Democracy or its ideals. Just wondering from critiquing american decisions, how did we do what mistakes we make and how would you do it differently . I dont have time to tell you all the mistakes that were made here. The basic problem has been not having a strategy, not having an idea and reacting. The arab uprising countess off guard here three months later what was our response . We still didnt have one. One year later, what do we want . Still dont have one. That goes on today. Pacific the u. S. Spends billions of dollars in egypt has been on the ground in all kinds of ways come the summer was share quite helpful to the country for decades and yet has managed to alienate and enrage every single constituency in the country. Somehow today, muslim brothers, revolutionary activist and human rights communities, the military that the u. S. Crucially bankrolled all feel betrayed and abridged by the United States because of the ways in which it is flawed, delayed we first overreacted to development on the ground. There would still be a lot of people in egypt that would be angry but to have a coherent story to tell egyptians and ourselves about what we want there. We dont have that coherent story because we have lurched from embracing mubarak to blessing the revolution wont be rolling the military that was actually rule in egypt in 2011 to give any bearhug to the Muslim Brotherhood in power. Not saying we respect the transition we are happy you had elections, but acting almost like advocates for them is the brotherhood. We have american officials bragging about the democratic credentials and tactics of the Muslim Brotherhood in power when the Muslim Brotherhood and power was behaving completely autocratically busty imogene for the u. S. Posture in the region. Today we are left without a minimum, complete incoherence. What does america want . We know some things. We want the region to not oppose our policies towards israel. We want the cooperation on counterterrorism and security. That is why at the end of the day throughout the transition period, the military then were uninterruptedly held the lion share of power have also had americas laughing because theyve elaborate on the things that i guess when push comes to shove or the policy priorities at the united state. Eric. Thank you for writing the book. Thank you for coming. You say that middle eastern regimes can no longer existing ideas and vacuums to me that an extraordinary number of ordinary egyptians were willing to so quickly reembrace kind of neofascists regime in general. I am curious, were you surprised at all, we depressed that it how do you ask why an ordinary egyptians reembrace so quickly of the military . To private and a prize for a big part of how i felt in fall 2013. It was shocking to see millions of people. They were people i spend hundreds and hundreds of hours with and trying in dangerous circumstances to see the sky on july 4, 2013 celebrating in a conga line because there had been a military coup and saying it is not a coup. It is a popularly legitimate coup. Its like the egyptians struggle even to this day. I got heckled last night by someone going you call it a coup, but people like it. Yes it is a coup in people like it. Those are not at all mutually exclusive things. So this is yes it is sad. It is depressing. It is horrible. It is horrible to have people marching in the streets to years ago telling me casually they think that guy happens to be someone i admire personally have a lot of encourage and integrity. Why are you glad hes in prison . The brought the chaos. That is a horrible thing to hear. The shallow shortterm reaction and i dont think i dont think it is sort of the whole lancer to what is going to happen. Part of how i understand the is most people in the world arent super articulate when it comes to political views. When an honest man on the street interviews and american, most people are going to have a new one separation of power. Some will some wont. In a country in which political literacy was for a generation you will have a lot less of that. What happened is that caught me off guard to some extend the speed to which people jettisoned the revolution. But then you look at the details and its like shaddai make this comparison . The horrible genocide happened. How could this be quiet one of the things we found forensically with years of media incitement that were essentially brainwashing people in a certain way. In egypt huge concerned media browbeating in brainwashing and the public which just yesterday you had leaks where the staff is in the office and telling them what they say about the talk show hosts will say. You could be it in real life you sort of a beautiful salon of ideas i described were suddenly replaced by a coordinated symphony of the feature added hogwash and they came from every direction. In the papers, on the radio. And now works. You know, on one hand we learned people are achieved. On the other hand we learned you can manipulate publics especially the entire resources with all the media at your disposal. You work in the newsroom. Can you imagine even your boss trying to tell you what to do . It doesnt work. So you know i have egyptian friend who are very pessimistic and whose response to the coup and the aftermath was to just give out. Some of them have into exile