Gizele Oliveira wears the combat boots, gold chains, and floor-sweeping coats that define a season melding street with glamour.
From Bazaar.
Historically, Black women have continuously been ridiculed and objectified for the natural state of their bodies, from head to toe.
Upon the release of the new live-action version of Disney’s The Lion King, Beyoncé blessed the world with an accompanying album. The Lion King: The Gift beautifully combines R&B, hip-hop, and Afrobeats, and includes one song in particular titled “Brown Skin Girl” — which opens with sweet-voiced Blue Ivy Carter singing the hook and is a celebration of dark-skinned women.
Let me say that again… dark-skinned women. (Because, yes, colorism exists in the African-American community).
The song sparked such a grand response for its empowering lyrics that it birthed its own hashtag #BrownSkinGirlChallenge. For many, the song was a no-brainer, direct message to a specific type of woman, with darker, deeper brown skin. For others, who joined the challenge by posting their photos, it seems they skipped over the specific cues in the lyrics and only listened to the hook to celebrate themselves.
Beyoncé is deliberate in her intention by mentioning beautiful brown beauties Lupita Nyong’o, Naomi Campbell, and Kelly Rowland in the lyrics of the song.
She added to her specific pigment description by saying “melanin too dark to throw her shade.” For those of us with basic knowledge of the parts of speech, we know that the word “too” is an adverb that emphasizes the adjective “dark” to create a stronger sense of the darkness being referred to.
To break it down: Mathematically, that “too” would more than likely be represented as a power symbol on top of a number to show that the number is to be multiplied to equal something of greater value. Extra. More. Additional. This degree of melanin is specifically devoted to women who are often berated for their Blackness, women who represent African ancestry and heritage and are mocked for it.
This song is for those Black women. That doesn’t mean that other Brown-skinned ladies can’t get down… it just means the song isn’t about them. After-all, this is The Lion King. This is Africa.
“I love everything about you/ from your nappy curls to every single curve/ your body natural./ Same skin that was broken be the same skin takin' over,” Beyoncé sings.
Historically, Black women have continuously been ridiculed and objectified for the natural state of their bodies, from head to toe. Nappy was used as a derogatory word to describe the texture of Black hair that is naturally coarse, tightly coiled/curled, and considered unkempt; it was used to show inferiority and a symbol of ugliness.
Nowadays, Black people who choose to wear their hair naturally are often subject to being kicked out of school or fired from their place of employment. In April 2018, Black news anchor, Brittany Noble-Jones, was fired from her job as a Mississippi news anchor because she refused to straighten her hair after she was told that it was “unprofessional.” This year, New York City and California passed laws against natural hair discrimination.
One of the final reminders of who this song pays homage is the lyric, “Your skin is not only dark, it shines, and it tells a story.” The evidence is clear that this song is representative of the systemic existence of color privilege. This topic, that has been thoughtfully tackled by Black-millennial roundtable show The Grapevine TV, is an ongoing conversation that requires fewer people inserting themselves and more people willing to listen and understand the impact of color privilege's brutality.
Beyoncé, a fair-skinned Black woman, made a song that puts her in the background and centers dark-skinned women in the foreground. It is a celebratory ode to the kind of Blackness that is often dismissed, disrespected, and ridiculed. It is not specific to every hue, but for the Black women whose skin is full of melinated magic and hasn’t been given the floor or stage of acceptance. Maybe we should all accept the song as it is and who it was made for.
Way before that tweet last Sunday, I had been planning to “go back” to the place from which I came. As a matter of fact, that’s what they’ve been teaching all of us at my high school here in South Central Los Angeles: “If and when you make it, you have a responsibility to ‘go back’ and help out the community.”
But what if I’m already here? Shouldn’t I be able to “help fix the totally broken and crime infested” neighborhood I wake up in, go to school in, and am trying to get up out of only to “go back” to once I get my college degree?
Either way, I’m writing this to let everyone know that no matter who says it, or tweets it, or believes it, or doesn’t… the “go back” is what people of color do. And regardless of its racist origins or intent, the true essence of “going back” is uniquely American. You see, without the opportunity (even if it’s sometimes just being lucky) that this country affords, kids like me wouldn’t even consider the possibility of a “go back” as a part of my life. Instead, I imagine we’d all feel stuck — kinda’ like those people from those sh*thole countries, I guess.
But because I love America, and I believe in its infinity, my dream is to be like Robert Smith. Go back, and give back. Now I’m not sure if my family is eight generations deep from slavery like his is, but I’m positive that when someone is willing to “put a little fuel in your bus,” a lot more of America becomes possible.
So, I’m making Sunday’s tweets my fuel. And my bus, like Kamala’s, is taking me from here to a neighborhood near you sometime soon.
When I get there, I’m asking that we do it a little differently than how it was done before. Because, I listen to those Malcolm Gladwell podcasts, and I’ve seen that Lester Maddox interview with Dick Cavett, and I know that on the road to becoming an American like Mr. Smith, I’m bound to have a few Jim-Brown-Moments along the way.
