Dorothy Roberts reframes interracial love in new essay: Report

In an exclusive personal essay for People, scholar Dorothy Roberts reflects on the complex intersections of race, family and love in America, using the recently released film One Battle After Another as a point of departure to critique how interracial intimacy is portrayed in popular culture.

Roberts, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and author of acclaimed works including Killing the Black Body, draws on her own experiences growing up in Chicago in the 1960s as the child of a white father and Black mother. 

According to People, what once seemed to her a simple testament to human connection became, over time, evidence of deeper social and political forces shaping identity.

In the essay, Roberts questions the assumption that interracial love is inherently radical or transformative. 

Moreover, she argues that while intimate relationships across racial lines can challenge prejudice, they do not automatically dismantle entrenched systems of inequality. 

Instead, she suggests, interracial relationships can contribute to racial justice only when paired with intentional systemic engagement rather than serving as symbolic gestures of progress.

As per the outlet, Roberts also revisits her father’s decades-long, unpublished research on Black-white couples, including hundreds of interviews he conducted dating back to the 1930s. 

Her essay coincides with the upcoming release of her memoir, The Mixed Marriage Project: A Memoir of Love, Race, and Family, due out Feb. 10.