Several years ago Nicole Richie, the daughter of famed R&B singer Lionel Richie , starred in a reality show with her childhood friend and hotel heiress Paris Hilton. In this show,
The Simple Life, the two blonde-haired Beverly Hills-bred young twenty-somethings spent several months living with a white (to all appearances) farm family in rural Arkansas. The comedy and drama revolves around the cultural differences of the materialistic urbanites and how they adapt and maladapt to their new surroundings. But the newfound celebrity of Nicole Ritchie revealed at least four surprises.
I watched the entire season, from the sendoff party at the Hilton estate (which Lionel also attended), to the livestock auction to Nicole and Paris's attempts to succeed as convenience store clerks and other small-town tasks. Nothing surprising there.
Here were two of the surprises:
1. This Southern town did not seem to have any black people in residence. (though I know all southern towns do not have black residents).
2. Nicole Richie's ethnic background, which is partly African American (at least by upbringing), was never mentioned.
Though any number of racist comments might have been edited out, none of the avowedly conservative patriotic Republican family seemed to have any discomfort with Nicole Ritchie's presence in their home and other social settings. The father is an ex-marine and proudly so. Just being celebrities in that Arkansas town made them a subject of interest, especially to local young males, and somehow no one was particularly interested, much less hostile, to Ms. Ritchie's blond hair, green eyes and upbrining in the home of a still famous black-identified singer who even once scored a hit on the Country music charts. Okay, as they say in Latin America, "money whitens," and so perhaps "beauty whitens" also. But I think there is more to this story than that.
On one show Nicole and Paris play a board game with their host family. The question is "who is the Secretary of State?" Neither Nicole nor Paris have a clue, but the four-year-old boy shouts "Colin Powell!"
Here is another possible surprise:
The white folk in that Arkansas town simply were not that racist. They knew Nicole Richie might loosely be considered "black" but it did not matter to them. Not even to the elderly white residents who had once expected black folk to know their place. They were conservative, Republican, gun-owning, church-going, but they were not cross-burning extremists. How's that for overturning stereotypes.?(Many white conservative Christian Southerners support missionary and other relief aid in Africa, though this gets little attention in secular media.)
Surprise Number Four: Instead of abandoning a child in accordance with the stereotype of black men, Lionel Ritchie actually adopted a child that was not biologically his. The media, of course, has nothing to say about this.
And Surprise Number Five: Nicole Ritchie's "Biological" Background.
Nicole and her father, Lionel Richie, later appeared on
Oprah. Mr. Ritchie explained how he came to adopt Nicole, who was the biological child of an un-named woman and the brother of percussionist Sheila E. (E for Escovedo). Sheila E. had a hit song in 1984 during her association with Prince. Her father from Mexico had performed for years with fellow-Mexican Carlos Santana. In an interview from that time Sheila reported her father as Mexican, and her mother as Louisiana Creole, and raised in Oakland, California, apparently in a black community, though she did not say as much. Nonetheless, the American music awards of 1984 gave Sheila an award in the "black" music category.(Yes, that's what they called it)
So, Nicole Richie, presumably sharing this same Escovedo genetic ancestry of Mexican/Mestizo/Creole, might as easily be classified as "latina", Creole, or something else. She could easily have inherited (or not inherited) African (and/or Native American) ancestry from either her Mexican or Creole ancestors. But despite all the ways she might be considered "black," the most obvious is this:
Nicole Ritchie's Possible Black Identification Comes From her Adoption by the Richies:
Nicole Richie was raised in the home of a famous performer of African descent, whose connection to popular black culture is well-known. She still carries the Richie surname. She still seems close emotionally to her father, and her two children presumbaly see a lot of their famous ("black", though nor particularly dark) grandfather. I don't even know if Nicole Ritchie considers herself to be "African American." She does not seem to have made any effort to publickly associate with any famous black celebrities, even less so than Paris Hilton. The father of her children is white to all appearances. And everyone is cool with this. It's no big deal that she was raised "black" and lives "white."
Her social fluidity is never mentioned on-camera by commentators. The media gives her this freedom, and also for the public, to decide how Nicole Ritchie is racially perceived. They show Nicole and her father, her friends and children, and let you decide how you will perceive the situation.
This seems a step in the right direction.
