The Significance of Skin Color Among African Americans and Mexican Americans

Authors

Margaret L. Hunter, Santa Clara UniversityFollow
Walter Allen
Edward Telles

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2001

Publisher

Program for Research on Black Americans / University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research

Abstract

As W.E.B. Du Bois predicted in his July, 1900 speech before the Pan-African Conference in London, race continues to challenge our society. Du Bois asserted that:

The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the colour line, the question as to how far differences of race, which show themselves chiefly in the colour of the skin and the texture of the hair, are going to be made hereafter, the basis for denying to over half the world the right of sharing to their utmost ability the opportunities and privileges of modern civilisation (Lewis 1995:639).

What Du Bois did not anticipate, and what for the most part social science has failed to address adequately, is how race in this country would be affected by immigration. Immigration has had profound consequences for how this country thinks about and responds to race. The dramatic demographic increase in cultural, racial and ethnic diversity over the past quarter century—linked with the politicization of race, ethnicity, and culture—has compelled an elaboration of the country’s racial construct beyond the historically simple (and never completely accurate) Black-White dichotomy (Almaguer 1994; Omi and Winant 1994). Previous research has shown that a skin color continuum is an important component of how race is conceived and how race determines life chances for two of the largest U.S. minority groups (Keith and Herring 1991; Telles and Murguia 1992). This study seeks to advance our understanding of the complexities of race by taking a comparative look at how skin color, ethnic identity and racial discrimination operate in the lives of African Americans and Mexican Americans.

Comments

Copyright © 2001 Program for Research on Black Americans / University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research. Reprinted with permission.

Recommended Citation

Hunter, Margaret, Walter Allen, and Edward Telles. 2001. “The Significance of Skin Color Among African Americans and Mexican Americans.” African American Research Perspectives, Winter:173-184.