‘Able to identify with anything’: racial identity choices among ‘coloureds’ as shaped by the South African racial state

ABSTRACT

The Apartheid South African state crafted Coloured racial identities through a powerful racial project that signified and positioned them as a group that was both neither and between White and Black. Non-Racialism in post-Apartheid South Africa has, however, loosened the role of the state in making race. So how has the transition of the state impacted ‘Coloured’ racial identities today? Informed by both macro-level theories of racial formation and micro-level theories of racial identities, I examine racial identity choices as constrained by the state among 50 adults. I find identities choices are influenced by transformations in the racial state: racialisation via reappropriating ‘Coloured’; re-formation and joining of ‘Black’; racial uplift construction as ‘Khoisan’; and a non-racialist approach to identity as ‘Human’. I argue transformations of the racial state shape, or even lead to, a transition in racial identities and therefore clarify theorises of co-constructed racial identity formations.

KEYWORDS:

• Coloured south africans
• racial identity
• racial formation
• South Africa
• racial state
• Khosian

Introduction

The Coloured¹ racial category in South Africa is often used as an example of how a state might make race² (i.e. Du Pre, 1992). As written into law through the 1950 Population Registration Act – linchpin legislation that helped set in motion South Africa’s Apartheid system by defining race for its population – to be Coloured was to be ‘a person who is not a white person or a native’ Black/African. It was the act that helped formalise a legalised racial identity for a people that were defined by being neither/nor. ³ The naming of racial groups by the Apartheid state worked to facilitate a racial identity among members by becoming common sense (Posel 2001). Coloured as a racial label is now most used for South Africans unable to fit into definitions of White or Black including those with mixed-race and the Cape Malays, Namas, Koranas, and Griquas, for example (Adhikari 2005; Lewis 1987).

Apartheid officially ended in 1994 and South Africa underwent a massive transformation, moving away from a white supremacist, explicitly racist state to a democratic racial state. By naming contemporary South Africa as a racial state, I am referring to the way the modern state continues to regulate and insinuate race throughout all institutions according to racial hierarchies (Coates 2018, 47). The difference is the contemporary racial state’s disavowal of overt racism and its support of non-racialism, which pulls from colour-blind racial frames and refers to an ideology that seeks to diminish the relevance of race in everyday life (Ansell 2006; Whitehead 2012). For example, the post-Apartheid state generally moved to not legislate race, shifting to self-classification of race on forms and in censuses – except in how it attempted to address racial redress. Two laws were created to do just that, the Employment Equity Act (EEA) and Broad-Base Black Economic Empowerment Act (BEE), outlined affirmation/equity action policies for ‘“Black people”’ or ‘a generic term which means Africans, Coloureds and Indians’ (BEE Section 1); hereby rewriting Coloureds as Black in the law (Pirtle 2020).

How are these racial categorisation changes at the state level felt by South Africans? In particular, how has the transition impacted Coloured racial identities in post-Apartheid South Africa? Informed by critical race and social psychological scholars who conceptualise racial identity as a multidimensional, transitional, and varied phenomenological experience (Rockquemore and Brunsma 2008; Tatum 2003), and racial formation scholars who argue such identities are shaped by the state (Omi and Winant, 2015; Marx, 1998), I interrogate racial self-identity choices of 50 South African adults who were previously identified as Coloured to uncover the ways they talk about themselves in relation to past histories and changing state conventions.

Theoretical and conceptual frameworks

Racial formation and racial identity options

According to Omi and Winant’s racial formation theory (Omi and Winant, 2015), racial projects are defined as ‘simultaneously an interpretation, representation, or explanation of racial identities and meanings, and an effort to organize and distribute resources (economic, political, cultural) along particular racial lines’ (125). Accordingly, once the ideas about race and racial hierarchies are learned they become embedded into the social structure (Treitler 2013), a process called racialisation. Racial formation theory tends to locate the state, or racialised social system, as the eminent macrostructure that makes race (see also Bonilla-Silva 1999 and Marx 1998). The theory suggests that through racialisation processes, racial categories, as ascribed by the state, can shift from being a social descriptor and organising principle, to a racial identity.

As applied to South Africa, Apartheid laws both explained racial identities and meanings, and organised resources by rigid racial lines; allocating money, power, and prestige to the White minority, stripping the large Black/African population of all of these things, and leaving Coloured South Africans as a buffer group between the two (Adhikari 2005; Frederickson 1981; Marx 1998). Apartheid was a pernicious, racist racial project that institutionalised race and racial hierarchies to the highest degree; everyone knew who they were and what that meant for their life chances and individual identifications (Posel 2001).