or to do Something Else. They said you know what, that people dont want to. I am going to go do Something Else and hopefully put myself in a position to contribute more next time there is an opening. And its actually a good example because he did a sellout for being willing to tamp down criticism but you know, what he says as he says we are at a moment where we could have won and we didnt and we lost. This is like when he puts aside the legitimate coup in all of this. He says you know we did three major uprisings in three years and at the end of the day the people want with us. A small group of us wanted it among the people were convinced. We failed to convince the people. He doesnt say the people are or prone to fascism. He says we failed to convince them so they got to figure out a better way to convince them. Thats not the whole story and the regime is quite wrong and ultimately is responsible for the fact its dominating the country. Its not the revolutionary loss or gain. But hes right that they have to up with a better story to tell. You cant change the military dictatorship with a vague slogan of red freedom. We are all in favor of red and freedom and social justice. Everyone is. Youve got to have a better story to tell. That is the story hes trying to right now is a Political Party leader designing his own cadre school with a curriculum of political education that he hopes in 10 years will social Democratic Party actually have operatives that know some in that none of the people in someone new about politics. [applause] i am delighted in the audience should know that you were going to speak to the council on foreign relations. It is important that those Foreign Policy of the fear what you have to say. One word of advice, dont short your comprehensive answers to questions. Just do it as you are doing it because people need to hear what you have to say. I take a lot of encouragement. For years i have been influenced decades by an essay written called protest to politics. I hear what you are saying the beginning of what might the politics in egypt which means organization which means discussion, which means building from the ground up and finding ways of learning how to resolve differences and that is how power gets shifted. So thank you very much. Thank you on the cspan, for being here. Books will be signed. Just line up over here. And watch cspan on when this will appear. You can hear it again and invite others to watch with you. Thank you all for coming. Thank you so much. [applause] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] next Allyson Hobbs examines the lives of africanamericans who chose to pass as whites between the 18th and mid20th centuries. The author reports on the political and the show ramifications of passing which included greater right than opportunities but also isolation and disregard for the greater africanamerican community. Our topic for today is a chosen exile a history of racial passing in American Life by Allyson Hobbs. Allyson hobbs as an assistant professor in the History Department at stanford university. She graduated magna laude from Harvard University and received her im sorry from Harvard University and received a phd with distinction in the university of chicago. Shes received on the ford foundation, the michelle r. Clayman institute for gender research and the center for comparative study of race and ethnicity at stanford. Allison teaches courses on american identity, africanamerican history africanamerican womens history and 20th century american history. Shes won numerous Teaching Awards including the Phi Beta Kappa prize grays award and humanities in the st. Clair teaching award. She gave a 10 x talk at stanford here she has appeared on cspan and National Public radio and her work has been featured on cnn. Com, slate. Com and the chronicle of higher education. A chosen exile a chosen exile a history of racial passing in American Life is allysons first book. Its been featured on National Public radios all things considered, tibor smiley on international and the madison show went. Xm. The book was selected as the New York Times book review editors choice, a best book of 2014 by the San Francisco chronicle in a book of the week by the Times Higher Education in london. The roots chose a chosen exile is the best Nonfiction Book i bought copters in 2015. Please join me and welcoming Allyson Hobbs to the national archives. [applause] well, thank you so much for such a lovely and generous introduction. My sincere thanks to douglas for inviting me to come to the national archives. It is such a pleasure being in the beautiful city with such a rich history. Thank you all so much for coming. I really appreciate it. I am very eager to hear your questions and your comments. She joined a crowd that numbered in the thousands, and she cheered as the drum majors, batons workers and celebrities in convertibles passed by. She ran out to the floats to touch the parades anointed king and queen, and cotton candy that the participants tossed to her. The parade was a south side institution, and at a time when racial tensions ran high when black families squeezed into overcrowded jeanettes come and when black children knew not to venture the on the boundaries of their neighborhood the bud billiken parade if a deep sense of race pride, community