Writer-musician James McBride's life was a search for the means of reconciling his multicultural, multiracial heritage. Trying to understand where he fits in causes him to undergo an identity crisis that is not resolved until he is in his 30s. His 1996 memoir, The Color Of Water, centers on McBride's search and its resolution. Central to the theme is how human beings are categorized in society based on their racial, ethnic and religious beliefs and origins. The book is structured in alternate chapters describing the life of the author's mother Ruth and his own, and the intertwining of both. Ruth is a Polish/Jewish immigrant who grew up in the South, and after moving to New York and marrying black men, she hides her heritage from her children and her community. McBride's confusion stems in part from his mother's denial of her heritage. She prefers to be part of black society because of the harsh home life she had, and the prejudice she underwent as a Jew. "Jews were different from white people" (87). This is passed onto her children, and is an example of an essentialist position.
The book takes place from the 1930s to the late 1990s, and the search for identity of mother and son is bound to the way in which people, and society, view and label individuals according to their color, religion and ethnicity. Certain traits are ascribed to individuals and groups based solely on their race and ethnic type (such as European Jews are not white). Many of these traits are expressed in the book in which the author and his mother label others and/or discuss how they in turn are labeled by others by categorizing them into a group with innate traits rather than as individuals with variations. The result of this type of thinking is group prejudice, as McBride's book illustrates. Following are three lists that enumerate some of the particular traits McBride associates with Black, White and Jewish in his book. Some of these represent the views of pe...