The Black Body of Literature. Colorism in American Fiction

Blond and blue-eyed African Americans who look like typical Northern Europeans? The American racial definition has resulted in the fact that no other population group has such a range of skin colors, hair textures and facial features as African Americans. And individual appearance impacts all areas of life – from social relationships to salaries. It is no wonder, then, that this phenomenon has become an important topic in literature as well. Harriet Beecher Stowe divided her black protagonists in "Uncle Tom's Cabin" into two distinct groups – the light ones and the dark ones with specific character traits. African American writers, on the other hand, developed different strategies for writing against skin-color-based discrimination against blacks within their own group: from lighthearted irony to bitter realism, from praising the richness of physical differences to invoking the unity of all blacks. The diversity of strategies shows not least that the subject matter has lost none of its explosive power to this day.