and togetherness. For one day a year black children could imagine that the city of chicago was all theirs. Now, our cousin could not have known that this would be her last time hearing the marching bands and the cheering crowd. Unlike many black parents, she would not share this experience with her children. She was black but she looked white. She was very light skinned. And at the insistence of her mother, after she graduated from high school she would move far away from chicagos south side to los angeles, to live the rest of her wife her life as a white woman. It was not her choice. She pleaded with her mother. She did not want to leave her family her friends and the only life that she had ever known. That her mother was determined in the matter was decided. Years later after she married a white man and raised white children who knew nothing of her past, she received a very inconvenient telephone call. It was her mother, and she was calling to tell her that her father was dying and that she must come home immediately. Despite these dire circumstances, she would never return to chicagos south side. The young girl who had once sat on a curb and chicagos most historic black neighborhoods to watch americas largest lack parade, was a white woman now him and there was simply no turning back. After my aunt told me the story it stuck with me. It wouldnt leave me alone. So i have spent the last 10 years wrestling with this curious phenomenon of passing. Conventional wisdom tells us that a history of passing cannot be written, that those who pass left no trace in the historical record, and that only novelists, playwrights and poets could write about this clandestine and taboo practice. But i believe that the sources were out there for historians, just waiting to be discovered. So i went into the archives looking for ghosts, hoping to tell their stories. To find these ghosts, historians must seek out unconventional stories that very at the different historical moment. In each era, americans produce a sense of unexpected sources from runaway slave advertisements to diary entries. From newspaper accounts to laws designed to preserve racial integrity, and police the one drop rule. From students represent colleges and universities to articles in popular magazines. The sources of passing are abundant, but often found in unlikely places. These sources make claim that passing was generally an egalitarian practice. Elites tended to have greater access to resources and opportunities to pass but given the right circumstances, the poor could cross over also. Men tended to enjoy greater mobility in American Society but under particular conditions women passed almost effortlessly. The sources revealed passing to be deeply individualistic practice, but also fundamentally social act with enormous social consequences. The iconic image of the heartbroken yet sympathetic black mother who must not speak a word nor lay eyes upon her white looking child in public lays bare the painful consequences of this practice. A history of passing cannot be written without telling her story, too. Passing as often and intentionally or in voluntarily collaborative endeavor. Family members friends, neighbors and coworkers were often affected and sometimes implicated in this practice. Those who were left behind describe the pain and the loss of this act just as keenly as those who passed. The path is a white tenement to lose a sense of indebtedness in a community. For many Family Members and friends of those who passed, racial identity came to mean much more than individuals rejection of the race. It meant no longer belonging as a Family Member and no longer sharing experiences stories and memories of times past. Passing is often represented as a story of games. By passing as white, particularly during the years of legalized segregation, once could access a range of Employment Opportunities that would be otherwise restrictive. One could live in a better neighborhood and one could enjoy countless social privileges, like sitting in a more comfortable seat on the train or being addressed as mr. Or mrs. , respectful titles reserved for white men and women only. But my cousin story made me realize that to write a history of passing is to write a history of law. The goal of my work is to explore not only what was gained by passing as white but also what was lost by walking away from a black identity. Racial passing is an exile sometimes chosen, sometimes not. From the late 18th century to the present racially ambiguous men and women have wrestled with complex questions about the conditions of their time. And they have fashioned complex understandings about their places in the world. Over these two centuries, countless africanamericans passed as white, leaving behind families, friends communities and roots. Lives were lost only to be remembered in family stories like mine. My book is an effort to recover those lives. I joined a scholar to have argued that race is socially constructed as performative but i keep my eye on what race and racial identity mean to those who are racialized your rather than seeing racial identity from the racial regime looking down on those who passed as white i bring into focus what pastors and saw when they looked out onto their own world. Race was quite real to those who lived with it. That