Hello,
I am new to this forum, and am thankful to now be a part of it. I need help editing, or adding any views that I have yet to cover. In this essay I was to:
Analyze the quotation-reveal an accurate understanding of the quoted passages, comments indicate close reading, particularly on the inferential and applied levels, and provide context for the quotations where necessary.
Synthesis - Make clear, thoughtful connections between and among texts, ties the works together in an insightful way.
Again, thanks a lot for anyone who helps me, it really means a great deal to me. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks,
Babacanoosh
In today’s culture, a need for separation of people, places and things is apparent. With these divisions of various things come very different and complicated advantages. Tall people may have an easier time of making a basketball team is one example of how one type of group of people may have an advantage. When looking at race however, more specifically color of the skin, there are many different views, each contradicting each other in many different ways. One may question that such advantages of color may not exist, and are not apparent to society. However if you open you eyes to society, and try to look for these occurrences, the world is teeming with the advantages, and disadvantages of different colors. The principle conflict however is that in most cases, being a lighter colored skin has greater advantages than being a darker colored skin. Looking back in history, many different things point to the statement as being true, however there are often overlooked advantages that a darker colored skin tone person may have. Many authors have explored this subject, and many have very different point of views.
Looking in society today, many occurrences display that a lighter skin tone has an advantage. As a Berkeley Repertory Theater article titled “
Color Complexity” quotes “…lighter skinned Blacks enjoy better careers, higher income, greater acceptability in mainstream society and higher self-esteem (particularly among women) than their darker-skinned peers.” This quote supports itself in many ways. Looking at today’s movie stars, not many of them are of a darker skin tone. Many famous movie stars are a lighter colored black, such as Will Smith, and famous singer Beyonce. These big time household names are in fact typically a lighter colored individual. In addition when looking at movies, one does not see very often a darker colored protagonist. Thinking off the top of my head, I cannot think of one movie with a darker colored skin tone protagonist, other than movies with Ice Cube, who is one of the few darker colored movie celebrities. This is only being compared to black celebrities only. There are a lot more white movie stars then black movie stars. Next time you watch a movie, you will notice the huge imbalance of skin tone. While society has taken great strides from the previous years, where finding anybody that was not white on the big screen was impossible, the difference in sheer numbers of darker colored people is still apparent. In addition, looking at “better careers, and higher income” which are directly related, point out this quote to be very true also. Looking at society as a whole, it is apparent that darker colored people have a great disadvantage when it comes to higher positions in society, and higher paying jobs. Just looking at our history’s presidents, all have been white. Only is it now in today’s presidential race that we have a black running for president. Even looking at this however clarifies the truth of this quote. Barack Obama is a lighter colored skin tone of black. All of these occurrences make a valid point that a lighter skinned individual has many advantages over a darker skinned individual.
“American means white and Africanist people struggle to make the term applicable to themselves with ethnicity and hyphen after hyphen after hyphen, ”Quotes Tonni Morrison in“
Romancing the Shadow.” This quote supports that lighter colored skin personal have a great advantage. Like in “
Color Complexity,” darker colored “Africanist people” struggle to be “American” and essentially fit in with society. Because of their “Ethnicity,” they are unable to fit in with American society. This supports the previous quote when looking at society, and the colored individuals who hold higher positions in the American Government. In addition when looking at how darker colored individuals are trying to essentially fit into American society, this could not be truer. Looking at most historical American figures, most are white, with the exception of a few people such as Martin Luther King Jr., Fredrick Douglass, and W.E.B. Du Bois. Our very representation of our country, Uncle Sam, is a white individual. Never is he portrayed any color but white. He represents America from his clothes, to pants and jacket, to his hat, and apparently to his color. When looking at many Standardized tests, when asked to fill out race/ethnicity, African American describes blacks. White also is typically a choice, even though this can fall under many different races, typically it is connected with American. Like “
Color Complexity”, Tonni Morrison’s quote shows the advantages of a lighter colored skin.
There are other opinions when looking back in history however, that lighter colored blacks were at a greater disadvantage than darker colored slaves. Of course at this time however, the white colored individual has a huge advantage over the rest of the “colored” individuals. As Fredrick Douglass quotes in
A Narrative on the Life of Fredrick Douglass, “I know of such cases; and it is worthy of remark that such slaves invariably suffer greater hardships, and have more to contend with, than others. They
are, in the first place, a constant offence to their mistress…she is never better pleased than when she sees them under the lash, especially when she suspects her husband of showing to his mulatto children favors which he withholds from his black slaves.” This quote shows that the lighter colored skinned blacks were disadvantaged, a different view than
Color Complexity, and Toni Morrison. A main reason because of this was the time period. Both of the previous conflicting quotes were stated in a period of time that did not have slavery. The lighter colored slaves were disadvantaged in that they often looked greatly down upon by the mistress of the slave owner. This was a clear indication that the lighter skin toned child was the product of her husband having sexual relations with a person of color. Because of this, these children were at a great disposition, and had “greater hardships” to overcome. They were often beaten more severely than the rest, to show that her husband wasn’t “showing to his mulatto children favors which he withholds from his black slaves.” This shows how different time periods hold different values, and have many different structures in the system of race, and color superiority.
While there are many views about skin color, and that lighter colored individuals have advantages over others, there are many different views, and beliefs to be taken into consideration. Nevertheless, these three quotes have clarified many views, and shown how a different time period may affect these views.
