Beautiful Shades of Brown
Defining beauty to the point that black individuals feel as though they cannot be born beautiful, worthy, and smart inadvertently breeds a community that passes judgments and spews hatred within the culture itself. The black community harbors its own form of discrimination on the basis of color, social class, and gender. Positive characterizes and traits are accredited to those with lighter skin while those who possess darker complexions are repeatedly placed into stereotypical categories and judged harshly by their physical appearance. Playwright Dael Orlandersmith’s play Yellowman documents the ingrained existence of color prejudice and centers her characters Alma and Eugene to reveal the wounds that prejudices inflicts …show more content…
Among African Americans there exists an arrangement of skin tones with varying degrees of light to dark; some shades are considered more acceptable than others. The impact of colorism on the black identity is vast and complicated. Specifically, the black identity expressed in Yellowman illustrates dark-skinned individuals viewing themselves as authentic, hardworking, and strong while viewing their light-skinned counterparts as unauthentic, privileged, and uppity. Thus, in the play light-skinned African Americans view themselves as more assimilated and less identified with the African American community and dark-skinned African Americans see themselves as less than their light-skinned counterpart. The best example that Orlandersmith gives is when light-skinned Eugene Gaines visits dark-skinned Alton White’s house play with comic books. Upon walking up to the house Eugene approaches Mrs. White and asked to play with Alton. Mrs. White quickly jumps to assumptions and asks Eugene “You come ‘round heah to laugh at Alton ain’t it”? To which Eugene replies, “No ma’am—I swear! He’s my friend—Alton’s my friend. I would never”. Mrs. White then
Defining beauty to the point that black individuals feel as though they cannot be born beautiful, worthy, and smart inadvertently breeds a community that passes judgments and spews hatred within the culture itself. The black community harbors its own form of discrimination on the basis of color, social class, and gender. Positive characterizes and traits are accredited to those with lighter skin while those who possess darker complexions are repeatedly placed into stereotypical categories and judged harshly by their physical appearance. Playwright Dael Orlandersmith’s play Yellowman documents the ingrained existence of color prejudice and centers her characters Alma and Eugene to reveal the wounds that prejudices inflicts …show more content…
Among African Americans there exists an arrangement of skin tones with varying degrees of light to dark; some shades are considered more acceptable than others. The impact of colorism on the black identity is vast and complicated. Specifically, the black identity expressed in Yellowman illustrates dark-skinned individuals viewing themselves as authentic, hardworking, and strong while viewing their light-skinned counterparts as unauthentic, privileged, and uppity. Thus, in the play light-skinned African Americans view themselves as more assimilated and less identified with the African American community and dark-skinned African Americans see themselves as less than their light-skinned counterpart. The best example that Orlandersmith gives is when light-skinned Eugene Gaines visits dark-skinned Alton White’s house play with comic books. Upon walking up to the house Eugene approaches Mrs. White and asked to play with Alton. Mrs. White quickly jumps to assumptions and asks Eugene “You come ‘round heah to laugh at Alton ain’t it”? To which Eugene replies, “No ma’am—I swear! He’s my friend—Alton’s my friend. I would never”. Mrs. White then