Blasian celebrities who celebrate their blackness and their AAPI tradition

As we get closer to the conclusion AAPI Heritage Month Let’s take a look at some of our sisters and brothers who celebrate their AAPI background. Afro-Asian, or Blasian, we mean, a mixed ethnicity of African-Americans and Asians.

Looking at the celebrities with the AAPI tradition, the Blasian community has a lot of exciting talents, just think of Jhin Iko, Naomi Osaka, our own Vice President Kamala Harris and Chanel Iman.

Many celebrities and public figures celebrate their AAPI traditions, look at some of them who are inspiring others to be proud of who they are.

His

HER is an African American and Filipino singer / songwriter based in Los Angeles. Most recently, HER was nominated for eight Grammy Awards in 2022, including Best Album of the Year, Best Song of the Year, Best R&B Performance, Best Traditional R&B Performance, Best R&B Song, Best R&B Album, Best Contemporary Christian Music Performance / Song and Visual. The best songs written for the media. He is also open about wide-ranging identification with both ethnic groups An individual Filipino recalls growing up at home.

You get in and just find out: the shoes are on the door, the stove is cooking, and her grandparents, who lived with her at the time, have fixtures in the house. He goes on

“It’s a completely different thing,” he said, sitting on the edge of a couch in Midtown Manhattan. “When our black side is over, my father will throw us down with the food of the soul. Black culture is very important to me and I get to know young black women. I represent young black women and I’m proud of that. “

HER, born Gabi Wilson, is 24 years old and is steadily dominating the new age RnB.

Jhine Iko

Xin Aiko, a native of Zinne Efuru Chilombo, is a rarity with a truly distinct ethnic background. With Spanish, Dominican, Japanese, Native American, Black, and German traditions, he speaks openly about the joys and challenges of trying to grow as an artist in an art that strongly urges him to “choose a direction.” A. 2019 Interview with Revolt TVHe spoke of the pressure to comply with those standards.

“When I started auditioning, they hired me for the role [as] Spanish girl, or Japanese girl or black girl. “

He continued, “When I was 12 years old [or] 13, Someone told my mom, ‘You really should play one or the other. You should straighten her hair to make her look more Asian, or you should keep her hair normal and curly and put a little bronzer on her so that she [will] Looks even blacker. “

The lively singer / songwriter has a beautiful Blasian daughter named Namiko, whom he shares with entertainer O’Real.

Naomi Osaka

Top of the women’s singles rankings as the first Asian tennis player and ranked No. 1 in the Women’s Tennis Association, Osaka, 24, is known for celebrating her success by breaking the barrier as a young Japanese woman. Mixed with Haitians, Naomi often encounters adversity about public misrepresentation of her. She Discuss this frustration freelyMention,

“I’m just trying to look like myself and create a platform for all Japanese living in Japan and when they go to a restaurant, they are given an English menu, although this is a slight aggression.”

In one Interview with WSJ Magazine He also opened a time when he was young and played against a Japanese opponent:

“She was talking to another Japanese girl, and they didn’t know I was listening [or that] I spoke Japanese. His friend asked him who he was playing, so he said Osaka. And her friend says, ‘Oh, that black girl. Is he supposed to be Japanese? ‘ And then the girl I was playing with was like, ‘I don’t think so.’ I remember it especially because, yes, I sometimes think that a lot of people think that way about me. “

Naomi has also been vocal about this perception and hacking by fans Affected his mental health. Naomi Osaka, in fact, is an inspiration to young girls with mixed traditions who face adversity in pursuit of their dreams.

Orange Harris

Our own Vice President, Kamala Harris, of Jamaican and Indian descent.

USA Today An earlier article highlighted her heritage Many of the identities of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris are as follows:

A proud American says he has identified Black American, Jamaican American, Caribbean American, Asian American and Indian American and also of Asian descent, Indian descent, mixed Indian and Jamaican traditions and Tamil and Hindu roots.

Time to talk The Washington Post How his multinational background influenced his campaign efforts, Harris commented;

“… when I ran for the first office the things I struggled with, which was that you were forced to define yourself through the process in such a way that you fit nicely into the buggy made by other people. My point was: I am that. I’m fine with that. You may have to figure it out, but I’m fine with that. “

Karreuche Tran

California-born models and Claws The actress was born to a Vietnamese mother and Jamaican father. Strongly identified as black and Vietnamese, Tran, 34, shared the joy of being a black actor in an interview in 2015 Jet.

“I am for diversity and multiculturalism. I grew up half black and half Vietnamese and very diverse. I had an Asian godmother and Korean best friend, so it’s amazing to be a black actor and get involved in the art.

I want to be able to contribute to the community of African American actors. We need more of them there, just period. People look at me and ask, ‘What are you?’ And I call them black and Vietnamese, and they think it’s really great. I love and am happy that I have been able to bridge these two cultures. “

Michael I.

Michael Yeo is an American comedian with a black and Korean heritage. Yeo grew up in the South and recalled being a Blasian kid in an interview in Texas Half Korean.

“I was the only mixed boy in school. In Houston, I went to a predominantly white school, and if you’re black, you’re black, and if you’re Asian, you’re Asian. There [were] No mixed kids. It was different then, especially in that area. I have been called all kinds of racist names. When kids don’t know what you are, they can be very bad. They were trying to be bad, but they didn’t know how it affected me. I grew up and was very insecure. “

He continued, “When I used to hang out with Asian kids, black kids would go crazy. When I grew up, I guess I was most attached to black and white kids because I played sports and I wasn’t a very good student. We had one [Asian kid] In our basketball team, then a few black kids and then mostly white kids. I didn’t join my Asian team until I started to stand-up. “

His wife, Claire Alice Schreiner, is an American beauty queen, and the couple shared two adorable babies, Oliver and Alice Yeo.

Kimora Lee Simmons

Ozi definition of girl boss Kimora Lee Simmons! A model, fashionista, businessman, and 5-year-old mother, Simmons has been getting bags for decades. Mixed with black, Korean and Japanese nationalities, Simmons has always felt like an outsider. According to Working motherShe shared:

“I grew up alone. I was a mixed-race girl with a Korean Japanese mother and an African American father, and none of the other kids at my school were like me. I was about 6 feet tall when I was 11 years old. And I was the only child who was raised by a single mother. “

“They called me a chinky giraffe,” he said. I cried all the time. But my mother wanted me to turn my tears into something else, something positive. ” So her mother signed her up for modeling, where Carl Lagerfeld called her the “face of the 21st century.”

Kimora Lee married Russell Simmons, an African American music executive, from 1998-2009. Simmons has two daughters, Ming Lee and Aoki Lee Simmons. Both girls grew up following in their mother’s footsteps as fierce blasphemous models.

Channel Iman

Oh look! Another model! Chanel Iman Robinson of Korean and Black Traditions. Born to a Blasian mother in Atlanta, Georgia, Chanel is marked by a celebration of her Korean heritage as well as being black. In a 2009 interview with Enjoy the tinIman reveals that her mother has a special fondness for her Korean Vogue cover

“It’s really important for my mother,” he explained. “My mother was born in Korea, but they didn’t accept her because she was black. She was adopted when she was a child. Now, her daughter is on the cover of Korean Vogue.” !

Chanel’s father, Tick Price, is an American college basketball coach in the Southeast. Known best for her work as Victoria’s Secret Model, Chanel set foot throughout the early 2000s and is the proud mother of two beautiful daughters.