because of skin color or notions about biology, but because it was social and excremental. Because it involved once closest relationship and ones most intimate communities. Let me take a step back now and offer broader social context of this project. Racial passing in the United States is the focus of my project, but it must be acknowledged as only a subset of a much larger phenomenon that encompasses multiple disguises and forms of the semblance. In the 19th century as young men and women steadily migrated out of small towns to seek their fortunes in americas booming cities, american that taureans warned that these men and women might pass and enter higher social classes to which they did not belong, given the fluidity of our late 19th century america. While american victorians were fretting over class passing jewish applicants changed the names to outmaneuver discriminatory admissions policies that limited enrollment at universities such as harvard princeton and yale mike. Chinese immigrants disguise themselves to pass as mexicans and enter the u. S. From u. S. Mexico border during the era when chinese were excluded from emigrating to the United States. In 1907, a u. S. Government investigation discovered these photographs attached to fraudulent mexican citizenship papers. Loretto vasquez, a cuban born woman, pass as a confederate soldier to fight in the civil war and entered the ranks of numerous women who joined the military or participated in occupations and activities restricted to men. Gay men passed as a straight, also known as putting their hair out. Married women and work in professions that wouldve been unavailable to them if they had quote let their hair down. And the flamboyant jazz saxophonist born to russian jewish immigrants passed as black to shore up his musical credentials. Here i have identified only a handful of examples of a sweeping phenomenon to demonstrate its flexibility and its adaptability to various historical context. The poor passed as the rich women passed as men jews pass as gentiles, gay men and women passed as straight and whites sometimes fast as black. And, of course, the reverse of each of these was possible given specific conditions and circumstances. Particularly in societies with relatively open and fluid of social orders the permutations on passing were endless. Now let me give you a brief overview of my book which spans the late 18th to the mid20th centuries. The late expense of passing, the act of negotiating the permeable border between black and white reveals one way that everyday people have interacted with a racist Society Since the late 18th century. Each era determined not only how racially ambiguous men and women lived, but also what they lost. In the antebellum period, enslave the men and women lived with the looming threat of law, knowing that they could be bought sold and forever separated from their families if the master lost a card game or decided to present a slave as a wedding gift. During the era of slavery to pass as white was to escape, not necessarily from blackness but from slavery often with the intention of recovering precious relationships, and living as black under the more secure conditions of freedom. Passing as white became possible in a society where whiteness was not based solely on appearance, but also on dress, behavior and mannerisms. Indeed skin color and physical appearance were usually the least reliable factors. Racially ambiguous as slaves drew on highly sophisticated understandings of racial gender and social norms to enact whiteness. And by doing so many successfully passed to freedom. Alan craft passed as a white man crossing both racial and gender lines to escape the freedom while her darker skinned husband played the role of her slave. It was necessary for her to pass as a man because she knew it was highly unconventional for a white woman to travel alone with a male slave. But theyre convincing performance required far more than her white skin. It was her knowledge of how to dress and comport herself like a southern gentleman and a subtle and nuanced understandings of southern social and gender norms that made this daring undertaking a marvelous success. Concerned that are beardless face might betray her, or that her illiteracy would prevent her from registering her name at hotels ellen became a master of improvisation. She bound her right hand in a sling so she could ask others to sign her name over. She bandaged her face so that no one would know that she did not have a beard. By feigning illness, disability and even deafness she politely excuse yourself from conversation and won the sympathy of other travelers. In fact, allen played the role of a southern gentleman so well that white southern ladies reportedly swooned in her presence. [laughter] passing to freedom, however was not nearly as laden with the moral questions and experiences with law that would follow in later years. During the long years of jim crow, passing the striking out on ones own and leaving behind a family and a people. Without a doubt benefits accrued to these new white identities. But a more complete understanding of this practice requires a reckoning with the loss alienation, and isolation that accompanied and often outweighed its reward. During the jim crow period, the treaty between 18901955, segregated