Perhaps especially so for Coloured South Africans, whose racial construction was heavily crafted by the state through the naming as neither Black nor White (Du Pre, 1992; Goldin 1987). Some academics have argued, for instance, that ‘the legitimacy of defining [Coloureds] as a group rests solely on the power of the state’ (qtd in Lewis 1987, 3–4). However, and according to Adhikari (2005) in Not White Enough, Not Black Enough, the claim of the state in crafting race for Coloureds under-emphasises group processes and autonomy (see Lewis 1987; Van Der Ross 1986). This critique is shared by others in relation to how macro level theorising over-emphasises the significance of imposed racial categories in peoples’ lives and personal identities (Loveman 1999).

Theories of identity options, on the other hand, stem from social psychological frameworks that see the crafting of racial identities as more interpersonal and interactional processes, one in which a person defines for oneself the personal significance and social meaning of belonging to a particular racial category, and can be dynamic overtime (Tatum 2003). Put another way, racial identities can be considered the construction of race among individuals.

Given the flexibility that accompanies increased complexity of mixed race (Root 1996, xxiv) and other liminal racial groups, like Coloureds, research on these populations tend to reveal a greater fluidity of racial options (i.e. Daniel 2007; Telles and Sue 2009). For instance, Rockquemore and Brunsma’s (2008) study of Black-White biracial identity in the U.S. led to the creation of a ‘taxonomy of racial identity options’ including: a singular monoracial identity; a border identity as biracial; a protean identity that changes depending on context; or a transcendent identity that rejects racial categories. In addition, the propensity to have a change in racial identification over time, as well as heighted experiences of invalidation of identity options from others (see, Sims and Njaka 2020; Pirtle and Brown 2016) contributes to the complexity of their own racial constructions.

However, a limitation of the micro approach to exploring racial identities is the emphasis on the individual, which sometimes fails to fully critique the social environment that marks race and constrains the identity options available (Song 2003; Telles and Sue 2009). Thus, some scholars suggest a synthesis (Adhikari 2005; Sims and Njaka 2020; Song 2003). For example, Song (2003) identifies an array of factors that structure’s individuals’ options to identify as a racial or ethnic group, based on their class, gender, etc., and argues that it varies by national context. Her analysis leads her to differentiate between racial identity assignment by the state, and racial identity assertion by the people.

Changing coloured racial identity choices in the New South Africa

In general, recent research on Coloured identities today suggest that the ‘groupness’ that was solidified during Apartheid may not fully capture differences in Coloureds’ phenomenology of race today (Adhikari 2005; Erasmus 2001; Jackson 2003). For instance, Erasmus’s (2001) put forth a taxonomy of racial identity options for Coloureds. This taxonomy emphasises personal significance and suggests Coloured identity ranges from striving towards Whiteness, eagerness to be authentically Black, clinging to Khoisan history, or by trying to transcend racial categories, often signalled by qualifying their Coloured identification with ‘so-called’ (Erasmus 2001). Thinking about societal constraints, Ruiter (2009) pulls from social and political movements occurring before and after the 1994 election to suggest a slightly different variation in Coloured phenomenologies, arguing that some opt for essentialist Coloured identity, others an identity attached to the history of enslavement and abolition through the December 1st movement, some identify with creole or African, and even others adopt Khoisan.

While helpful to think about both the flexibility and complexity of Coloured identities in post-Apartheid, these identity perspectives lack a strong engagement with the state. Working in Adhikari’s (2005) proposed social constructionism approach to understanding Coloured identity – a synthesised analysis that emphasises social identity formation and thus accounts for historical, political, interpersonal, and social influences – I contribute by presenting an analysis of Colouredness by focusing on the macrostructures and policies that shapes the bounds in which identities are (re)formed and constructed by individuals. Whereas there was forced congruence during Apartheid, there is still much to be reconciled between assignment and assertion for Coloured South Africans today.

Materials and methods

I conducted interviews with 50 adults in Cape Town, South Africa during summer 2015 and winter 2018. Participants ranged from 18 to 82; though the median age was 36 and 94% of the sample was between 20 and 53 years of age. Fifty-eight percent of the sample identified as women, and 42% men. About a third of the sample were employed full time, another third reported contract and/or self-employment work, and the remainder were unemployed at the time of interview (22%), retired, or students. One participant had an advanced degree, 14% had a bachelor’s degree, 26% had some college experience or an advanced certificate, 32% had matriculated (12^th grade equivalent), 18% had less than matric and the remaining did not report. Eighteen percent of the sample self-reported their class status to be poor, nearly half of the sample reported working-class status (44%), about a quarter middle-class status (26%), whereas 6% reported to be upper middle class.

