The Blacker the Berry: A Novel of Negro Life

Colorism is a form of racial prejudice based on skin color that privileges individuals with lighter skin tones over those with darker skin tones. Although white people can and do engage in colorism, The Blacker the Berry depicts colorism among Black American communities. Although Thurman is interested primarily in the way that Black Americans engage in colorist discrimination and internalized ideas of perceived white “superiority,” he identifies white supremacy during the era of slavery as the root of colorism. White enslavers in the South often raped enslaved Black women, and the children born from these relations typically had lighter skin than their mothers. Emma Lou’s grandparents were the product of one such union, and rather than judging their ancestors’ enslavers for their crimes, both Emma Lou’s grandmother, Maria, and mother, Jane, see their white blood as a mark of “superiority.” Maria notes that “[i]n their veins was some of the best blood of the South. They were closely akin to the only true aristocrats in the United States” (7). Emma Lou’s family believes that their Black and white ancestry and light skin situate them closer to the upper echelons of white society than their Black peers with darker skin. The elevation of white enslavers who brutalized their ancestors points to the inherent violence of colorism; it perpetuates the same racism that undergirded chattel slavery.

The Blacker the Berry represents the way that colorism is both experienced externally in the form of prejudice and as self-hatred in the form of internalized racism. Emma Lou experiences prejudicial treatment because of her dark skin and illustrates internalized colorism through her own self-loathing. Emma Lou’s first and most formative experience of colorism happens within her family and the tightly-knit Black community in Boise. Her mother, grandmother, and other members of their immediate social group express repeated disappointment that Emma Lou was born so Black. Maria objected to her daughter’s choice of partner, primarily because of his dark skin. Because she so strongly associated light skin with high class and respectability, she was certain that a man with darker skin could not be good enough for her daughter, and she ultimately caused the dissolution of her daughter’s marriage. Emma Lou comes of age against the backdrop of this insidious colorism and learns to see herself through the lens of skin color preference. The novel begins with Emma Lou’s assertion that her Blackness is “somewhat of a liability” (3), and that sentiment pervades the entire novel. Each of the novel’s five sections begins with an inner monologue in which Emma Lou expresses unhappiness about her skin color.

This unhappiness also propels the action in the first section; because her uncle argues that larger cities do not foster as much colorism as smaller ones, Emma Lou decides to move to Los Angeles and attend USC. There, as she does in her family, she experiences both colorist discrimination and internalized colorism: She is excluded from desirable social groups because all of their members have light skin. She continues to judge her appearance harshly, and she also engages in colorism herself. For example, she meets a girl who has darker skin named Hazel whom she feels conforms to the worst stereotypes about Black people and does not want to be associated with her.

Ultimately, Emma Lou becomes disillusioned with USC and leaves Los Angeles, hoping that in Harlem, she will have an easier time as a Black woman with dark skin. There, too, she both experiences and internalizes colorism in her personal and professional relationships. When searching for work, she wants to find a “congenial” job, the type of position held by secretaries, stenographers, and other office girls. She has no interest in cooking, cleaning, or the type of labor typically done by lower-class women; she associates class with skin color and has coded “good” jobs as “light” and undesirable jobs as “dark.” However, she is turned down from a position working for a Black-owned real estate firm because they have “someone else” in mind for the job. Although they do not explicitly state their preference for a woman with light skin, Emma Lou notices that all of the secretaries in the front office have light skin tones, are well-dressed, and frequently reapply powder to their faces. Emma Lou wants desperately to be part of this cohort because she has absorbed her mother’s and grandmother’s colorism. She extends this skin color preference to her personal relationships as well, and in her descriptions of undesirable male partners, she typically notes the “darkness” of their complexions. The two men with whom she has long-term relationships in Harlem, Alva and Braxton, are both lightly complected, and she notes that although she finds Braxton dull, she is flattered that such a man would want to be seen with her on the streets of Harlem.

Thurman’s treatment of colorism happens most frequently through oblique criticisms of Emma Lou that elide explicit discussions of race. However, through the character of Truman (styled after Thurman himself), he directly addresses the phenomenon of colorism within Black communities. While in Harlem, Emma Lou attends a rent party where a group of intellectuals openly discuss race and colorism. Truman argues that because of America’s white majority, Black Americans are taught to value what white Americans value and conform to white standards. He goes on to say that Black Americans are only human, that “they are subject to be influenced and controlled by the same forces and factors that influence and control other human beings” (72). He thinks that it is a natural tendency for an oppressed individual to want to feel superior to another group and that it is understandable—although not excusable—that Black Americans with lighter skin would single their neighbors with darker skin for mistreatment. Alongside this speech, Thurman counteracts colorism in the novel by highlighting how it never improves Emma Lou’s life. She sacrifices for lovers with lighter skin than her who consistently exploit her, and she only self-actualizes in the book’s last pages when she finally leaves Alva, determined to make her own path.