Six weeks on, race faker Rachel Dolezal STILL unapologetically identifies as a black woman and says: 'I deceived no one' 

• Dolezal she insisted that she is black after being outed as white by parents
• Says she didn't deceive anybody and blamed people's 'definition of race'
• The 37-year said she wasn't African-American but still claimed to be black
• Former blonde revealed hair is a weave adding she 'doesn't stay out of sun'

By Hannah Parry For Mailonline

Published: 03:41 EST, 20 July 2015 | Updated: 04:00 EST, 20 July 2015

Former president of African-American rights group NAACP Rachel Dolezal still insists she is black six weeks after she was publicly outed by her parents as a white.

The divorced civil rights activist, who sparked a national debate on race, has no black relatives dating back to 1671, an investigation by Daily Mail Online revealed previously. In fact her family were entirely white including some who were Mormons.

Yet the 37-year-old insists she 'didn't deceive anybody' - presenting herself as being black for years.

Former president of African-American rights group NAACP Rachel Dolezal still insists she is black six weeks after she was publicly outed by her parents as a white

Former fiance: She also got engaged to a Mississippi musician, Maurice Turner, pictured, in 2012

Instead she claims that it was the public's definition of race that was to blame for the confusion.

'It's taken my entire life to negotiate how to identify,' she said in an interview with Vanity Fair.

'You can't just say in one sentence what is blackness or what is black culture or what makes you who you are.'

'I just feel like I didn't mislead anybody; I didn't deceive anybody. If people feel misled or deceived, then sorry that they feel that way, but I believe that's more due to their definition and construct of race in their own minds than it is to my integrity or honesty, because I wouldn't say I'm African American, but I say I'm black, and there's a difference in those terms.'

Dolezal has previously told NBC's Nightly News she was 'definitely not white. Nothing about being white describes who I am.'

Her deceptions came to light six weeks ago after her parents Larry and Ruthanne Dolezal told a local paper in no uncertain terms that their daughter had been born Caucasian. 

Her estranged parents have previously said that she began 'disguising' herself as black around 2007.

Now and then: Dolezal's parents have released photos of their daughter when she was young, including the one seen here. On the Today show she said she was not identifying as black as a teenager

Former flame: Dolezal, who revealed on Wednesday that she is bisexual, married her now ex-husband Kevin Moore in 2000. They are pictured with her parents and four adopted siblings at the wedding

Denial: After she appeared on the Today show, her parents told CNN that some of her statements had again been false, including how she drew herself with a brown crayon when she was five years old

'It's a weave': Dolezal comes clean about 'natural' hair

But Dolezal denies she has changed her appearance to seem black. Her hair is worn in tight brown curls - a far cry from the blonde locks of her youth. 

'It's not a costume,' she told Vanity Fair. 'I don't know spiritually and metaphysically how this goes, but I do know that from my earliest memories I have awareness and connection with the black experience, and that's never left me. It's not something that I can put on and take off anymore.'

In response to her tanned complexion, she previously explained she doesn't 'stay out of the sun.'

Speaking to NBC BLK she admitted her hair was a weave - despite posting in earlier Facebook posts that she was going for 'the natural look' with the style.

She added to MSNBC that she had always felt a connection to 'the black experience'.

'From a very young age I felt a spiritual, visceral, instinctual connection with black is beautiful,' she said. 'Just the black experience and wanting to celebrate that... 

Since being outed by her parents, Dolezal has resigned from her position as president with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NCAAP).

She admitted there was 'some awkwardness' between herself and the organisation and said she felt distrust from the new leader.

Dolezal was also asked to stand down from a role at a police oversight commission and has failed to have the contract for her teaching position at the Africana-studies program at Eastern Washington University renewed.

Emotional: Rachel Dolezal became tearful as she said that she understood Caitlyn Jenner's feelings of isolation and being misunderstood during an interview that aired on Wednesday morning

Dolezal's parents: Rachel tried to 'damage her biological family'

Since her deception came to light, Dolezal has also made a string of TV appearances on MSNBC and NBC as she tried to explain why she has presented herself as black.

