ABSTRACT
Chapter 6 has mapped out the growth of mixed sociability experienced by the families in the research set from the 1950s to 2003. We have seen how, despite public and often personally experienced racial prejudice, individuals have come together in friendships and intimate relationships, for some resulting in the formation of mixed families. We have also seen how over time, with increased mixing and cultural exchanges, the children and grandchildren of the African-Caribbean migrants and their white British counterparts have come to share similar interests. Given this evidence, how has the rise in mixed sociability in London in the past 50 years influenced the experience of racial prejudice of individuals in these mixed-heritage families? This chapter aims to address this question, while exploring the strategies family members have used to counteract prejudice through the generations. Additionally, it examines mixed-heritage individuals’ understanding of their social positions within their families and the wider society, as well as their agency in constructing and establishing their positions in British society. Thus, it reconsiders Benson’s suggestion that, ‘for the mixed-race child...there were problems inevitably arising from an ambiguous ethnicity’ (Benson 1981: 134). First, however, I take a look at the concept of racism itself.
