LONDON: All my life, I’ve wanted to find depictions of people who look like me; I've searched for stories of those with similar life experiences to mine. My search has been fruitless. As a mixed-race woman, my story remains untold and I hit walls of indifference each time I try to raise the issue. I'm a half south-Asian, half white-English woman, and I know no one who can reflect my story back to me. So what, some of you might say. Stop navel-gazing; get over yourself, you may mutter. It's hard to explain to white people, who take their identity for granted, just how lonely it can feel when you've never met anyone else with your particular experience of ethnicity, let alone read about them or seen them on TV or in the movies.
You -- the white majority - take your role models for granted. British Asians have their Rich List and people of African Caribbean origin have their 100 Great Black Britons list. I don't begrudge them their pride in their achievements but what do biracial Britons -- who are predicted to become the single largest minority group in the country, overtaking those of Indian origin -- have that is comparable? We have nothing -- because people like me still remain largely unacknowledged, with debates around race, culture and identity excluding mixed-heritage people. —Dawn/The Guardian News Service