I selected Cape Town as my site given the immense Coloured history of that region (Jackson 2003). One participant summed up their view of the area: ‘there is more space to be Coloured in Cape Town’. The University of Cape Town (UCT), and the Centre for Social Science Research (CSSR), served as my host support (and validated my U.S. based IRB # 15–0016). CSSR helped facilitate my connection to a research assistant, a formerly identified ‘Coloured’ and current community activist, who helped recruit from his networks through word-of-mouth and utilisation of listservs for Coloured and Khoisan community groups. To ensure variation and breadth in my sample I also used snowball sampling techniques, as well as posting flyers around UCT. I recruited participants who either identified as Coloured or had been identified as Coloured. The recruitment language encouraged those with varying affinity to ‘Coloured’ to agree to be interviewed. Participants were compensated for their time.

My interview schedule captured a phenomenological exploration of the lived experience of racial identity. I employed a grounded approach to data analysis (Glaser and Strauss [1967] 2009). which allowed unanticipated themes and patterns to emerge alongside what the literature suggests (i.e. Erasmus 2001; Rockquemore and Brunsma 2008). Through my qualitative analysis, I identify a revised taxonomy of racial identity choices among those labelled as Coloured and focus most prominently on the way racial constructions are formed through individuals in interaction with the state, and additionally highlight how other social factors shape contemporary racial identity constructions.

Results and discussion

All respondents completed a short demographic survey. Of my 50 participants, 28 or 56% self-identified as Coloured on the form. Eight identified as Black/African. Four people wrote human in the ‘other’ option. Another 16 participants, 32%, wrote in some derivative of Khoisan in this ‘other’ category.⁴ The distribution reveals that racial identities are complex, especially so for Coloured South Africans, whose category has been shaped by multiple, competing racial re-formation processes.

What my interview conversations further revealed is an even more complex overlap between these identities. For instance, some who checked Coloured expressed that they disliked the Coloured racial label, while someone else who identified as human might talk about being Coloured. This slippage is reminiscent of the protean identity that Rockquemore and Brunsma (2008) found, but even less constrained; changing racial identities based on context and even through one conversation.

Coloured maintained through racialisation

Despite the dismantling of the Coloured legal identity at the state level, the Coloured racial identity remains a strong part of everyday experience (Posel 2001). Racialisation’s effect means race persists without explicit naming and organising, through embeddedness in social systems (Bonilla-Silva 1997; Omi and Winant, 2015). The majority of respondents who identify as Coloured, and the way they attach meaning to the identity, illustrates the impact of racialisation and the maintenance of Coloured in individuals’ lives.

This taken-for-granted nature of the identity resonated for my participants. There was not a lot of teaching of how to be Coloured, because it was the norm. Most never left their racially segregated Coloured communities, and Black and White people rarely came in. Lydia, a 25-year-old writer and comedian, explains: ‘Being Coloured was always – it wasn’t something you discussed. It’s just something that we were’. Out of all of the folks I interviewed, about 90% would have considered themselves Coloured at the time they first learned about race and this often went unquestioned until approaching adulthood.

Despite not having strong instruction on what it is to be a Coloured, those that identify as Coloured typically feel strong as doing so. Khusi is proud to be Coloured, and to be a Cape Muslim in particular. Khusi, age 35 and currently unemployed, says: ‘Being Coloured is who I am. It is my existence … my heart beats Coloured’. She goes on to deliberately distinguish Coloured from other groups, by situating how Coloured pulls from Black and White. She says, ‘I can say with pride that I am … I’m a Coloured. … I’m in the middle. This makes me mixed. I’m Coloured, and, yes, this is great to be Coloured’. For Khusi, having roots tied to both Black and White was an asset attached to Coloured that she carried with pride.

Those who identify as Coloured are fully aware of the tensions within their declarations of pride attached to that label, especially considering the post-Apartheid state legislative decision to redefine Coloureds as generic Black South Africans according to the BBE. Chrissy, a 30-year-old general manager unequivocally touted her Colouredness and rejects any negative connotation to the label. And when pressing her to consider changes in post-Apartheid she says,

“I don’t have an issue with falling under a category [Black] cuz in—what I believe in my heart and in my mind is I’m a Coloured— and if a paper’s gonna say something, it’s not gonna determine who I am. Not that I don’t care, but it doesn’t have an effect on what I am as a person— so if the term or the, uhm, legal name is to say that I’m Black— that’s fine. I feel that I’m Coloured. … It’s like I’m not White, but I’m not Black, either. And that’s how I’m going to live my life.”

Chrissy sees a defining feature of being Coloured as being between Black and White, and embraces it in a way similar to Khusi – a similarity they share despite their significant class differences. In addition, the quotes reveal identifying as Coloured today is an act of resistance. It rejects the new South Africa’s vision of just White and Black and rather proclaims that Coloured is here to stay, independent of any new laws.

