:00:00. > :00:19.Welcome to HARDtalk, I'm Stephen Sackur. What gives us our sense of
:00:20. > :00:24.who we are? Well, our upbringing, our communities both have a huge
:00:25. > :00:29.impact, but the most basic pillars of identity we tend to regard as
:00:30. > :00:37.immutable - our gender, our race. At least, most of us do. But not my
:00:38. > :00:42.guest today. As part of the BBC's special identity season, she's
:00:43. > :00:45.Rachel Dolezal, the ostensibly black American human rights activist,
:00:46. > :00:51.whose life unravelled last year when it turned out she was the daughter
:00:52. > :00:52.of white parents. Is our racial identity something we can define for
:00:53. > :01:26.ourselves? Rachel Dolezal, welcome to HARDtalk.
:01:27. > :01:32.Thank you. Let's begin with the here and now. You have been through the
:01:33. > :01:37.most tumultuous, difficult year. You have, in certain sections of the
:01:38. > :01:39.American media, being vilified, you've lost friends - just explain
:01:40. > :01:47.to me what life is like for you today? Well, certainly, it is
:01:48. > :01:53.different than it was a year ago, the same time. It's different in
:01:54. > :01:59.that I'm not able to do the same work that I was doing, which was
:02:00. > :02:04.very active in racial and social justice work with NAACP, with the
:02:05. > :02:09.police ombudsman commission. And to remind people who don't know, you
:02:10. > :02:10.were president of the Spokane Washington State chapter of the
:02:11. > :02:12.National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, it
:02:13. > :02:17.was an important position. Right. Absolutely at the centre of local
:02:18. > :02:23.civil rights issues? Right. And in an unpaid position, along with the
:02:24. > :02:27.other unpaid position I was in over at the time was the chair of the
:02:28. > :02:31.police ombudsman commission for the city, for police accountability and
:02:32. > :02:36.transparency. Which is, again, another national civil rights issue
:02:37. > :02:39.going on in America. And my other two jobs, the ones that were paid,
:02:40. > :02:49.were being a professor of black studies at the Eastern Washington
:02:50. > :02:54.University Africana programme, and also I was writing for The Inlander.
:02:55. > :02:59.And you lost all those positions, one way or another you lost them
:03:00. > :03:04.this all? Right. And how do you make money today? To be quite honest, I'm
:03:05. > :03:08.running right up to the end of my unemployment, and have just secured
:03:09. > :03:15.a book deal so I will be writing through the summer for that but it
:03:16. > :03:19.has been very tight circumstances financially for the last year. For
:03:20. > :03:24.an outsider like me, it seems, in a sense, straightforward. You lost all
:03:25. > :03:28.those positions and you ran into a storm of controversy because you had
:03:29. > :03:35.passed yourself off as something you were not - that is, a black American
:03:36. > :03:38.woman activist, when, obviously, you were a woman activist but it seems
:03:39. > :03:52.you weren't black in the way people thought you were. Well, I guess some
:03:53. > :03:56.people treated June --ed the media expose about my identity, a big
:03:57. > :03:59.frenzy, as like an outing - like, I was outed as a white woman.
:04:00. > :04:06.Personally, how I experienced it was more that it wasn't a coming out, it
:04:07. > :04:12.was being put back in the closet, only a closet that has glass walls.
:04:13. > :04:15.I mean, really, it was being told - the world being told that I was
:04:16. > :04:24.something that I'm not, that I don't identify as. So, uhm, I felt like it
:04:25. > :04:29.was really not the entire world's business who my biological parents
:04:30. > :04:35.were or how I was born or what my whole childhood story was. But I
:04:36. > :04:39.guess the point was, and you outline them in the posts you have, an
:04:40. > :04:43.academic study of race issues, you had those posts and were appointed
:04:44. > :04:46.to them on the basis that you were a black American. But then, you know,
:04:47. > :04:55.pictures came out of... Well, not necessarily. I mean, you know, for
:04:56. > :05:01.example, there's no qualification for the NAACP that you have to be
:05:02. > :05:04.black in order to be president of a NAACP chapter and there's not an
:05:05. > :05:08.application - it is an elected office. I guess, no, obviously it's
:05:09. > :05:13.true, there's no requirement that you have to be, but your back story
:05:14. > :05:16.and the way you presented yourself on social media and everything else
:05:17. > :05:23.suggested that you were sort of biologically black, you know. You
:05:24. > :05:29.presented pictures of a man who you described as your father, who was a
:05:30. > :05:32.black individual. You presented pictures of your son, you said he
:05:33. > :05:37.was your son, and he was clearly a black young man. But he wasn't your
:05:38. > :05:41.biological son as it turned out. I mean, these, to many people, seemed
:05:42. > :05:46.like deceptions. Right, I understand that that's how it seemed to people.
