Language continuously evolves as our human reality evolves. As the widely beloved James Baldwin wrote in 1979:
“People evolve a language in order to describe and thus control their circumstances, or in order not to be submerged by a reality that they cannot articulate. (And, if they cannot articulate it, they are submerged.)” –James Baldwin
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Prior to 2011, I had never heard of colorism. In the last 12 years, I’ve met dozens of people who all say that hearing the term “colorism” was an epiphany moment for them and the first time they knew there was language, a word, to describe what they had witnessed and experienced throughout their lives.
Evolving Terminology
Alice Walker is credited with coining the term colorism in her 1983 book, In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens. However, people have written about this phenomenon for over a century, using other terms such as: skin tone bias/prejudice, pigmentocracy, shadeism, color struck, and colorstruction.
When I began writing about colorism in 2011, I included discrimination based on other racialized physical traits—hair, nose, lips, and eyes—as inherently implicated in colorism. Since 2011, those forms of discrimination have received their own specific language: featurism, texturism, and hairism. Therefore, I will not collapse them into this specific examination, but I will clarify how they’re inherently implicated with colorism in my upcoming article on intersectionality.
The Definition of Colorism
Colorism is a societal system that privileges people with lighter skin and marginalizes people with darker skin.
Within the system of colorism, individuals and groups with lighter skin benefit from such things as:
- explicit and implicit preference for light skin
- compounding and generational advantages
- norms and practices that cater to whiteness
- designs and structures created for whiteness
Why Vocabulary Matters (and Why There is No Reverse Colorism)
A viral clip of a celebrity claiming to experience “reverse colorism” has brought up an old debate about whether or not colorism goes both ways.
The notion of reverse colorism is only possible if the person understands colorism as simply a matter of bullying or negative personal interactions.
As soon as one understands colorism as a societal system with an entrenched, society-wide hierarchy that has deep historical roots and far-reaching socioeconomic impact, it’s impossible to conceive of such a thing as “reverse colorism.”
I always use what I call “The Robin Hood Analogy”:
Poor people stealing from rich people is not reverse classism. It’s a form of backlash to classism.
We might consider a type of behavior wrong, but it does not mean that behavior constitutes the complete reversal or overturning of a societal system.
Lighter and Darker vs. Light and Dark: Nuance for All Shades
I think it’s most helpful to understand that instances of colorism can be contextual, and that the degree of privilege we have in the system of colorism falls along a spectrum rather than a binary.
Individual instances of colorism for many people can fluctuate when they have the darkest complexion in one context, the lightest complexion in another context, or have a medium complexion in yet another context. Understanding this helps us identify and elucidate specific instances of colorism.
And also, privilege is not all or nothing. It’s more like standing in a line. Even if you’re not first in line, you may still be ahead of several other people.
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Homework: Try to recognize one new-to-you example of colorism. Don’t worry if “everyone else” is already aware of it. The only focus is on increasing your own awareness, whatever that might look like.
Affirmation: I understand the value of precision and nuance as useful tools to help me identify, assess, and address complex problems.
This post is part of a long series based on my new ebook, Corporate Colorism: Why Business Leaders Must Upgrade Their Anti-Racist Strategy. If you want to do the readings before class, you can purchase the Corporate Colorism ebook, or download a free PDF resource.