Miscegenation [mi-sej-uh-ney-shuhn] (Latin: miscere ‘to mix,’ genus ‘kind’) is the mixing of different racial groups, a social construct, through marriage, cohabitation, sexual relations, and procreation. The term miscegenation has been used since the 19th century to refer to interracial marriage and interracial sex, and more generally to the process of racial interbreeding, which has taken place since ancient history.
The term entered historical records during European colonialism, but societies such as China and Japan also had restrictions on marrying with peoples they considered different. Historically the term has been used in the context of laws banning interracial marriage and sex, so-called anti-miscegenation laws.
Today, the word is avoided by many scholars, because the term suggests an actual biological phenomenon, rather than its nature as a categorization imposed on certain relationships. The word is considered offensive by many, and other terms such as ‘interracial’ or “‘cross-cultural’ are more common. The term remains in use among scholars when referring to past practices concerning multiraciality, such as anti-miscegenation laws that banned interracial marriages.
The word was coined in an anonymous propaganda pamphlet published in New York City in December 1863, during the American Civil War. The pamphlet was entitled ‘Miscegenation: The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro.’ It purported to advocate the intermarriage of whites and blacks until they were indistinguishably mixed, as a desirable goal, and further asserted that this was the goal of the Republican Party. The pamphlet was a hoax, concocted by Democrats.
After the Second World War, an increasing number of states repealed their anti-miscegenation laws. In 1967, in Loving v. Virginia, the remaining anti-miscegenation laws were held to be unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States. Similar laws were also enforced in Nazi Germany as part of the Nuremberg laws, and in South Africa as part of the system of Apartheid.
The Daily Omnivore 
Leave a comment