Earnst also situates his identity as being tied to the South African state, but specifically ties it back to days of Apartheid. He shared that he first learned about Coloured when he had to join his parents at the ‘Coloured affairs office’. Earnst is 36, has a university degree, and is currently unemployed. He shared how his learning of Coloured through interactions with the government agencies meant he associated it with a marginalised status. He shared, ‘but it did effect one in a sense that it was being marginalized, so your group that you belong to are being margin – subject to marginalization. … [it makes you ask] why am I in this group? I wish I was never this because this is the reason why I’m suffering, because I’m Coloured’. The realisation of marginalisation came about at the Coloured affairs office; he perceived a group of phenotypically diverse looking people, but most of them appeared to be economically deprived. That meant, if the only similarities between these group of people was the label and that they were poor, then perhaps being labelled as Coloured meant you were deprived.

Despite this initial understanding of Coloured, he believes that in post-Apartheid South Africa, there is opportunity to shift the narrative.

“But I think at the end of the day when there’s liberation, one could embrace the idea and get a new understanding [of] what Coloured means. … one can take a concept and put meaning to it the way you want to … you [rid] yourself from those negative influence and negative instruments, too, that idea and concept of identity as being Coloured—that’s how I got a new understanding about being Coloured. And also means understanding that an identity is something that is fluid. It’s not fixed.”

So here, Earnst had to rid himself of negative connotations of feeling marginalised because of his racial label as Coloured and attach more positive meaning to it. For him, identity is fluid. Not just in the way that it might change over time – he is still Coloured – but also how the meaning of it might change over time. This is an example of trans-coding strategies explained by race scholar Stuart Hall (1997, 270); a way of challenging the dominant and negative representations of race and reappropriating the category with new, positive meanings.

For the slight majority of my participants, the state’s race-making of Coloured that happened long ago has made Coloured a fact for them, their lives, and their identity. The racialisation process persists, though it might adapt in interesting ways at changing times, it remains meaningful and something to hold on to, even when the state writes it away. In this way, Coloured can be conceived of as essentialist (Ruiter 2009) but not rooted in the idea of race purity, but rather as a label that is essentially theirs to do as they please.

Identifying as Coloured cut across variation within participants’ social demographics. However, although I spoke with participants that had few economic and educational resources and who identified unequivocally as Coloured, a majority of my participants who identify as middle class (10 of the 13) also identify as Coloured. Adhikari (2005) argues an attachment to a Coloured identity is a hold on to the relative privilege that was guaranteed by the Apartheid state. Those with middle class status are able to experience that privilege, which could explain their affinity to the identity and continued racialisation processes that maintain the racial order.

Re-formation as Black

Not only did the state diminish the use of the Coloured label in legislation, it also re-signified Coloureds as Black South Africans in post-Apartheid legislation. Moreover, the BEE considers Coloureds a part of the Black ‘designated group’ for redress in employment as a means to address persistent racial inequality among non-White South Africans. As a result, post-Apartheid South Africa opened the door for a potential re-formation process as Black (Pirtle 2020). Whereas the state-level utilisation of an inclusive Black is more recent, the Black Consciousness Movement, led by the admired anti-Apartheid activist Steve Biko, was also an early driver in extending the inclusivity of Black to all persons of colour as a way to mobilise against White supremacy. According to Biko (1973) Black consciousness (BC) is ‘those who are by law or tradition politically, economically, and socially discriminated against as a group in the South African society and identifying themselves as a unit in the struggle towards the realization of their aspirations’.

Moesha, a 33-year-old call centre worker, explained, ‘I identify with being Black South African because-because I’m a person of colour firstly’. She went on to say, ‘Where I go in the world, I will be Black. No matter what I do, I’ll be Black. And in my own country, my own heart, I’m Black … . We all need to recognise our Blackness, cuz it’s-it’s a strength’. Glenda, a 40-year-old office administrator, said she was an adult when she made the transition from identifying as Coloured to Black, ‘That is when I realized, you know, there is no such thing as Coloured. For me, personally, we are Black … You are either White or you’re Black’. What was attractive about the Black label was the idea of a community and unity, a strong political identity, and one that was well recognised within South Africa.

Despite being surrounded by Coloured-identifying family and friends, Rissa said she always sort of had a ‘Black consciousness from a very young age’. I probed Rissa, a 22-year-old university student, even more, asking specifically about forms: ‘Most of the time I check Black. There are times when for instance if I have to apply for work like an employment process – I do put Coloured because I understand why they need to know’. Her checking Coloured for work purposes is not because she identifies as such, but she understands there are racial equity reports and doesn’t want to take up space that she believes is not for her. Many respondents, like Rissa, that chose a Black racial identification on the form did cite Black consciousness as instrumental in their identity in some way. It is non-coincidental that the majority of these respondents had formal post-secondary education or extensive reading in Black radical thought that likely exposed them to more of this ideology.