living and working arrangements created a necessary condition for passing to flourish, but also for this practice to undermine black families and communities. This period also witnessed the great migration a massive and unprecedented migration of africanamericans out of the south. These migrations allowed racially ambiguous people to travel and to try on new identities in the anonymity of northern cities. One woman described her grandmothers journey from mississippi to chicago. Once in chicago are no longer immediately identifiable as loses a daughter. Her grandmother could easily enter the white world. When she presented herself for work in chicagos all white retail district, no one ever asked if she was black. The question was unthinkable. Unwritten code of racial decorum in the fine establishment where she worked prevented such scrutiny. This was one of the most common forms of passing during the jim crow era working white while living block. 95 passing as it was often called aloud nearly white men and women to Access Employment slated for whites only. Simply mentioning that the Family Member held a white collar job became shorthand for passing as white given the strict segregation of Employment Opportunities. A woman wrote of a relative who was quote working up in new york state passing as the head manager of the largest paper factory in the country. Family members signaled that a relative had a highpaying job by stating that he or she worked as white, it could be assumed that a relative was passing if he or she worked in a particular field or in an all white establishment henry park was the only comet fire event in new haven, one Family Member bragged, adding he neglected to tell them he was negro. Others conceded i never tried to pass. Folks thought that i was white and i didnt enlighten them. The constructed nature of race becomes evidence evident when individuals change their racial identity i changing location clothing, speech, and life story. Us making themselves white. Others passed temporarily or situationally to seek respite from jim crow living every now and then. And in 1932 letter, a novelist wrote about passing as white in the company of great mel johnson, james weldon johnsons lightskinned wife. And i will read her letter for you. You will be much unused that i will never tried this much discussed passing stunt her letter reveals the type of momentary passing that became commonplace during the jim crow era, but it also revealed a fun and theatrics of passing. Convincing performance is required gumption, resourcefulness, and no small measure of humor. The sheer joy of getting over and folding our white folks, as Langston Hughes put it, may passing a means of poking fun at a racial system laden with absurdity about racial purity. Walter white the racially ambiguous executive secretary of the naacp made a practice of putting his blond hair and blue eyes to use to enter the south during the 1930s to investigate lynchings. Whites must have laughed nervously when he sat next to a white man on edge train to brag that get special expertise in identifying blacks who passed as white. Taking and pointing at his cuticles, the man explained that if white and black blood they would show on his fingernails and antiquated belief about a telltale sign of black racial identity. In a country a test with racial distinctions passing consider just how unreliable ones appearance was in determining their race. At times, passing was a practical joke at the expense of whites but this lady must not obscure the work that passing does on more intimate registers. Levity. Laying bare the high emotional stakes, the threats to family coherence and the personal dislocations that this practice is substituted. And a memoir of her mother rouhani hartfield, a mixedrace woman, reflected on the expansive sense of black family feeling and wrote, it is said that colored people all over the world will ask each other upon first meeting, who are your people . This question signals the importance of locating black individuals with the are familiar networks and can for. Her mother had lived on both sides of the color line. In chicago shield a wellpaying job at the Automatic Electric company. She did not volunteer any information about her racial background and none of her coworkers recent immigrants from italy, lithuania and poland asked any questions. As her daughter explained, this was the kind of tacit passing that allowed her mother to gain a foothold in chicago in the 19 teens. Despite her mothers practice of 95 passing, she could not make sense of the familial his locations that permanent passing required. As she explained, in slavery days people got cut off from their families but there was nothing they could do about it. But these passing people who choose to do that i cant make any sense out of that at all. All they get in return for giving up everything is people can think they are why. People think im white anyway and i dont feel any different. I have my family and my true history. That means something. Shephard stanleys relationship and her true history were more meaningful than the privileges of looking white. Passing meant letting go of once people, or as shephard limited of giving up any thoughts of ever seeing one scholar family again limited. Something she could never conceive