Growing up as young child, I didn’t experience a whole lot of racism. The issue that I mainly dealt with was colorism which was very difficult for me in school and at home. The issue of colorism all started back in slavery when light skinned blacks received special treatment by being assigned to do housework while dark skinned blacks were assigned to work outside and do hard-labor tasks (Coard et al., 2001). Even during the abolition of slavery, light skin African Americans were managed in a high socioeconomic stratum than dark skin African Americans. African Americans who are dark skinned are very proud of their skin color while those who aren’t are likely to view their skin color as a “mark of oppression” (Coard et al., 2001).