:05:47. > :05:55.But I - I don't believe that those actually were presented in a way -
:05:56. > :05:59.you know, I regret that my story was handled in a way that created a
:06:00. > :06:10.larger misunderstanding about who I really am as a person. And, yes, I
:06:11. > :06:13.still do have a father figure who is not biologically my father, but I
:06:14. > :06:20.call him "Dad", and my son, you know, still is my son, and I have
:06:21. > :06:29.documentation of having full custody of him and legally how that came
:06:30. > :06:33.about... Legally, I know you have full custody of him, but... Right.
:06:34. > :06:37... He in fact was the adopted brother of yours, he was adopted by
:06:38. > :06:45.your white parents. As an infant. That's right. He's my son. That
:06:46. > :06:49.makes sense to you? He's my son. Yeah I mean, biological or not, he's
:06:50. > :06:53.my son. People, including me, of course, researching this, people
:06:54. > :07:02.have seen the pictures of you as a girl, you know, a blonde, Montana
:07:03. > :07:06.girl. Your parents say, you know, "We're completely of European stock,
:07:07. > :07:13.Czech and German stock". Explain to me, how as a girl and a young woman,
:07:14. > :07:19.you became so sure that your self-perception, your identity, was
:07:20. > :07:24.that of a black person? Well, it's... It's really something that's
:07:25. > :07:32.always been with me. From as early as I can remember, I saw myself as
:07:33. > :07:36.black. And I think that some people still are perpetuating black as
:07:37. > :07:42.under kind of a colonnial definition of something that is only racialised
:07:43. > :07:54.physical features, but with regard to the larger, broader definition of
:07:55. > :07:57."Black" being a state of mind or "White" being a state of mind, or
:07:58. > :08:01.philosophy, culture, all of these things kind of interacting, this is
:08:02. > :08:04.how I saw myself as a young girl, this is kind of always something
:08:05. > :08:15.that has resonated with me and nurtured me and so ... But if - if
:08:16. > :08:19.black is a state of mind in your view, I'm wondering why it was so
:08:20. > :08:23.important for you, as you grew up into womanhood, that you appeared to
:08:24. > :08:29.work very hard in terms of physical appearance to promote certain, you
:08:30. > :08:35.know, aspects of your appearance that made it seem you were more
:08:36. > :08:40.African American. I mean, I'm thinking of the braided hair, I'm
:08:41. > :08:44.thinking of the colouring, I think, perhaps, it was spray tan, I don't
:08:45. > :08:48.know what it was, but you physically changed from when you were much
:08:49. > :08:53.younger and I'm wondering, if it's all about a state of mind, why you
:08:54. > :08:57.needed to do that? Well, what anybody else needs to do is up to
:08:58. > :09:02.them, but why I do my hair how I do my hair is because I've done black
:09:03. > :09:08.hair for 20 years. I love textured hair. I love to braid. And so, you
:09:09. > :09:15.know, over the last couple of decades, that's, uhm, how I feel
:09:16. > :09:24.most beautiful. Did it worry you that you knew some people were being
:09:25. > :09:29.misled by things you were saying and doing? You know, they clearly
:09:30. > :09:34.believed you were African American in extraction and you were not, and
:09:35. > :09:38.you didn't correct them. I mean, did you ever feel you ought to? Did you
:09:39. > :09:41.ever feel awkward about what was going on, as your life developed and
:09:42. > :09:48.more and more people assumed you were something you were not? Well,
:09:49. > :09:52.again, assuming that I'm something that I'm not - I mean, I do identify
:09:53. > :09:58.as black, so it didn't bother me that people saw me as black. I
:09:59. > :10:02.really do think that, when it comes down to it at the end of the day, we
:10:03. > :10:06.all should be free to be exactly who we are, and when it comes to
:10:07. > :10:12.identity, that's a very personal experience. I'm just wondering, it's
:10:13. > :10:16.such an interesting phrase, "I identified as black, I felt black".
