Gyasi Ross: Yawna Allen shares her Native and African ancestry

Did or do you ever feel pressure to identify as either simply Native American or simply African-American? Who was it that created that pressure?

All the time. Most of the pressure is to identify myself as being simply black and surprisingly, it has most often come from the black community in my personal experience. I have been told that since I look black and my father was black, I am JUST black. That isn’t to say I haven’t experienced this from the white community as well. A business professor (with a doctorate degree who taught in international studies no less) once asked me several years ago what my next tennis tournament would be. I told him I was playing in the North American Indian Tennis Association tournament. Before I could finish my sentence, he cut me off and said, “Now, you know you’re not Native American right?” It was only after he quizzed me on what tribes I belonged to that he dropped the discussion.

From the Native side of things, it’s interesting. Some of the issues arise from differences in blood quantum requirements among Tribes, being of mixed-Tribal or mixed-race descent, or views on the Five Civilized Tribes. The question is usually if I am “Native enough.” These are the only things I have encountered with Natives, but on limited occasions.

Sometimes it feels like society as a whole forces you to choose, so “they” know what category to put you in. But I have never wanted to deny any part of my heritage or bow to that pressure, even if it makes some uncomfortable for me to be a proud “other.”

Were there ever times when you simply wanted to be one or the other—wholly Native American or wholly Black?

Definitely. I was solely raised by my mother with the help of my maternal grandparents. As far back as I can remember I have always known what tribes I belonged to, or what my name meant, or certain Cherokee and Euchee words my family taught me. I never thought I looked any different from my mom’s family—my full-blooded grandmother’s skin was the same golden brown hue as mine, and everyone had curly hair (it was the 80s after all!). It wasn’t until my mom and I moved to the Navajo Reservation in northern Arizona when I started elementary school that I learned of my father’s heritage. Being raised by my Native family and being surrounded by other Native children, for a short time I wished my outside reflected how I identified myself on the inside. As time has passed, I don’t want to be simply one or the other; because then I wouldn’t be ME. It took a pretty awesome mixture of white/black/Native to make me who I am, and I love and accept all of me. I’m proud of where I come from.

I guess, in kinda the opposite of the last question, was there a point where you began to see being mixed Native and Black as a positive or an asset?

I never realized how much of an asset it was until I was older. The greatest thing to me is being able to blend in with, appreciate, and understand both sides. I think it’s unique and a blessing to be able to frame switch and see the world through different cultures’ eyes.