Erasures Archives - The Other Madisons

The Convenience (or Inconvenience) of Skin Color, Yesterday and Today

For Americans whose skin color is any shade darker than pinkish, “inconvenience” is a euphemism verging on ridiculous understatement. The African slave trade laid the foundations for American racism and for Americans paying so much attention to skin color. The Africans’ dark skin became the foremost symbol of subservience. Later, skin color was quite inconvenient for both escaped slaves and freedmen, long before and long after the Mason-Dixon Line demarcated the regions of our country that […]