:10:17. > :10:20.I mean, if I'm just thinking of myself, obviously, I live in the UK,
:10:21. > :10:25.not in the United States, it's somewhat different, but if I were to
:10:26. > :10:28.say to myself, "I identify as white", I wouldn't really know what
:10:29. > :10:31.I meant by that. It's such a broad and general thing to say, I don't
:10:32. > :10:37.know what it would mean. What does it mean to you to say, "I identified
:10:38. > :10:43.as black"? Right. Well, for me, blackness is not, again, reduced to
:10:44. > :10:54.racialised physical features. It has to do with knowing your belonging -
:10:55. > :10:55.my belonging within the pan-African diaspora and representing
:10:56. > :10:59.psychological decolonnialisation of the mind as well as acknowledging
:11:00. > :11:04.and embodying common African history and an SESry. So, in that sense you
:11:05. > :11:09.are saying all of us - because humanity is believed to have
:11:10. > :11:12.originated, what, in east Africa, you're saying, "I feel that
:11:13. > :11:16.resonance, that connection to Africa", even though... Well,
:11:17. > :11:19.eventually, we all go back to a black mother, if we believe science
:11:20. > :11:28.to be true that we all came out of the African continent. Right, so you
:11:29. > :11:34.do feel to be African diaspora. I mean, I've never thought that way, I
:11:35. > :11:37.guess I self-identify as white, but you feel that Africanness, do you?
:11:38. > :11:40.Absolutely. I mean, in the last several hundred years there has been
:11:41. > :11:45.a great deal of oppression surrounding the behaviour of
:11:46. > :11:49.classification with regard to race and even the definition of a race as
:11:50. > :12:00.a world view and so I think that that particular mindset of some
:12:01. > :12:01.groups being superior, inferior and classification for administrative
:12:02. > :12:06.purposes and for social purposes has become very painful, you know,
:12:07. > :12:12.there's a very - several hundred years of a very painful history with
:12:13. > :12:15.regards to that. So - but at the end of the day, science has proven over
:12:16. > :12:20.and over again that there is no biological premise or basis for
:12:21. > :12:28.race. So, you know, what do we have then? We have kind of an imperative
:12:29. > :12:32.to do difference differently. You know, if we're going to keep
:12:33. > :12:36.grouping people, then, you know, what are we grouping them for? Are
:12:37. > :12:40.we grouping individuals into categories where there's, like,
:12:41. > :12:43.cultural bonding or language similarity or, you know, what are we
:12:44. > :12:51.doing? Are we doing to actually leverage power and priflg all over
:12:52. > :12:58.again? -- privilege all over again, like the colonnial era, like u --
:12:59. > :13:02.eugenics. You've clearly thought about this a lot and very hard, but
:13:03. > :13:06.does it bother you that so many black activists and even friends of
:13:07. > :13:14.your in the civil rights community, academics, simply don't buy your
:13:15. > :13:19.explanation for your behaviours and your feelings? I will just quote
:13:20. > :13:22.one, Gary Young, he is a leading black writer and commentator in the
:13:23. > :13:25.UK but has lived a lot of his life in the United States. He has thought
:13:26. > :13:30.a lot about your situation and says, "Rachel is a white woman who
:13:31. > :13:34.identifies closely with the black community, but that does not make
:13:35. > :13:38.her black". And I guess a lot of people would feel the same? Well, I
:13:39. > :13:44.think people are weighing in on this on both sides. So some people are
