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Yvettep
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 3403
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 03, 2009 - 10:12 am: | 
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...Skin has changed color in human lineages much faster than scientists had previously supposed, even without intermarriage, Jablonski says. Recent developments in comparative genomics allow scientists to sample the DNA in modern humans.
By creating genetic "clocks," scientists can make fairly careful guesses about when particular groups became the color they are today. And with the help of paleontologists and anthropologists, scientists can go further: They can wind the clock back and see what colors these populations were going back tens of thousands of years, says Jablonski.
She says that for many families on the planet, if we look back only 100 or 200 generations (that's as few as 2,500 years), "almost all of us were in a different place and we had a different color."
Over the last 50,000 years, populations have gone from dark pigmented to lighter skin, and people have also gone the other way, from light skin back to darker skin, she says.
"People living now in southern parts of India [and Sri Lanka] are extremely darkly pigmented," Jablonski says. But their great, great ancestors lived much farther north, and when they migrated south, their pigmentation redarkened.
"There has probably been a redarkening of several groups of humans"....
Listen to full story: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=100057939 |
Ntfs_encryption
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Ntfs_encryption
Post Number: 3551
Registered: 10-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 03, 2009 - 10:35 am: |
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As usual, nice post Ms. Yvettep. This story is not really related to yours but it does involve the dilemma of skin color. I found this in a black forum and I was stunned to read of pathological ignorance and gross stupidly of some Negroes. You read and decide.......
Why is my friend so color-struck?
I have a friend I've known for 15 years but our friendship is really starting to breakdown because of her obsession with light skin/dark skin.
My friend is from a Jamaican background. She has very dark skin (Angie Stone sort of color). I guess you would describe me as being 'brown skinned'. Although born here, my parents are both West African. In my parents' country I am considered 'light skinned'. Either way, I am not particularly interested in my skin tone and I rarely think about it.
A few weeks ago some Nigerian dudes were trying to holla at me in a bar. After I revealed that one of my parents is Nigerian, one of these dudes kept saying, "I think you're really pretty - you're really fair." I thought this was a really weak line and he did not get anywhere with me. However, later in the evening, my friend (the dark skinned one) became really angry/animated. She said, "I can't believe that man described you as light skinned. You are SO not light skinned. You are dark just like me. You are in the same category as I am. Back in Jamaica you are just 'regular' - you ain't no light skinned anything."
She even made me hold my arm next to hers to compare skin tones. She said, "See - we are both regular dark skin." (In actuality her skin is quite a bit darker than mine - but who cares, right?) I just sort of mumbled 'sure'. Then she went on and on about it. Then she asked some other friend of ours for their opinion about it. This other friend said to my friend: "Yeah, your girl is quite a bit lighter than you. She really looks light for a Nigerian too." My friend then got REALLY mad. She said again: "Yeah but she is still in the same category as me. She is still regular darkskin. With her features and hair texture ain't nobody in Jamaica calling her lightskinned."
She went on and on in this vein. It was really starting to freak me out a bit. Then we started talking about my vacation to Jamaica a few months ago. My friend said, "i bet those dudes in Jamaica were calling out 'Hey pretty dark girl' to you in the street." I said that no, nobody in Jamaica made any reference to my being 'dark' or any reference to my skin tone at all. My friend said she did not believe me.
Finally, she made me feel her hair. She was going "feel my hair. Feel how it moves and I don't even have a chemical in it." She also said, "You're pretty too but you know how it is - YOU are not the 'prize' or the 'trophy' like Beyonce is but you do have healthy Negroid hair and you have pretty Negro features."
She made quite a big thing about her hair and she kept urging me to confirm that she had 'good' hair. For the record, my hair is super-nappy and worn in locs and my friend's hair is also nappy but less nappy than mine and she wears it in a press and curl.
I gently said to her that she seems to talk about light skin/dark skin a hell of a lot (she does!!) and was it a real issue for her. She said that no it is not an issue but that she just doesn't want me to believe people who call me light skinned. WTF? Why is it so important? She then listed a whole load of celebrities who she considers to be really dark. On her list are:
Lil Kim
Halle Berry
Sanaa Lathan
Janet Jackson
Usher
Nia Long
LL Cool J
John Legend
I told her that I didn't consider any of these people to be especially dark really. I told her my opinion of really dark was probably Wesley Snipes and Alek Wek. My friend got really irate then and said she cannot BELIEVE that I can't see that Sanaa Lathan and Wesley and Biggie are EXACTLY THE SAME in complexion and that they are all 'dark skin' and 'just regular.' So I said, OK - whatever you say. No big deal.
But this is really starting to irritate me now. Every conversation we have she brings up skin tone. I realize she has been doing this for years and has a real fixation on it. She asked to borrow my foundation and when she dabbed it on her face it was too light and straight away she said "Of course this foundation is WAY too light for you." (In fact the foundation is a perfect match for me).
What the F makes somebody so darn obsessed with this stuff? She also started dissing Usher and saying that in Jamaica nobody is putting him on a pedestal or calling him a superstar and that he is 'just regular, darkskin with Negroid features'. She also said that Rihanna "actually just has Negroid features. It's only her light skin that makes her a star." |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 13479
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 03, 2009 - 12:43 pm: |
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Both of these articles were veeery interesting to me, especially since they confirm some of what I've always felt.
Socially speaking, the choice of words used to describe the tones in the color spectrum of non white skin is a subjective decision. It's all in the eye of the beholder, and the person making the judgment uses their own skin as a standard for comparison. The words dark, light, black brown, conjure up different hues to different people and how a person sees themself often dates back to how they were labled in their childhood either by family or friends or both.
Obviously a person's obsession with color is psychological in its origin and involves issues of self esteem.
I've always thought that many factors contribute to skin color and how it evolves and that the human race is inexolerably moving toward the time when its members will all be the same neutral color.
Of course, this commonality of color will not eliminate discrimination because people will always find a way to deem themselves better than those different from them. |
Gingerbronze
Newbie Poster
Username: Gingerbronze
Post Number: 8
Registered: 01-2009
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, February 13, 2009 - 09:26 pm: |
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The obsession of skin color is fueled by global white minority domination through racism. The majority of the world's population have melanin. The only people who have a REAL problem with skin tone are those without it. They project their insecurities onto those with melanin using reverse psychology and other means to promote the value of pale skin over dark skin.
I thank the universe I was born a dark hued woman - especially since my paternal/maternal family lineage is tainted (to my dismay) with the blood of non-Africans. I absolutely unapologetically love my dark ebony skin and gorgeous negroid features and physique. My natural beauty has been an asset (aided by my intellect) and has attracted throughout my lifetime male suitors of all nationalities.
I don't view my skin tone as an impediment.
I have found that people who internalize racism have self-esteem and psychological issues with skin color.
Being raised with a strong cultural identity and awareness stymied any illusions of inferiority and instilled within me a deeply embedded sense of pride and security in my "blackness". |
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