“If you’re black, stay back;
if you’re brown, stick around;
if you’re yellow, you’re mellow;
if you’re white, you’re all right.”
if you’re yellow, you’re mellow;
if you’re white, you’re all right.”
A simple nursery rhyme on the surface but one that illustrates a long-standing issue in the black community.
“Colourism” has divided black people for hundreds of years since the inception of European colonialism. It is a practice of discrimination where lighter skin is seen more favourably than dark. With its roots in slavery, those who had darker skin were forced to work hard labour outside while those with a lighter skin tone had less gruelling domestic roles inside. Thus having a lighter skin tone was highly sought after.
But even when slavery ended, the weight of colorism was still heavy on people minds. Even today, we can still see the effects of colorism in song lyrics, television and even on social media with the long ongoing twitter war between #lightskingirls vs. #darkskingirls.
Hear the stories of how colorism has touched the lives of three women.
Sara Miller
Sara Miller is a graduate of the Journalism Advanced Diploma program at Humber College. She is now currently enrolled in the Bachelor of Journalism program at the Lakeshore campus.
