Colorism in Indigenous Australia

COLORISM IN INDIGENOUS AUSTRALIA.

ALETHA M PENRITH, WRITER, UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY (ALUMNI).

Colorism’ is a phrase that was introduced in the 1980’s by author and activist Alice Walker. A definition in a recent article stated ‘Colorism’ is the systemic study of how white supremacy operates within ethnic groups to privilege those with light skin complexions, although definitions vary.

Hall (1995) for example argued that ‘Colorism’ is more than aesthetic of skin colour and Eurocentric features. Relaying in his paper on “The Bleaching Syndrome’ Hall notes that Colorism is a destructive response to racial hierarchies and racial domination that drives physio social acceptance and inclusion through assimilating one’s own physiological features.

Literature on “Colorism’ ranges from the legal studies, gender, criminology, education, youth education, politics, media studies to health and psychology and across African, African – American, wider America, Latino, Asian, South East Asian and Australian communities. It has a vast array of research material and explores tones and race more broadly within context of dominant culture, race and power relations.

Despite the fact that whiteness, race and Indigeneity have been regularly explored, for example see Moreton-Robinson, Higgas in ‘Whitening Race’ (2010) , ‘Colorism’ is perceived as having less of an impact in Indigenous Australia. Speculatively, this has been due to various factors in policy that have disproportionately affected Indigenous people at the design of Australian race powers, for example the stolen generation, assimilation policies, health (see Doyle, Hungerford

and Clearly 2016) and more prominently the exclusionary process of economic prisms that might be indicated should intra racial relationships draw unwanted policy attention (See Eatock versus Bolt [2011]).

The Legal System Numerous cases in the U.S have sought to define or create a prima facie case against colourism and many have failed. In the case of Santiago v. Stryker Corp. a determination made by the court recognised colour bias favoured a white skinned Puerto Ricans over dark skinned Puerto Ricans. The problem persists as courts struggle to define where to draw the ‘colour line’. Most cases have dealt with colour under racial discrimination. In 2008 , a taskforce was created to address the overwhelming numbers of Colour complaints in the workforce.

It is worth noting that Latinos have become one of the largest minority group in the U.S, but are legally classified as white despite having mixed heritage, whereas African –Americans have been situated as black under various tests when of mixed heritage. Although colourism does not necessarily equate to biracial parentage, where both African- American and Latinos sit in terms of legal determinations has interesting legal implications. While Puerto Ricans have a legal prima facie for colourism the majority of African-American cases have been dealt with under race discrimination.

Colourism across the legal spectrum have also impacted Japanese and Hindu women who are marginable based on colour preference. Caste systems and colour have

inter-relatable characteristics in the law, requiring a deeper and stronger analysis of the colour-caste binary. Other studies in the U.S have drawn upon colour bias in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and media depictions of African Americans who were described as ‘looters’ thereby actively perpetuating criminal imagery of dark skinned people. A CNN reported those left behind as ‘poorest’ and ‘blackest, indicating a natural relationship between darker skin tones, poverty and criminal behaviour.

Others yet have noted the use of darkened images in the case of O.J Simpson to send a message to the public ’reinforcing negative stereotypes’ of black people. Studies show disparities between dark skinned African American men and light skinned African American men, who are receiving longer and harsher prison sentences according to color biases.

Education A comprehensive study undertaken by Rybov (2012) focused on assessing how skin tone impacts adolescents in school to college and school to work transitions. In his study using multinominal logistic modelling, research showed that youth with dark skin tones were less likely to attend college than their lighter skinned counter parts in both genders. Further Rybov showed that phenotypical European features highly impacted female opportunities for work and college attendance. More broadly, those with higher socioeconomic backgrounds were able to access more opportunities and especially those who had parents who had attended college. One example noted those who had

darker skin and were from low socioeconomic backgrounds increasingly felt an obligation to go to work rather than attend college as an economic responsibility to family.

