Ambivalent, Dynamic and Changing Times: The Construction of Racial and Personal Identity in James McBride’s The Color of Water

Abstract

James McBride’s memoir The Color of Water provides a rich and nuanced history of the author, who is an African American and details his relationship with his white mother. Using the theories of Bhabha regarding hybridity, ambivalence and a Third Space between varied cultures, this work demonstrates that racial and personal identities are a historical construction, and continually evolve as flexible and mobile entities in this memoir. The linking of narratives and voices across several decades demonstrates the Third Space in the relationship between McBride and his mother, and the relationship of each individual to a broader multiracial culture. Lacan’s theories regarding rhetoric and signification are also used to underpin an exploration of the ways in which McBride portrays his own changing understanding of biracial identity in America.