ask your “race” but really the questions pertain to your nationality or culture example Asian=from Asia not race just nationality ie geographical region. Hispanic is a culture not race.

    I check all options because I am connected to all those regions side note no-one is BLACK people are named according to locations example European =Europe, Germans= Germany where is Black located? other than the black sea. Labels are meant to separate and divide and look where that got us, we have division of so called race,religion,color of skin, beauty, size of body and classicism rich or poor. I wouldn’t put much stock in the percentages either because they only test a small snippet of your dna so of course the percentages would be low depending on where they began or stopped testing you either share traits or you don’t percentage doesn’t matter oh yea Africa is a continent that Europe and asia is still connected to among other countries there is no such thing as the middle east where is upper and lower east? I thought it was North Africa
    I know I am Egyptian,sub saharan African,Asian,Iberian,Bavarian,italian,Berber,American Indian and this goes on WE ARE ONE PEOPLE and never let anyone tell you different. Excuse sentence structure I am writing as a human being not a student at school. For the record slavery has nothing to do with race but everything to do with economics read the book white gold. Study the Barbary coast please please please study real history not what was taught in school.

    1. 28.1

      Kia, you are one confused and deluded puppy! Race is an acronym? Did you think of that nonsense yourself or are you just mouthing some BS you read on some Boasian/Marxist blog? As it so happens, the noun “race” came into English in the mid-1500s from French, which got it from the Italian word razza (meaning species or kind).
      The source of razza has never been determined, but it could possibly be derived from the Latin words ratio (i.e., ratio) or generatio (generation), or from the Old French haraz.
      I suggest you check your facts first before you show your ignorance so publicly.

  22. 30

    I’m a little confused about whether a DNA test on a woman includes any info from her father. Can you elaborate?

    By the way, while writing a book about a lynching at the dawn of Jim Crow in NC that involves my family history, I found our for the first time about my African Ancestry. I grew up in an all white neighborhood in segregated South and went to all whites schools until the late 60s.

    I am 10% African, according to a test I had done in 2006. So the schools were actually integrated all along. I was always considered one of the top in my class. Had I been labeled or correctly identfied as “black” it’s likely my intelligence would have been downplayed or ignored or misreported — as the system had to justify its inequality by believing lies that people of African ancestry were incapable of high intelligence.

    Of course in the South, white people were not allowed to come in contact with or be made aware of the many people of African descent whose accomplishments contradicted that lie, and the white supremacist press made sure that big lie was promoted – always. Anything good ever said in the press about a person of color was that he or she was “loyal” “law-abiding” — your basic Uncle Tom.

    It sounds weird for me to admit that when I later looked at papers published in the north, I was shocked to see photographs of well-dressed and highly successful people of color —- Those images were completely kept from the average “white” person living in the South.

    It’s no wonder that Southern African Americans highly prized Chicago’s Defender. There was one successful Southern Black paper in Virginia (I think it was the Planet) with a very outspoken editor – that is until even his voice became stifled after Jim Crow became well established.

    Now I’m wondering if it was actually illegal for my parents to marry and whether my birth certificate mislabeled me.

    Though I think it’s ludicrous to label people at all as one race or another — the whole thing is a myth in the first place.

  23. 32

    In the future, we would all look back with laughter and asking ourselves why humanity was so stuck up with primitive mindset and so sensitive about a particular skin colour, race or religion. Remember all rivers lead to the same sea. There is only one race ie. the human race. We are one global humanity.

    Peace.

  24. 33

    Man, I cringe everytime I see someone say “Everyone came from blacks” obviously these people have not studied the actual Out of Africa theory and are just piggybacking some deluded blog they read. Otherwise they’d know, early humans had nothing to do with modern Africans.

  25. 35

    This blog writer is silly, ALL WHITE EUROPEANS HAVE NON-WHITE IN THEM! I REPEAT ALL WHITES BOTH IN THE AMERICA’S AND EUROPE HAVE NON-WHITE IN THEM GIVEN THE PROBABILITIES/GENETIC HISTORY! THIS IS AN UNDISPUTABLE GENETIC FACT! GENES AND GENETICS DON’T CARE ABOUT SOCIAL STIGMA’S AND SOCIAL HISTORY, ALL IT CARES ABOUT IS REPLICATION!

