Secret Daughter: A Mixed Race Daughter and the Mother Who Gave Her Away

Writer's Life Shines Light on Racial Crosscurrents

(WOMENSENEWS)--June Cross couldn't be clearer about her professional identity.

"I identify as a black, woman journalist," said the author of "Secret Daughter: A Mixed Race Daughter and the Mother Who Gave Her Away."

Cross, an award-winning producer of television news and documentaries and a professor at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism, has a long track record of professional accomplishments. She has worked for PBS' "Frontline," CBS News and what was known as the "MacNeil/Lehrer Newshour" on PBS, covering a range of topics including the defense industry, the Middle East, poverty in the United States, welfare, Haiti and the Cold War.

During a phone interview from a San Francisco stop on her national book tour, Cross said that during her journalism career, perhaps especially when she was covering the defense industry in the early 1980s, she was distinctly aware of the "double-edged sword" of being both African American and female.

"Being a female was always an issue," she said. "Being black was the bigger issue. There's presumption that blacks couldn't write, that they were there because of some affirmative action thing......"

Note from GKL: I've read Ms. Cross' book Secret Daughter. It's a very compelling story and I highly recommend it.