In addition, for some, having a Black identity also allows them to push back at the state – not for the re-writing Coloured as Black, but for the initial creation of ‘Coloured’. Carl, a 41-year-old Bush doctor, tells me:

“In South Africa, there’s no external influence that makes us Coloured. We’re all Coloured because that is what they named us. … We didn’t have a Black mother and a White father or the opposite. We didn’t have a mixed race descendent. … [But] in the Black consciousness era, we were all Black and African.”

In our conversation, Carl explicitly calls out the Apartheid regimen as ‘creating’ a group of people, of constructing Coloured. For Carl then, in the new South Africa, there is no reason to be Coloured. In contrast, being Black and African is an identity that all can be a part of. On this topic, Carl goes on to address the legislation, saying: ‘In our Constitution, they use the term Black. Yeah, that’s true. [pause] There is no such thing as a Black South African … anything that’s not White in South Africa is Black’. He disagreed with the way the legislation was constructing Black as Black South African. He felt like being Black as an identity was not about the legislation which he distinguished as Black South African, but being Black or African was about a political, anti-racist identity that fit him.

I suspect that if I had done this project shortly after liberation, the number of respondents identifying as Black would be higher, given the popularity of BC and anti-racist movements. For example, my conversations revealed quite a few cases where they had attempted to identify as Black at some point, but were not accepted as Black by other South Africans. Beatrice shared: ‘and then after 1994, shockingly, we were not Black enough. It came as a big disappointment. I was also part of the riots that took place. I took two rubber bullets in my left leg. My brother had six in his back. We stood out through all of that. Um, then, we didn’t know where we fitted because all of a sudden, we are not Black – but we are something else’. Beatrice, a 39-year-old community activist to this day, said she learned to accept it, but was not happy in doing so. Rissa, who said she had a Black consciousness early on said ‘Actually, this is something that comes up quite a lot where people say “Rissa you’re not Black. Stop saying that you are. You’re not. You’re Coloured and you need to be” – it’s almost as if I’m ashamed of being Coloured in their eyes. I’m not. I don’t like the word Coloured’.

Opting for a Black racial identity in the new South Africa might seem like a prominent option, given the state’s insistence in reconstructing Black as a unifying label for all people of colour, however only a minority of participants identified as such, and many of them did so through educational exposure and Black Consciousness. Still, identifying as Black was met with distain and distrust from both Black/African and Coloured people. In sum then, a re-formation for a unifying political identity has occurred only for a sector and is perhaps declining in significance for them over time. Therefore, this process of making Black ‘stick’ for this population through legal state means, doesn’t seem to carry much weight.

Construction of Khoisan and racial uplift campaigns

There is, however, a racial identity construction movement that is growing in numbers and significance in South Africa. The undoing of the Coloured legal identity seems to have opened the door for a bottom-up movement of racial formation, or racial uplift (Treitler 2013), that gives greater power and agency, and resonates personally to many of those belonging to the Coloured group. People here, 34% of my sample, opt for an indigenous identity label of Khoi (or Khoe), San, or more frequently, Khoisan. This process is what has been referred to as Khoisan revivalism and is tied to state-side and global reclamation for indigenous peoples (Adhikari 2011; Veracini and Verbuyst 2020). Ruiter (2009) describes Khoisan as a historical identity and Bestman (2009) writes the moniker ‘Khoisan’ was appropriated after 1994 as primarily a way to promote social and political concerns of the Coloured people as well as more indigenous Khoe-San people (2009, 135–136).

This revivalism is growing in popularity with new converts, so to say, each day. When I finally sat down with Charleen, the 47-year-old manager at the concierge’s desk in the building I stayed in, she leaned in a bit and whispered proudly ‘I am Khoisan’. She learned about being Khoisan from a cultural teacher who wandered into her work spreading the message. Charleen was newer to this identity label, and saw Khoisan as an extension to being Coloured; she even referred to herself as ‘Coloured slash Khoisan’ at one point in our conversation. Carl also sees Coloured and Khoisan as connected; ‘For me, I don’t think I should deny anything of me being Coloured as well. If I do, that is to deny some of my Khoi and San heritage, because without my Colouredness I don’t have very much. It’s one in the same thing’. For them, the Khoi identity is part of their Colouredness.

