The Bluest Eye (Vintage International)
by Toni Morrison
Pecola Breedlove, a young black girl, prays every day for beauty. Mocked by other children for the dark skin, curly hair, and brown eyes that set her apart, she yearns for normalcy, for the blond hair and blue eyes that she believes will allow her to finally fit in.Yet as her dream grows more fervent, her life slowly starts to disintegrate in the face of adversity and strife. A powerful examination of our obsession with beauty and conformity, Toni Morrison’s virtuosic first novel asks powerful questions about race, class, and gender with the subtlety and grace that have always characterized her writing.
Best book
…In which I invite someone bookish to tell us about one of their all-time favourite works of fiction, and why it’s so special to them. This Friday Fave comes from author Sara Foster:
124 was spiteful. Full of a baby’s venom…
So begins the story of Beloved, a book I often…
Alice Walker defined colourism (also spelled colorism) as “prejudicial or preferential treatment of same-race people based solely on their color” in In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens. Colourism prevails intraracially and interracially for Black people because of the same reasons; the dominance of Eurocentric beauty myths via White supremacy, external racism by Whites and internalized racism by Blacks, and rigid notions of femininity and masculinity as it pertains to race and complexion. Though these 6 reads above present a plethora of topics, revealing the intersectional experiences of Black women, all of them elaborate on colourism quite well and are critical reads. The first two are non-fiction, latter 4 are novels. MUST READ.
I’ve also written a few essays that elaborate on colourism and its impact on beauty and more (and some of these essays on natural hair also touch on the topic):
- Black Women Do Not Have To Reject Any Mention Of Beauty To Be Womanist/Feminist
- Black Couples In Television/Film - Casting and Colourism
- “Keep That Talk On Colourism Quiet!”
- F*CK Nude And Flesh-Toned
- Hierarchy amidst the WoC Label?
- Black Women and Erasure
- Before Whites Wag Their Fingers At Colourism and Black Hair Politics…
- Politics and The Blackness Police
- Bigotry Aside, Why Not Go For Aesthetic Truth? (In Reference To Zoe Saldana Portraying Nina Simone)
- Black Girls, Black Women and TV Commercials
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