    IT IS FOR THIS REASON THAT THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A PURE RACE! WHITE EUROPEANS ARE THE ALBINO’S OF INDIANS AND EASTERN AFRICANS, WHITE EUROPEANS ARE ALSO NOT NATIVE TO EUROPE B/C SINCE ANCIENT GREEK TIMES, ALL THE PRESENT DAY WHITE EUROPEANS ENTERED EUROPE FROM CENTRAL ASIA/SIBERIA! THEREFORE WHITES ARE NOT EUROPEANS, THEY ARE CENTRAL ASIAN ALBINO’S!

    IT IS ALSO AN OBVIOUS AND UNARGUABLE & UNDISPUTABLE FACT THAT WHITES ARE ALBINO’S OR PART ALBINO’S! WHITES DISPLAY ALL THE CLASSIC SYMPTOMS OF OCULAR TO OCCULTANEOS ALBINISM! THE WHITE R1A HAS BEEN CONFIRMED TO HAVE ORIGINS IN CENTRAL AND SOUTH ASIA! INDIAN ALBINO’S LOOK EXACTLY LIKE WHITE EUROPEANS!

    THE REASON WHY WHITES CAN FUNCTION AND ACT NORMALLY WITHOUT THE CONSTRAINTS OF ALBINISM IS BECAUSE THEY BRED WITH NON-WHITES/HOMINIDS IN THEIR DISTANT PAST THAT ALLOWED TO THE NECESSARY GENETIC DIVERSITY TO SURVIVE WHILE THEY INBRED AFTERWARDS TO KEEP THEIR ALBINISM GENE GOING!

    WHITES ARE DEFECTIVE HUMAN BEINGS B/C OF THEIR ALBINISM! THEY HAVE HIGHEST CANCER RATES OF ALL RACIAL GROUPS AS WELL AS A WHOLE HOST OF BAFFLING GENETIC DISORDERS AND HERITABLE DISEASES! THEY SUN BURN EASILY AND THEY AGE THE WORST OF ALL GROUPS! THESE SYMPTOMS OVERLAP WITH SYMPTOMS OF ALBINISM, AND THUS THEIR IS NO WHITE PRIVILEGE B/C WHITES ARE BY GENETIC FACT, ALBINO DEFECTIVE HUMAN BEINGS!

    THE REAL REASON FOR SLAVERY AND ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION, IS BECAUSE WHITES CANNOT WORK IN THE SUN AND FIELDS BECAUSE THEY ARE ALBINO’S! ALBINO’S HAVE A HIGH DEATH RATE IN HOT CLIMATES AND DIE EASILY WHEN EXPOSED TO HIGH LEVELS OF SUNLIGHT DURING THE DAY! WHITES CANNOT SURVIVE IN THESE CLIMATES BECAUSE THEY ARE ALBINO’S, THUS THE WHOLE REASON FOR THE ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE!

  26. Jo
    37

    Also, out of Africa is 100% BS and been disproven. I had my DNA done also and I am 100% European with no 0.5%’s of anything. No black in me at all so explain that with your out of Africa BS.

  27. 38

    IF YOU HAVE mtDNA white the probably that your son/daugher born 100% white is more than 90% (with only 43 chromosomes it’s the probably to this happen, YOU ARE IN THE EXACLY LINE YOU HAD 50% TO DESAPEAR THAT BLACK CHROMOSOMES BEFORE YOU WAS BORN)

    IF YOU HAVE mtDNA non white your son/daugher will have a little black DNA but the children of your son (not daugher because mtDNA) will have a VERY HUGE PROBABLY TO HAVE 100% WHITE DNA.

    Thanks,

  28. 39

    I recently took a dNA test and discovered I was 19% African. I’m a blue eyed ginger with pink skin and lots of freckles, it seems the ginger gene whitewashed me a lot. I’m very interested in finding out more about people like myself, I thought your write up was really thoughtful and insightful. Thank you for taking the time to share what you have learned, it means a lot to others who are just finding out the same.

  29. 40

    Relax. Asmuch as you are trying to be something you are not, the DNA tests are a game. You are European not black. A disappointment we know but deal with it. Some good things came out of Europe.

  30. 42

    That’s awesome, I too am attempting to piece together my African heritage.
    One in ten self described white americans in the South are atlest 1% African genetically.
    My ancestors are listen among the 500 Free African American families of colonial Virginia and the Carolinas.
    I too am a Sang-mele at 1.6% west African.
    Just goes to show why white supremacy is a laugh for the Americas, nobody is 100% anything.

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