Fabio, a 29-year-old currently looking for employment, went on a quest to learn about his ancestry and racial identity after a teacher probed him to do so in school. He first learned that his maternal grandfather was from the Netherlands and was admittingly proud because it perhaps justified his lighter skin. Eventually, Fabio learned from his great-great-uncle that he was Nama, a Khoi person and he became even prouder of this identity. For Fabio, learning about the Khoi was learning about the atrocities that White Europeans did in the Cape. And adopting a Khoisan identity was a rebellion against this White construct and White racism. Put directly, Fabio declared: ‘But I don’t wanna be Black. I also don’t wanna be White. Don’t wanna be Coloured. I want to be Khoi’.

Beatrice, who I described experienced rejection of her Blackness, now identifies as Khoisan primarily. Towards the end of her life, Beatrice asked her mother to share parts of her history: ‘when I found out who I am, I became very, very proud because now, I am a First Nation person. I was here – I would always say, I was here first’. For Beatrice, she found herself in the Khoisan identity. She said even her daughter now identifies as such: “And my daughter was in a debate with her teacher. He was talking about the Coloureds, and she stood up and she said, ‘Sir, I am not a Coloured. If you don’t know who you are, sir, with all due respect, this Hottentot woman, Khoikhoi, I know who I am’.

The experience of racial identity invalidation is a reoccurring theme for many with non-Coloured identity choices, and often is tied to the idea of the Coloured population having identity issues. The mismatch of identities can be a perceived stressor for more liminal and racially ambiguous populations (Pirtle and Brown 2016; Ruiter 2009). As a result, a lot of participants who identify as Khoisan discuss the identity is a fix to the crises. For instance, Hamilton, a 79-year-old chief and someone who now leads the Khoi revivalism movement had this to say, ‘and today, after the fight against racism … I believe a new struggle has emerged, and that struggle is the struggle of my true identity of who I really am. And that is I have discovered that I cannot be silent while I am being called a Coloured’. For Hamilton, and about half of those who identify as Khoisan, Khoisan wasn’t necessarily one in the same thing as Coloured, but something to replace Coloured as a constructed category.

Khoisan is an identity with history and meaning for themselves, but also for the state. This sentiment resonated with Charlotte, a 40-year-old working with the movement now advocates for Khoisan adoption, among both individuals and the state. During the last census, Charlotte went to over 250 households notifying them of Khoisan identity and asking them to select other as opposed to Coloured. According to Charlotte, ‘when you fill out a form, you will still see the term Coloured. Which was a White Apartheid racial group given to the Khoi and San people – To take away their true identity’. The Khoisan as a true identity, and one that demands recognition by the state, offers something to hold on to that they can be proud of. According to Charlotte, ‘You cannot say you free unless you are free to identify yourself’. And for her, there is nothing more freeing – from Apartheid, from the current administration, and from others who push identifications on them – than identifying as Khoisan. As Veracini and Verbuyst write, ‘the Khoisan had become lost in “categorisation” and made to seem extinct in a process of bureaucratic erasure’ (2020, 226). The fight for resources is an appeal to those in power to better address their identity and needs, bureaucratically and legally, and redress this genocidal erasure (Adhikari 2011).

Thus, not only does Khoisan bring about a true identity, a rich history, and meaning, it brings about a way to fight for economic and other resources, like land and language rights, in what respondents perceive as a constraining space for Coloureds in the new South Africa. Though a broad movement, it is non-coincidental that the majority of the Khoisan respondents, but definitely not all, are poor or working class and also perceive relative deprivation compared to White and Black South Africans. Interestingly, many participants also shared a spiritual outlook citing oneness with all and with the land, such as Rastafarianism or indigenous African spirituality.

Transcending race amidst non-racialism

Finally, for even others, the very idea of race is problematic. ‘So-called “Coloureds”’, as goes the popular reference, often accompanying air quotes, is used to identify others who use the Coloured label and to signal the construction of Coloured by the Apartheid state as evidence of the made-up and racist formation of Coloured. This group typically seeks to transcend race themselves (Erasmus 2001), by attempting to opt out of a racial identity and identify with a common humanity, like that discussed in the new constitutions and through colorblind non-racialism discourse (Whitehead 2012). In their mind, the best way to address the problem of presumed flawed racial constructions is to not talk about it.

Gerald, a 41-year old healer, identifies as human, which he links to the idea that, as formerly Coloured, he ‘can be accepted as any race’. For Gerald, Coloured was just a name that they have been called but one that is artificial. He says ‘we have like ten names. And the tenth name is the Coloured. But we have all names before that’. Prior names included Bushman and Hottentot, but he believes both the first and the last name should simply be: human.

