modulating blackness throughout history
Racial Passing
History of Racial Passing in the USA
In the history of the USA, racial passing was mainly pursued by people of color with mixed ancestry who passed as white in order to escape slavery and later racial segregation and discrimination.
In the early 19th century, racial identity and the slave status became fully intertwined. Being black was equated with the status of a slave. Thus, many light-skinned slaves sought freedom by escaping and passing as white in a different state. Some went to court and referred to their white complexion in order to make the argument that they had been wrongly enslaved.
After the Civil War, mixed-race freedmen and freedwomen had the choice of either start a new life and escape the oppression of Jim Crow Laws by passing as white or to stay with their families and community and continue to live as black.
In the Interwar Period, the Harlem Renaissance opened up new possibilites of racial identities for light-skinned African Americans. The movement allowed for a validated 'third option';
"[...] racial indeterminacy and hybridity emerged as new possibiliites and alternative respones to passing. White- skinned African Americans could choose not to abandon their blackness but ratherto embrace both sides of their putative racial selves" (Hobbs. A Chosen Exile, p. 180).
In the aftermath of World War II, new economic opportunities emerged for African Americans and led to growing hope for structural change:
"[...] more African Americans rejected passing and liberated themselves from the fear and anxiety of discovery. Racial discrimination persisted, and so did passing, but the promise of new economic possibilities coupled with a growing protest movement for civil rights led many to reconsider the choices they made about their racial identities (Hobbs. A Chosen Exile, p. 226).
For information on the contemporary situation of racial identities see:
Modulating Blackness Today
The Construct of Race
"Antebellum abolitionists used racial ambiguity to remind whites that, but for the accident of color, no
meaningful differences separated them."
Allyson Hobbs. A Chosen Exile, p. 31
A Chosen Exile: A History of Racial Passing in American Life by Allyson Hobbs (2014)
"This book is about loss. Racial passing is an exile, sometimes chosen, sometimes not" (p. 4).
Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote in an article on the social construct of race for The Atlantic:
"No coherent, fixed definition of race actually exists."
One-Drop-Rule
"[A]ny evidence of any African ancestry whatsoever, no matter how far back or remote and regardless of phenotype, meant that one was classified Black" (p. 67).
Traces of History - Elementary Structures of Race by Patrick Wolfe
What is Race?
"[R]ace does not exist as a physical, anthropological, or genetic fact. [T]he gesture of race, notably in the case of people of African origin, consists in dissolving human beings into things, objects and merchandise."
Achille Mbembe. Critique of Black Reason, p. 11.
Examples of Passing as White
Dr. Albert Johnston and his family passed as white for 20 years in order for him to practice medicine. They even hid the fact that he and his wife were black from their children until he told the truth when applying for the Navy in World War II. He was rejected due to his mixed heritage.
Assimilation to Whiteness
The "Conk" – A White Hairstyle for Black Men
The conk was a hairstyle popular among
African American man between the 1920s
and 1960s. The name derived from the
hair straightener gel congolene. The
procedure of straightening hair with the
chemical product was very painful, yet
the wish to adhere to white beauty
standards overweighed the burning
sensation.
In his autobiography, Malcom X wrote about his
adoration for the "conk" hairstyle when he was a teenager:
"I couldn't get over marveling at how their hair was straight and shiny like white men's hair; Ella told me this was called a 'conk'" (Chapter 3).
Chuck Berry with a conk (1957)
Later, Malcom X drastically changed his opinion of the "conk":
"Who told you to hate the texture of your hair?"
For a more detailed discussion of black hairstyles and strategies of assimilation, see: Modulating Blackness Today
Passing – A Novel by Nella Larsen (1929)
Two childhood friends meet again on the rooftop of the Drayton Hotel in Chicago - both of them passing as white. In their everyday life, however, the two of them chose very different paths in life: Irene Redfield embraces her Blackness and lives with her black husband and son in Harlem. Clare Kendry on the other side, is married to a racist man who does not know about her mixed heritage. The re-encounter leads the two women to question their life choices; each criticizing and envying the other at the same time.
The Choice of Passing
"'Haven't you ever thought of 'passing'?' Irene answered promptly: 'No. Why should I?' And so disdainful was her voice and manner that Clare's face flushed and her eyes glinted. Irene hastened to add: 'You see, Clare, I've everything I want. Except, perhaps, a little more money'"
(p. 19).
Fear of Discovery
"I nearly died of terror the whole nine months before Margery was born for fear that she might be dark. Thank goodness, she turned out all right. But I'll never risk it again. Never! The strain is simply too hellish" (p. 27).
Danger of Discovery
"Speaking with confidence as well as with amusement, she said: 'My goodness, Jack! What difference would it make if, after all these years, you were to find out that I was one or two per cent coloured?' Bellew put out his hand in a repudiating fling, definite and final. 'Oh, no, Nig,' he declared, 'nothing like that with me. I know you're no n[***a], so it's all right. You can get as black as you please as far as I'm concerned, since I know you're no n[-word]*. I draw the line at that. No n[-word]*s in my family. Never have been and never will be'" (p. 29).
The Harlem Renaissance
"'And he's coming up here to your dance?' Irene asked why not. 'It seems rather curious, a man like that, going to a Negrodance.' This, Irene told her, was the year 1927 in the city of New York, and hundreds of white people of Hugh Wentworth's typ came to affairs in Harlem, more all the time. So many that Brian had said: 'Pretty soon the coloured people won't be allowed in at all, or will have to sit in Jim Crowed sections.' - 'What do they come for?'
'Same reason you're here, to see Negroes'"
(p. 54)
The 'Tragic Mulatto'
A stereotypical fictional chracter in US-American literature.
Incognegro - A Graphic Novel by Mat Johnson (2008)
Set in the early 1930s, the African American reporter Zane Pinchback passes as white in order investigate lynchings in the American South as an eyewitness. On a last undercover mission he travels to the South to save his wrongly accused brother from the death penalty. In doing so he runs the risk of being found out by the Ku-Klux-Klan.
In Incognegro, racial passing is a subversive source of power. Rather than being a strategy of survival, it is employed as a form of empowerment and liberation.
Zane modulates his appearance to pass as white. "My camouflage is provided by my genes; the product of the southern tradition nobody likes to talk about. Slavery. Rape. Hypocrisy."
Zane remarks that black people are seen as derivation from white normativity.
Further Literature Involving 'Passing':
The material on this page was compiled, created, and arranged by Rahel Leuzinger.