of. She asked how would anybody know who they were without their people . To shephards mind letting go of once people was nothing less than letting go of ones self. Let me conclude with one of the most heart wrenching stories of passing that i discovered in the archives. This is the story of a woman named elsie roxburgh. Elsie roxburgh was born to restored africanamerican family, and she chose to pass as white after she graduated from the university of michigan in 1937. This is a picture of her during her freshman year at michigan. Her story ends in tragedy. She took her own life in 1949. During the depression, the roxborough family lived a life that few americans, white or black, could imagine. They had made they had made and shall first. Family vacation with other blacks at idlewild a lakefront resort in western michigan make named the black eden. As one family friend explained, we knew things were bad but not for our crowd. We knew people sold apples on street corners but we were white linen jackets to sunday school. Elsie was tall and slender glamorous and vivacious. She had a beauty and charm that few men, black or white could resist. Langston hughes admired her. Her classmate, the future Playwright Arthur Miller called her a duty, the classiest girl in ann arbor. Langston hughes road that elsie would tell him her dream and wonder whether or not it would be better for her to pass as white to achieve them. After graduating from college in 1937 elsie moved to california in past to work as a model and a screenwriter. Winner fortunes ran dry out west, elsie moved east. In new york she dr. Broun had read and drop the famous roxborough name to become the unattached white mode monday. That even as a white woman, her dreams would never come true. And heres a picture of her when she was passing as white in new york. Langston hughes was in this thing when elsie roche and to tell him she decide to pass. For several years, elsie wrote letters to him and sent gifts at christmas without a return address on the package. In time those letters and gifts stopped altogether, and he never heard from her again. When her white roommate returned from a weekend trip she found elsie in her bed. It appeared that she had committed suicide. Her sister who could also pass as white, traveled to new york with a wrenching assignment of claiming the body. The arrival of this ostensibly white woman allowed elsie to remain white even in death. Elsie had written to her father for financial help. He refused her, and three days later she was dead. Her sister would never speak to her father again. By the 1940s and through the 1960s, personal testimonies begin to declare that the law says were simply too much to bear, and it was a time to give a passing and come home. The black press published numerous testimonials of africanamericans who disavowed passing him and catalogs countless psychological advantages of embracing a black identity. Many articles cheerfully announced the collapse of economic barriers after world war ii that seemed to make 95 passing no longer necessary. Other pashtun others focus on the collective pride at africanamericans experienced, and the growing protests. Of the burgeoning civil rights movement. The johnston family, shown here in their suburban home in new hampshire, past for 20 years before they were discovered. The father, a successful and wellrespected radiologist applied to be an officer in the navy during world war ii. Enable background check revealed that hed been in a black fraternity during college. Now, note to self if youre thinking about passing audibly passed not to join a black fraternity. [laughter] but after the family secret was revealed, they insisted that they were through with passing and that they would never pass again. By the 1960s racial politics had changed once again. Black identities were confirmed, and passing was rejected. Black was a beautiful. Blending in with the white world seemed to longer economically this is a, politically advantageous, or socially desirable. I am often asked, the people still passed today . I am certain of that passing continues, but probably in a very different form than what i described in my talk. We now live in a far more Multiracial Society than ellen craft or Elsie Roxborough could have ever imagined. The conditions of the 21st century allow for a greater acceptance of mixedrace identities. But still the core issues of race and identity remain. Each generation must navigate the social currents and racial realities of their time period. A history of passing opens a window on the complexity of the human experience. It allows us to gain a deeper and more meaningful understanding of the ways that race is lived and experienced. I have assembled a disparate cast of characters scenes, and settings, and moments of conflict and contradiction to knit together the history of passing. Passing offered account was freedom, from the pleasures of sitting and more comfortable sections of the movie theaters to the simple dignities of trying on a hat and a star without being compelled to buy it, to the more elusive opportunities to view more like a man were to be treated like a lady. Passing is an enduring historical phenomenon that opens a wide window onto larger issues about fluid of racial definitions, the changing dynamics of race