Bazel, and 82-year-old retired teacher also identifies as human and rejects any official racial classification. He retold a story about forced removal from the racially diverse District 6 area (see Jackson 2003) after the Group Areas Act of 1950, and how his family was forced to move out to the Cape Flats. But the move also meant Bazel was forced to re-classify since the midwife had named him as multiracial on his birth certificate. He really rejected this idea, and racial classification:

Eventually, during the period of Apartheid, with a nationalist government, they sent me there to say that I must reclassify myself. I said, “I refuse to reclassify myself.” Eventually, they classified myself with a new identity document as Coloured. I couldn’t do anything about it … [Now] when I fill in forms, I refuse to fill in that section, even “other.”

Bazel sometimes also identifies as South African when probed. He says ‘I am a South African. There is no thing like a race where I’m concerned’. For him, his reluctance is not because he doesn’t see racism, but rather because he worked so hard to fight racism that he ought not to have to continue to deal with racial categories. Bazel’s imprisonment, alongside his activist son, and the non-racial political movements he was a part of were a catalyst for his racial identification as human, or other, or South African, if need be. He truly believes the non-racial approach is best, and therefore refuses to identify racially at all.

The rejection of race altogether was also associated with being rejected from other racial identifiers. Emmett, a 46-year-old artist is actually a ‘Coloured’ role model, though he does not identify as Coloured today. Emmett shared his racial identity development over time. He first learned he was Coloured when he attempted to board a train as a child and his lighter skin mom was allowed on, but they got stopped when the conductors realised the darker kids with her were her own. His exposure as a writer and MC opened up his world view, reading on Black consciousness and global white supremacy, and facilitating his Black racial identity adoption. But he also experienced rejection from others when trying to claim Black. He said this identity development process has been ‘a constant journey and struggle to find one’s identity that I don’t think has to end, you know. And that’s the problem. Like people find a box, and then they jump in that box, you know, so – Yeah. I just chose not to’. First growing up Coloured, then wanting to be Black, then rejection of Blackness, made him fully reject the idea of stable racial identities. He said he still looks to texts and books for information but that it has recently led him to this shift, “like information about like that history that humanity sprung from Africa and then spread around the world, then you – you’ll learn the word ‘human’ is synonymous with ‘African’. Interestingly, Emmet suggests that he has an African identity, but that for him, that means human.

For a few like Emmett, being African actually allows them to be human, and not to be attached to a racial category. For others, like Bazel and Gerald, being human means not having to fit into the social, or what they consider artificial and harmful construction of Coloured. For all of these respondents, transcending race means not having to deal with it. However, the state-level undoing of Coloured in racial redress legislation has yet to un-do the ideal of Coloured in everyday life for most and even in parts of the law. Likewise, not identifying with a particular racial identity hasn’t allowed these individuals to not be perceived racially. It is for these reasons I believe this option finds the least resonance. Given the smaller number of participants with this identity, I saw less trends within social factors that contribute to this choice, though, many experiences in transitions in identity choices overtime was a pattern.

Conclusion

What does it mean to be Coloured in the new South Africa? How are people making decisions about their racial identity and what does that say about the current context and past conventions? My taxonomy of racial identity choices suggests those labelled as Coloured choose from a Coloured, Black, Human, or Khoisan racial identity. My findings share similarities with past models by Erasmus (2001) and Ruiter (2009); yet, differs in a few significant ways, with implications expanding to how we view racial identity constructions. First, it situates the choices within constraints of the state and racial formation processes. I argue that the state is still implicated in the minds of Coloureds and how they wrestle with new constructions of race, even if the state isn’t mandating the categories. This means that processes identified here, (a) racialised maintenance via reappropriating (Coloured), (b) re-formation and expansion of an existing category (Black), (c) racial uplift construction of a new/revised category (Khoisan), and (d) a non-racialist approach to racial identities (human), extend from the initial racial formation of Coloured as a buffering racial category. Now, the multiple processes happening on the ground, lead to multiple identity configurations, within the constraints of the state.

This recognition of state-level practices in shaping racial categories and racial identities was prominent throughout the interviews. Both Carl, who learned about being Coloured by having to go to the Coloured affairs office and Bazel’s experience of being asked to classify by state agencies after enduring forced removal, offer examples of the interplay between the state and self-conceptions. The discussions regarding the BEE that named Coloureds as a part of Black are other examples of how the state continues to permeate self-understandings today, and how individuals accept or reject these conventions. Chrissy said she was okay with the Black label for work purposes, though it wouldn’t change her mind about her own Coloured identity. In contrast, Rissa identifies as Black but would check Coloured if needed. Both women have acute understandings of how the state might see them, and can reconcile their mismatched identities in those moments, but refuse for these legalised identities to sharpen their personal identities. Finally, some Khoisan respondents, like Charlotte want the government to step up to help shape the Khoi identity, as they have done for other groups in the past. Success here would look like public acknowledgement of the role that Khoisan people have played within the formation of the country, which might include additional resources such as land later on. Charlotte recognises that identities are adopted given state-level practices, especially in South Africa, and therefore sees this as an opportunity to finalise the formation of the Khoisan racial identity.