Light skinned students are also more generally perceived as unlikely to have behavioural problems, and as personifying other positive traits, enabling their schooling experience to be less conflicted. This has been described by scholar Margaret Hunter (2015) as the ‘Halo effect’, a projection by teachers that those with lighter skin are more attractive and more intelligent. She writes ‘The culture of colorism elevates the status of light skinned students and denigrates the status of dark-skinned students’ in people of Latino (including those who identify as Indigenous) and African-American heritage.

Scholars further drew a correlation between those with darker skin tone and the probability of suspension from school and perceived unfair treatment by teachers, finding them twice as likely to be suspended as white students. Findings were not the same for those who had lighter skin tones.

Socioeconomic Opportunity Lighter skinned people are selected above their darker skinned counter parts and able more freely to work within the broader society. Harrison (2010) commented that this is the result of a psychological preferencing, citing Byrnes’ 1971 study, noting that people feel more comfortable around those who look like them and further arguing that white skinned people reflect the imaginary likeness of those racial structures devised by whiteness. Harrison also argues, along

with a number of others, this selection preference based on structural whiteness can be seen across all racial groups.

The socioeconomic reality of ‘Colorism’ enables those with lighter skin to get ahead in society by obtaining jobs, and to a degree being less likely to come into conflict with the law. Moreover, in the case where they are in contact with the law, they are less likely to receive heavier sentencing thereby creating greater opportunity to engage in the workplace.

From a historical perspective, light skinned people were ‘more likely to be literated’ (Ryabov 2013) and therefore employable. In the context of slavery, those with light skin fetched higher prices at auction and as an investment were more likely to be treated better in the areas of housing and food and furthermore had a greater chance at survival. These socioeconomic benefits have contributed to a socioeconomic legacy of wealth and inclusion.

Indigeneity, Colourism and Assimilation in Australia. Studies of ‘Colorism’ can be highly complex due to the interwoven fabric of interracial relationships, themes of caste, religion and race. ‘Colorism’ within ethnic communities is sometimes a contested notion due to how peoples within those groups perceive themselves and others in the racial hierarchy, and further, the benefits such a discussion may have on policy implications in racially charged societies. Some groups and individuals may even argue that ‘Colorism’ has no significant impact on their identity and inter and intra groups relations, although this is highly unlikely.

The impacts of colonisation and racial hierarchy means that whether or not those impacted by the operationalisation of ‘Colorism’ perceive themselves to be, the dominant culture through

which socialisation, politicization and socioeconomic opportunity are devised determines, much like racial hierarchy, such systems are present. Moreover, these systems have political, economic and structural impacts on broader society.

In the Case of Eatock Versus Bolt in 2011, the question of colour is raised to discuss the manner through which the Racial Discrimination Act section 18C could determine the outcome of the case in the form of legal principles in relation to ‘light skin’ Aboriginals. The case was pursued in response to an article by Sun Herald Columnist Andrew Bolt , entitled ‘It’s so hip to be black’, in which he noted ‘Meet the white face of a new black race’.

Bolt detailed a number of high profile Indigenous people as misrepresenting themselves as Indigenous to claim funds proportionally directed at Indigenous people designed to counter historical policies excluding them from political, economic and social progression. The High Court found Bolt guilty and awarded the plaintiffs as a result, however, the matter of colourism was obscured by racial dialectic. As noted in the above literature under Law, the tendency to address colourism in accordance with race legislature has its limitations.

It is worth understanding historical policies when addressing political and legal implications of Indigenous groups and ‘Colorism’, specifically processes of assimilation legally constituted under the White Australian Policy to ‘absorb’ Indigenous Australians into the wider mainstream of white Australia. Douglas and Chesterman (2004) note the objective of inter racializing Indigenous people through miscegenation officially drew on the value afforded to whiteness and situated blackness as a caste system of shade. It argued ‘light skinned’ Aboriginal people should be assimilated genetically, and other,

into white society. While some of the ‘light skinned’ or ‘half caste’ lived with ‘blacks’, the authors wrote, others lived with the whites and were more socially accepted. This hierarchicalization within race undertook what ‘Colorism’ scholars have observed as a caste system with roots in the 1600’s.

