A01=Robert L. Reece
Author_Robert L. Reece
Beyonce too white
Category=JBSL
Category=JHBD
color discrimination
color-based inequality
colorism
colour-based inequality
colourism
colur discrimination
commercialization of race
eq_bestseller
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eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
mocha skin tone
multiracial
racial discrimination
racial inequality
robert reece
skin color
skin color bias
skin colour
skin colour bias
too white
what is colorism?
what is colourism
what's wrong with skin whitening?
Product details
- ISBN 9781509565825
- Weight: 340g
- Dimensions: 140 x 218mm
- Publication Date: 05 Dec 2025
- Publisher: John Wiley and Sons Ltd
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
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Colorism – discrimination based on skin darkness within a racial group – has plagued Black Americans since their first arrival in this country. Although colorism has taken different forms over time, lighter-skinned Black people have always received advantages at the expense of their darker-skinned counterparts, and colorism is a problem that fosters ongoing social inequality to this day.
The Shades of Black Folk traces the development and evolution of colorism in the US from its origins in the late eighteenth century right up to the present. It chronicles the phenomenon’s various manifestations, from nineteenth-century debates about the fate of children born to parents of different races, through the contentious arguments between famed Black activists Marcus Garvey and W.E.B. DuBois, to the modern legal battles where judges struggle to adjudicate color discrimination cases. Recognizing that this issue is made more complicated by rarely being discussed in conversations about race and racial discrimination, Reece calls on readers to grapple with the complexities of color-based inequality and offers policy suggestions to tackle it.
The Shades of Black Folk sheds light on an underexamined but all-too-powerful axis of social inequality and will be necessary reading for students of race, racism, and stratification.
The Shades of Black Folk traces the development and evolution of colorism in the US from its origins in the late eighteenth century right up to the present. It chronicles the phenomenon’s various manifestations, from nineteenth-century debates about the fate of children born to parents of different races, through the contentious arguments between famed Black activists Marcus Garvey and W.E.B. DuBois, to the modern legal battles where judges struggle to adjudicate color discrimination cases. Recognizing that this issue is made more complicated by rarely being discussed in conversations about race and racial discrimination, Reece calls on readers to grapple with the complexities of color-based inequality and offers policy suggestions to tackle it.
The Shades of Black Folk sheds light on an underexamined but all-too-powerful axis of social inequality and will be necessary reading for students of race, racism, and stratification.
Robert Reece is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Texas at Austin.