relations, and the complex roots along which africanamerican identities have developed in the United States. My book attempts to reconstruct the world of passing by pairing scholarly discussions of its social, economic and political context with the personal emotional and familial matter that make it human. Passing was not an automatic response to Racial Discrimination. Some africanamericans used passive as a crucial channel leading to physical and personal freedom. They declared their rights as american citizens and insisted on their humanity. What they could not fully know until they had successfully passed was that the light of freedom was often overshadowed by the darkness of loss. Thank you. [applause] so i would love to take questions. Yes, please. To breathe hold and put questions to the our accounts at warren g. Harding either passed or was descended from someone who did which would make harding the first black president. And my second question, were any people who passed betrayed by the children they father . Very interesting. Warren g. Harding is such a fascinating story because supposedly when he was running for president , this story of him actually having black ancestry really dogged him come individual he just said, you know, and actually, let me try to get the quote because its a classic. He said Something Like you know, how would i know if one of my ancestors jumped the fence . So he never actually denied that he had black ancestry. He was kind of vague about it but he certainly never denied it. So it is very likely that he was the first africanamerican president. And then theres been other speculation that other president s have had, you know africanamerican ancestry as well which certainly would not be that surprising either when you think about the amount of racial mixture that there was in this country, particularly in the south. And thats why in the 1800s, in the early 1800s there is a judge in virginia, a judge named william harper, and he is sort of arguing that we shouldnt make the laws to strict when it comes to what defines someone as black and white define summer as white. And basically he says, because if we make the laws to strict, there are a lot of people who really believe themselves to be white, who are not going to pass the test. And he said you know, its a lot better if we let one or two people pass as white and if we really start pulling out this all of yarn because the whole system could easily become undone. So i think more people were aware of this than probably publicly stated it but it does remind us of just how much racial mixture that has been in this country, particularly in the south during the antebellum period. Your second question is also very interesting about whether the children later betrayed the parents. And i havent read any account of that though im sure that that was possible and that that happened. I guess the question would be who wouldve told the children you know, how would they have found out . [inaudible] yes absolutely. Theres many cases where theres this fear of what was known as the dark baby and in literature there are lots of examples of women are passing as white. They refused to have children because they were terrified that theyre going to have a dark baby. This family, the johnsons, their story was turned into a film called lost boundaries that was produced in 1949, and theres a scene where the white house our first child and theres so much concern and angst about how the chilled child is going to look and theres so much relief when a child looks white, and everything is fine. But theres also a story of a family who actually lived in washington, d. C. In the late 19th century. They were here actually in the 1860s, i think through the 1870s because the father was like a Founding Member of the friedmans bank, and when the bank collapsed, he felt horrible and responsible. So he decides we are going to leave town, moved to nebraska. Which i should also mention is often one of the prerequisites to passing, right . That you have to leave where youre from where you are known, live over in a new place in order to be able to pass because you cant pass where everyone knows who you are. So we decided theyre going to move to nebraska, and somewhere along the way between washington, d. C. And nebraska they decided theyre going to pass as white. So they decide to pass as white. The daughter eventually marries a white man and they have a baby and the physician, the attending physician says i cant write that this baby is white on the birth certificate because clearly this baby is not white. I dont really know what to do. Its kind of awkward. And essentially a husband in the case, the white husband, ends up suing the wife and getting the marriage on hold and claiming that on old claiming he did not know his wife was black and was passing until the baby was born. So its a great question and yes, there are any cases come and also its sort of like a trope particularly in literature, this kind of fear that eventually, it was also sort of like a cautionary tale kind of like you dont want to pass because you never know a few generations down the line or even the next generation might give your secret away. So thank you for your question. You teach some interesting course at stanford, american identity, africanamerican