She added that she hoped to write a book so she would not be forced to 'continue explaining' her race.

On the Today show, she claimed that she first started seeing herself as black when she was five.

'I was drawing self portraits with the brown crayon rather than the peach crayon, and black curly hair,' she said. 'That was how I was portraying myself.'

But when Lauer held up a photo of Dolezal as a teen - with blonde hair and a fair complexion - she conceded that she looked like a white person and that she was not identifying as black at the time.

'I was socially conditioned to not own that and to be limited to whatever biological identity was thrust upon me and narrated to me, and so I kind of felt pretty awkward a lot of the time with that.' 

Dolezal added that her black identity was solidified more recently when she took in her adopted brother, Izaiah, and started bringing him up as her son. Izaiah, a high school student, is black.

'He said, 'you're my real mom' and for that to be something that is plausible I certainly can't be seen as white and be Izaiah's mum,' she said. 

However, her father Larry Dolezal, said she is lying about drawing herself with brown crayons.

He told TMZ that it never happened and that she only started thinking of herself as black when she was in her 20s and 30s.

Support: Her two sons, Franklin (left) and Izaiah (right), appeared on the Today show with her. She claimed that when she took Izaiah in as her own son, she could no longer plausibly be a black woman

'Family': She has previously identified this man, Albert Wilkerson, right, as her father even though her real father is white. In the Today show interview on Tuesday, she said that she sees Wilkerson as her dad

Mr Dolezal, who has adopted four children of color, also responded to her suggestion that she had to think of herself as black after taking in Izaiah. 

'What would you think if I said to you since I adopted four African-American children I'm going to identify as black?' he said. 

As well as Izaiah, Dolezal has a biological African-American son, Franklin, with her ex-husband.

Dolezal married an African-American man, Kevin Moore, in 2000 with her now-estranged parents by her side. She and Moore had a son, Franklin, before divorcing in 2004.

More recently, she was engaged to Mississippi musician Maurice Turner, although she called off their engagement just a couple of months later, in February 2013.  

'I actually was talking to one of my sons yesterday and he said, 'mom, racially you're human and culturally you're black',' she said. 'I do know that they support the way I identify.'

She also answered other questions about her family, namely the claim that an African-American man is her father. On Facebook, she has identified Albert Wilkerson - a black man - as her dad, despite the fact that her biological father, Larry Dolezal, is white.

She told Lauer that she first met Wilkerson at an event in North Idaho and 'we just connected on a very intimate level as family'. 

Tearful: She wipes away her tears during the interview with NBC's Savannah Guthrie

Family: The couple, who divorced in 2004, went on to have one son together, Franklin

'I have a huge issue with blackface': Rachel Dolezal speaks out

'Albert Wilkerson is my dad,' she said. 'Every man can be a father; not every man can be a dad.'

When asked if she would do anything differently knowing the uproar that her situation has caused, she said that she might have approached a few interviews differently. She admitted that she had failed to correct articles that identified her as 'trans-racial', 'bi-racial' or 'black' in the past. 

'But overall my life has been one of survival and the decisions that I have made along the way have been to survive,' she claimed.

And she added that she took 'exception' to the accusation that she had deceived people about her face, saying: 'It's a little more complex than me identifying as black or answering a question of, are you black or white?'

Speaking with MSNBC she said that she understood people's anger towards her but 'they don't know me'.

'They really don't know what I've actually walked through and how hard it is. This has not been something that just is a casual, you know, come-and-go sort of identity, you know, or an identity crisis.' 

She said that her story - and the 'viciously inhumane way' it came out - will hopefully start a conversation about 'what it is to be human'.

'I hope that that can drive at the core of definitions of race, ethnicity, culture, self determination, personal agency and, ultimately, empowerment,' she told the Today show

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