Self Identification

Q: (?@utne) Could you tell us how race travels over networks?

A: People generally self-identify when it comes down to it, although some folks purposefully spoof their racial identity. There are a great number of conversations around the subject of race in which identity plays a small or no part, but then there are many in which the experience of reckoning with one's racial identity directly effects one's credibility. In my net experience, whitefolks generally show up as literarily white when those kinds of subjects arise.

As for spoofing, it never completely suceeds. Americans are more aware of race than they think, even though they do less hard thinking about race than they are generally aware.