The Eatock Versus Bolt case shows, as with many international cases in the context of race powers and colonisation, light skinned people have been the subjects of control and systemic abuse. An essential argument is not that light skinned people are not of a specific racial or ethnic origin, as Bolt (2009) argued, but rather a need to explore the impact skin colour in Indigenous Australia and how it reflects racial values of broader society, or as Holdschild puts it, creates a ‘double disadvantage’ for some.

‘Colorism’ transcends race and gender, normalises whiteness in race powers, and preferences light skin as reflective of normative. ‘Colorism’ also engages narratives and power relations related to tone as not just an inference of interracial relationships, but those with parents of the same ethnicity and leads to psychic conflict within the individual and more broadly the group (Hall 1990). It has a particularly insidious impact in relation to aestheticism in women of colour, allowing those with lighter skin to ‘marrying up’ on the socioeconomic scale, while leaving those with darker complexion notably unwedded and subjects of discard and dehumanisation.

Noonuccal’s poem in 1989 ‘Dark Unmarried Mothers’, reflected on the value of whiteness in Australian court systems where white females are concerned, compared to those of black women when she wrote:

‘Is it a white girl, then court case and headline/ Stern talk of maintenance / Is it a dark girl? Then safe immunity/ He takes what he wants’

This passage comments on Colour, race, gender and sexual consent, and the manner through which the law protects whiteness and allows the exploitation of blackness. Whether similar agency is considered when light skinned women are raped is a question requiring interrogation. The case of the rape of Black Power Activist Roberta Sykes in the 1960’s in Townsville saw the conviction of one of several rapists. No such case from the same period has recorded the rape of darker skinned women nor the conviction of a white male, despite there being a rich literary premise for such occurrences.

Research shows Indigenous Australians face a number of negative stereotypes which impact policy across a broad range of areas. However, like many populations of colour across the world, being dark skinned can intensify and activate negative associations, as research has shown with recent online experiments on the pigmentation of U.S President Barack Obama and the 2008 U.S election. *Colorism is an important field of study that, unlike critical race theory, moves beyond racial groups and relates to systemic privileges bestowed upon those with lighter skin tones. It has important implications across a number of fields including the media, the law, socioeconomics, politics, policy and education.

This paper has argued the importance of introducing the concept of Colorism into Indigenous Australian research , and despite the fact that it has rarely been attempted, colour is already present in the way society perceives people, and has placed limitations of human interaction and human potential. In EATOCK v. BOLT [2011], for example, colour plays a particular role in how various Acts can be interpreted and applied.

Recent social media activity has continued to highlight the problem of ‘Colorism’ in many parts of the world using the internet (ABC 2016), and while there is little research on Indigenous Australians and

colourism, the idea that it does not operate here in light of Australia’s historical White Australian Policy and attempts absorb the Indigenous population into the whiteness of Australian standardized norms, is very unlikely. Practices of whiteness exist in many areas of Australian policy therefore it seems unlikely that this would also not be privileged in skin tone, therefore ‘Colorism’ research can expand opportunities for Indigenous researchers and non-Indigenous researchers to identify and address how whiteness is operationalised to privilege those with light skin tones in Indigenous communities, as it has elsewhere in the world. Certainly it may draw inference from historical policies that have privileged whiteness. It can also create structural resources to counter such privileges which have traditionally satisfied white imaginaries and reflections of self and power.

distributions towards darker skinned Indigenous people. Furthermore research on ‘Colorism’ in Indigenous Australians will add research design in causality, and widen literature on ‘Colorism’ and race studies.

While Doyle et al (2016) may argue that Indigeneity is not defined by skin colour, in a world that privileges light skin and Eurocentric features above dark skin and Indigenous/black features, the desire to be a whitening nation persists. Privileging those with lighter skin tones and disproportionately impacting dark skinned Indigenous people is a double negative in the Indigenous experience. Roberts noted in his 2014 article for the Quadrant , ‘Skin colour has been the elephant in the room for some decades but its implications are ignored, unspoken, denied and otherwise not on the table’ in Australia, therefore I argue the need for ‘Colorism’ to be introduced into Indigenous Research is essential to provide more nuanced understanding and to counter negative policy and social