womens history. I assume you use the book in your courses, and if so what are some of the responses you get from students today who may now who may never have known about this . Whats the most interesting response youve heard either from students or people who you speak to on the book . Thank you. Thats a great question. So i actually havent taught the book yet in my classes. Because i like just finished writing it but i do really enjoy talking about the phenomenon of passing with my students, because they are of very different generation. Which sometimes makes me feel very old, but i try to let go of that. But i love to show them this picture, and often in the classic each on racial identity i show them this picture and i said, how would you describe his familys racial identity . And they say, you know well they are mixed race. They say they are black. They say theyre puerto rican. They say maybe they are italian. They have a number of different responses, and when i tell them that they passed as white for 20 years, they say oh thats not even possible, there is no way. And then explain well actually they lived in new hampshire, the fact that the father was a radiologist, the fact that mother was kind of a consummate housewife, that she hosted the christmas social at her home every year and that she was a member of all of the right clubs and organizations that they are classics that is really played a major role in the way people understood their racial identity. And, in fact, when they did come out and say they were actually black, one other neighbors that can we did know that black people could even live like this. You know, they were so shocked because they lived a life that people assumed that only white people lived. So we talk a lot about class and a lot about the ways that class is really a determining factor in race. We also talk a lot about kind of the absurdity of racial definitions and racial categorizations come and we talk a lot about mixedrace identity and about how we are now living in a very different time when a number of identities are both socially accepted and also accepted officially by the state. I mean the fact that the census has been changed such that people can mark one or more categories that we have really moved into a very different period, and that its kind of important for us to sort of thing about our present moment and the kinds of opportunities that the present moment allows that really were not available during this time. During this time you are either black or white. In the film, and actually in the real story, the father has a really difficult time getting an internship as a medical doctor, and supposedly a colleague of his whose wife says no one will ever know why dont you just pass as white . And he decides thats what hes going to do, and all of a sudden he has these great opportunities. It sort of shows the kind of injustice and unfairness of Racial Discrimination but the point being that its not as if he couldve said well im mixed race or im biracial. But rather you were white or black and there really wasnt a lot of room in between. But, i hope that gives you a sense of the kind of conversations we had. I found your book to be a very compelling read. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I was just wondering there are some parts of it that just reads like an exciting thriller, and i was just wondering if there has been any consideration of adapting that to a movie or documentary . When i think about ellen craft and you also mentioned the johnsons, those were really exciting portions of your book. I just wonder if theres any thought given to that . Thats a great question. Im waiting for Steven Spielberg to call off mike [laughter] steve mcqueen, if youre out there, you can find me on facebook. I mean, i actually agree with you think thats what made studying passing so exciting was that while it was very difficult to find some of these stories, once you find them they just would you feel like theyre out of a movie, you know . Especially the ellen craft story. Affairs all of these different moments where she and her husband kind of they dont meet up at the right place and theres another moment where shes on the train and this man is really trying to talk to her and shes trying to feign illness and shes trying to act like she cant hear him. So its like your heart is down as you are reading this story about what shes going through to try to make this disguise work. And shes very anxious about it and, you know, so theres a number of times where you dont really know whats going to happen and you are sort of thinking that this is really a desperate escape, you know that if anyone were to find this out, they would be back in slavery. This is a matter of being enslaved versus being free. So i definitely think that that there are many, many pieces of this story that would certainly make for Great Television or film. Im sure many of you have seen some great films about passing imitation of life. Is a great film called pinky. The film about this family, lost boundaries, and there are these really intense moments. Theres a really sad moment in imitation of life if youd seen the one from 1934 where fredi washington, a black actress plays the role of the woman who was passing, and she really sort of cries out against all of the