In recognising socially constrained autonomy of racial identities, I do not consider those maintaining a Coloured racial identity as having essentialist notions of race (Ruiter 2009) or a striving to whiteness (Erasmus 2001), but as carefully negotiating their sense of self with reconstructed ideas of what Coloured means in the absence of oppression. Likewise, I did not find that the use of ‘so-called Coloured’ is a way to abandon race, but as a way to distance themselves from past conventions. Arendse (2020) recently reflected on this idea of decolonisation from the Coloured label as created a Coloured conciousness of beloning. Even amongst those who seek to transcend race, it was not because they bought into rainbow nation wishes, per se, but because they believe that abstaining from categorisation is a way to fight against racism and support the goal of non-racialism. The construction of Khoisan is also strategic and not an identity solely attached to a history of enslavement (see, Ruiter 2009). This construction was created not only as a way to preserve difference from well-established categories and maintain their uniqueness, but also as a way to improve the material conditions for this group.

Overall, I argue that being Coloured is associated with heightened variation, fluidity, and experiences of invalidation, in ways similar to other middling and/or mixed groups (e.g. Rockquemore and Brunsma 2008; Sims and Njaka 2020; Telles and Sue 2009), and also in unique ways that demonstrate how they are constrained by boundaries of betweenness within the racialised social system. I find that the meanings attached to the identities are purposeful, strategic, and valid for those claiming the particular identities. This quote from Moesha explicitly states that it is the nature of being Coloured that opens up identity choices. She says:

“To be able to identify with anything, and I feel that as a Coloured or Khoi person, you can do that. You really can just be from anywhere. … it also gives you that opportunity to-to decide, and I think that’s amazing”.

Furthermore, divisions by social factors, such as economic class, were neither straightforward nor largely significant. Across every identity option there was a mix of class status, gender, age, and even skin colour. I highlighted some patterns, but argue the variation across social factors reiterates the ways racial identities are both personal and structural. Future research should broaden the sample to other areas of South Africa, or have a more structured recruitment strategy to examine if context or other factors (e.g. generational cohort) moderates the relationship between the state and self.

The contribution of this work is demonstrating that transformations of the racial state can shape, or even lead to, a transition in racial identities. Scholarship in South Africa and beyond needs to better synthesise perspectives on racial formation that privilege one emphasis – macros v. micro – over another to recognise the mutually constitutive dynamic processes of racial identity formations. Indeed, the state names racial categories but the categories are lived and co-constructed by its people within the constraints of the state. This case shows, as many other contexts might replicate that individuals make choices about their racial identities but those options are constrained by macro-level socio-historical and political practices and re-made and lived through micro-level actions. Both of which are dynamic in nature; as too, are racial identities.

Acknowledgments

I appreciate the thoughtful and helpful feedback from my writing group colleagues Sharla Alegria, Dalia Magaña, Ma Vang, and Anneeth Hundle, and to my postdoc mentor Mara Loveman and the anonymous reviewers at Identities. I thank Bradley Van Sitters for research assistance and the University of Cape Town, Centre for Social Science Research for their support. Continued gratitude goes to my participants for sharing their imporant perspectives.

Funding

Funding for this project come from the Hellman Foundation Award 2015-2016, University of California Merced Faculty Senate Award 2015, and Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Award 2018-2019.;

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. As I detail later, some make the argument that ‘Coloured’ as a racial label is derogatory given the racist Apartheid construction. I do not use quotes throughout this text because of the immense variation in affinity to the Coloured label.

2. All racial designations such as Black, White, Coloured, Indian are socio-political inventions. The invention means race operates as a symbolic category based on false biological beliefs that has been imbued with meaning and recreated over time through social interactions and institutions (see Omi and Winant, 2015; Marx 1998; Posel 2001; Tatum 2003).

3. Though fictitious, notions of Black and White in South Africa were often treated as ‘pure’ whereas early constructions of Coloured rested on ideas of them being between or a mixture of but no categories represent biological realities or purity.

4. Four checked multiracial alongside other categories and ten participants also selected multiple categories, but not only multiracial. Ruiter (2009) argues that the mixture for Coloureds is not contemporary consciousness. This articulation of creole (Erasmus 2001) and mixture frames Coloured identities as a whole, as opposed to a distinct racial identity for most Coloured South Africans today.