:13:45. > :13:48.saying, you know, kind of in support and solidarity, we understand that
:13:49. > :13:53.this is actually innate, this is who she is. And then there are other
:13:54. > :14:00.people saying, that this is actually not who she is and kind of demanding
:14:01. > :14:08.that I somehow re-classify myself or change my identity. I guess what
:14:09. > :14:12.he's saying, in a way, is this. That, you know, given from a very
:14:13. > :14:16.young age our affinity with the black community, your care for
:14:17. > :14:18.issues of civil rights, your perception that many black Americans
:14:19. > :14:22.were disadvantaged and your desire to work with those communities to
:14:23. > :14:26.raise them up, all of that people can understand very clearly. But a
:14:27. > :14:29.lot of other people identifying themselves as white people feel the
:14:30. > :14:32.same way and commit themselves to working with the black community,
:14:33. > :14:38.living in the black community, maybe some marrying black men, as, indeed,
:14:39. > :14:43.you did - but they don't feel that they have to present themselves as
:14:44. > :14:46.black. That's the step you took that others who feel the same way as you
:14:47. > :14:54.don't take. And I think everybody has the right to be exactly who they
:14:55. > :14:57.are and so I'm not - I don't think that one individual's story needs to
:14:58. > :15:04.be copied and pasted on to everybody else. So I'm not saying that there
:15:05. > :15:09.aren't white mothers that, you know, have successfully raised black kids,
:15:10. > :15:11.or that there are no white activists that have done important work, in
:15:12. > :15:17.fact the NAACP was founded by a majority of white -identifying
:15:18. > :15:21.individuals in the United States. So, uhm - but this is who I am. This
:15:22. > :15:28.is how I feel most beautiful, wearing my hair, this is who I
:15:29. > :15:35.identify to be on a very deep, core level. And I think, in as much as it
:15:36. > :15:39.wouldn't be my place to say what somebody else should do, I find it
:15:40. > :15:44.odd that people that don't know me... But does it upset you that a
:15:45. > :15:47.lot of people who have been most critical of you have been black
:15:48. > :15:50.Americans? Actually, I don't know that that's true. Well... There have
:15:51. > :15:55.been some critical black Americans, but there have also been some... Who
:15:56. > :16:02.I hear from with the most hate is, you know, white supremacy groups. So
:16:03. > :16:06.there are a lot of ... Uhm, white individuals who are very angry and
:16:07. > :16:13.feel that I have somehow been a traitor from -- from the black
:16:14. > :16:18.community, one thing that I do really hear that bothers me is that
:16:19. > :16:25.somehow I am, you know, the face of white privilege and ... Well, what
:16:26. > :16:30.they say - they say a couple of things that seem to me important.
:16:31. > :16:37.One is - and we'll get to the privilege point in a second, but one
:16:38. > :16:41.thing they say which revives the trope of the black face, white
:16:42. > :16:45.people blacking up in some sense to entertain or to mock the black
:16:46. > :16:47.experience - some black people say that there's something deeply
:16:48. > :16:52.uncomfortable about what you do because, by using colouring and
:16:53. > :16:55.presenting with the hair, which to most people looks like a style that
:16:56. > :16:56.is usuallily adopted by black people, they see a connection to
:16:57. > :17:19.that horrible past. I understand that there is an
:17:20. > :17:27.incredibly painful history with But I do not dress in black face.
