Colorism

I cried when I got my first sunburn in eighth grade. I thought my skin color was permanently changed. Even as a Florida native, I grew to hate the beach. For many summers of my life, I wished for the winters to come sooner and never wanted to go outside because I feared becoming darker. 

I am not light, but I am not dark. My dad calls me “golden brown.”  For a long time I would have changed the hue of my skin for a lot of reasons. I was often perplexed that my darker, “mocha” shaded older sister did not feel the same. Everyone in my family loves to tan and become darker than they are. Lotioning themselves with SPF 15 Banana Boat tanning oil was something I could never wrap my head around.

I had internalized colorist attitudes. 

Colorism, a term coined by American novelist Alice Walker in 1982, is the “prejudicial or preferential treatment of same-race people based solely on their color.” It is a form of discrimination based on one’s skin complexion. It is a preference for lighter skin that ultimately devalues and discriminates against those with darker skin. A colorist mindset associates lighter skin with beauty because of its proximity to whiteness—a mindset I had adopted. 

Colonialism in the Americas played a huge role in the preference we see today for white and light skin in the United States. This preference was carried by colonists and their enslavement of African people. This distinct enslavement of visibly dark-skinned people is what made slavery in the United States so unique—it became almost impossible to separate slavery and dark-skinned people.  

In early years of American slavery, African slaves in the Virginia and Carolina colonies could be released from slavery if they converted to Christianity. In 1667, this rule was eliminated and the legal status of Africans became tied to their dark skin color. Ultimately, by the late seventeenth century, white skin came to be associated with freedom and black skin with enslavement. 

Over time, practices, beliefs and false justifications made white and light skin more valuable, ultimately placing it at a premium while simultaneously dehumanizing black and darker skin. 

These colorist attitudes prescribed by white individuals were internalized by black people leading them to believe lighter skin was better. In elite, social circles, light-skinned blacks administered practices like the brown paper bag test, for example. That is, if a black person was lighter than a brown paper bag, then they were light enough to join certain elite, black organizations and circles. 

Colorist attitudes persist and hold true even today. When first-year Northwestern student Janeá Wilson was 7 years old, her school orchestrated the paper bag test. Growing up, Wilson described her now “caramel” shade, as much fairer. 

“I passed,” she says. “I was so happy that I passed. I bragged about it.” She expressed to me that she even made fun of those that didn’t, saying that there were on the “outside.”

For a long time, Wilson held onto that feeling of superiority. She considered light skin to be prettier and better, never wanting to go outside out of fear of becoming darker.

First-year Northwestern student Channing Russell also dealt with insecurities as a result of his “midnight” skin complexion. 

“I was a butt of a lot of jokes in sixth and seventh grade,” Russell says. He was once even called a “burnt crow” by one of his closest black friends. 

“It’s tough, especially as a middle school kid because you don't exactly know why everyone's trying to roast you for something that you can't control,” he continues. 

According to Wilson,  colorism is so deeply ingrained. “You know that you are different from other people that are the same as you,” she says. However, Wilson’s family never addressed colorism.

In contrast, Russell’s parents did address colorism and openly loved his dark shade. According to Russell, they instilled confidence within him. Because they told him that he was beautiful he rarely felt that he couldn’t be himself. 

Wilson did not find her sense of self until high school. “In my friend group there were more people that looked like me,” Wilson says. These friends were very comfortable and proud of who they were, which inspired Wilson to embrace herself as well.

In the end, Russell believes that skin complexion does not matter, and he believes that at a certain point, you have to accept the fact that there’s nothing you can do about it. “You have to always reaffirm yourself and practice self love,” Russell said.

However, it takes more than that. Although many believe in the idea of a post-racial environment, colorism still manifests itself on a macro level. Bad individual experiences like Wilson and Russell’s are just the trickle down effect of a broader institutional and historical problem rooted in pain and bigotry.

Colorism is embedded everywhere in our society. Colorist attitudes have impacted the representation of blacks in the most powerful positions in the United States—many black CEOs, corporate executives and government officials are lighter in skin tone. Darker skinned people are arrested and incarcerated at higher levels than lighter skinned blacks, and receive longer prison sentences. Lighter skinned blacks are more prevalent in all forms of media whether it’s television, movies, advertising, magazines, or billboards, their features are preferred. 

Although loving yourself is important, as a black community we need to hold our families, practices and institutions accountable. We must be transparent with the history of colorism and the attitudes that still pervade in today’s society. We must acknowledge each other’s privileges, and we must love who we are. No one should be treated differently based on something they cannot control, especially when it is something so beautiful.   

Colorist attitudes will never go away. And to be quite honest, colorism is something I still internalize. Especially as a black woman, it is so hard to ignore the normalcy of light skinned women constantly being considered more beautiful. However, working on my self-love has been essential in the past few years of my life. There hasn’t been a defining moment where I have completely ignored my colorist instincts—and who knows whether there will be—but I have learned to value myself. I have learned that I shouldn’t let my skin color devalue my own self-worth and deter me from my aspirations and goals in life. Most importantly, I will not let allow that to happen to other black women either. Our skin complexion should not and will not define us.