:17:28. > :17:32.That was some of the first statement is ever made in the press, that this
:17:33. > :17:38.was a mockery or whatever. But, black face is something that is used
:17:39. > :17:44.to make fun of, to belittle, to drive that pain and historical
:17:45. > :17:56.oppression deeper. That is not, it doesn't in any way connect with
:17:57. > :18:00.the... It must hurt you when you read this. Absolutely. There is
:18:01. > :18:04.plenty of pain to go around. There is a lot of pain from where those
:18:05. > :18:08.statements are coming from. I want to acknowledge that paying because I
:18:09. > :18:14.might have my own personal pain, but the larger history of cultural
:18:15. > :18:20.appropriation and mockery and black face, I spent hundreds of hours
:18:21. > :18:39.doing other black women's care. Brady and styling... -- hair --
:18:40. > :18:44.braiding. There is a fundamental difference because you are white and
:18:45. > :18:49.you can make the choice to be black. The editor of union Station magazine
:18:50. > :18:53.wrote about your case and she said, to believe that one can transfer 1's
:18:54. > :18:57.identity in this way is eight privilege, maybe even the highest
:18:58. > :19:01.manifestation of white privilege. The ability to accept
:19:02. > :19:04.marginalisation, to take on the identity of blackness, without truly
:19:05. > :19:09.living the burdens of it and always knowing that you could escape it on
:19:10. > :19:18.a whim, that is not a true transition to blackness. Well, once
:19:19. > :19:24.again, I regret that people don't understand what I've lived. I have
:19:25. > :19:32.taken the good with the bad. Meaning that I have taken half the salary of
:19:33. > :19:36.a someone who had the exact same job description, the man before me
:19:37. > :19:41.described me as a college girl and I took half the salary for the same
:19:42. > :19:46.job. Cops have marked black on my traffic tickets. There are ways in
:19:47. > :19:52.which I have experienced racism being seen. Identity is not just
:19:53. > :20:00.what box a cheque or how I self identify, it is also based on power
:20:01. > :20:05.and privilege dynamics, which people are acting out. There are ways in
:20:06. > :20:14.which I have been treated by others who see me as black, and I haven't,
:20:15. > :20:21.in those cases, I didn't interrupt the processes and say excuse me, I
:20:22. > :20:38.want to rent an apartment so why will be whiter. I ... You don't say,
:20:39. > :20:43.hold on, I am white. Exactly. I have raised my children to be committed
:20:44. > :20:46.to fight for total freedom and justice and equality for black
:20:47. > :20:56.people around the world. I think that within the All Black, for me to
:20:57. > :21:04.then somehow be seen as the face of white privilege is very painful. It
:21:05. > :21:13.is not representative of my life and when it comes to... I think your
:21:14. > :21:19.question was twofold. There is my experience but there is also the
:21:20. > :21:26.experience of people who are assuming... It was about the
:21:27. > :21:30.privilege of choice. There is a long history of passing, which is
:21:31. > :21:35.different in identifying hours. There is a long history of lack
:21:36. > :21:45.people passing for white in America in order to... Get on. Yes, survive.
:21:46. > :21:50.I think there is a range of light-skinned privilege. You could
:21:51. > :21:56.say that as far as having the choice. I. You because we are almost
:21:57. > :22:00.at a time. Some personal questions. Do you have any regrets about what
:22:01. > :22:10.you've done? I am thinking particularly about the fact that you
:22:11. > :22:16.are estranged from your biological white parents. Some of your adoptive
:22:17. > :22:20.siblings who are black, they say they don't understand what you have
:22:21. > :22:28.done. Do you have regrets on a personal basis? As far as, do I
:22:29. > :22:36.regret... The pain that I imagine it has caused to your parents? I am not
:22:37. > :22:40.going to talk about my parents. That's just not a subject that I
:22:41. > :22:44.talk about. It is personal and I'm not going to talk about that. I will
:22:45. > :22:49.say that I do regret any pain that it has caused anybody else, all
:22:50. > :22:56.people feel like it has caused. I feel like a lot of that pain is
:22:57. > :23:02.based on misunderstanding with regards to some of the family
:23:03. > :23:06.dynamics -- or. Family dynamics have sometimes created those divisions,
:23:07. > :23:13.those are deeply personal and something that maybe in time...
:23:14. > :23:17.There is a lot of pain there. They will become more understood, but it
:23:18. > :23:24.is nobody 's business what has splintered the family apart. But a
:23:25. > :23:30.lot of pain? Yes, there is a lot of pain. Today, are you truly
:23:31. > :23:35.comfortable in your own skin? I am comfortable being who I am, I am not
:23:36. > :23:42.sure that the world is comfortable with that yet. Time will tell if we
:23:43. > :23:47.can reconcile how I identify and how people see who I am. Rachel Dolezal,
:23:48. > :23:51.thank you very much for being on HARDtalk.