Abstract
Under colonialism, the mirror of the black-white binary has been shattered by white colonials consorting with black and indigenous women. By privileging lighter-skinned mixed-race groups, colonialists established a hierarchy that linked skin colour to economic and social class. Therefore, we argue that to understand the texts of Frantz Fanon and Mayotte Capécia requires analytical tools that resist seeing the world in black or white. Our reading of Fanon seeks to broaden the scope of analysis of these texts by looking at them as works standing at the crossroads where issues of race, colour, gender, class, and power converge. Blaming women absolves men from the painful reality that they are also partners in this construction. As two black women, we have been fascinated by the depth of Fanon’s understanding of the mechanisms and ideology of colonial oppression. However, the way Fanon deals with the desire of the black man to be whitened by his association to a white woman is very different from a reverse situation between a black woman and a white man. Both seek their redemption by the association to whiteness—lightness.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Anthias, F., & Yuval-Davis, N. (1992). Racialised boundaries: Race, nation, gender colour and class and the antiracist struggle. London: Routledge.
Bergner, G. (1995). Who is that masked woman? Or, the role of gender in Fanon’s black skin, white masks. Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, 110(1), 175–188.
Bhabha, H. K. (1986). Remembering Fanon, self, psyche and the colonial condition [Foreword]. In F. Fanon (Ed.), Black skin, white masks (pp. vii–xxv). London: Pluto Press.
Capécia, M. (1948). I am a Martinican woman [Je suis Martiniquaise]. Paris: Corréa.
Childers, K. S. (2006). Citizenship and assimilation in postwar Martinique: The abolition of slavery and the politics of commemoration. In Proceedings of the Western Society for French History, 34. Ann Arbor: Scholarly Publishing Office, University of Michigan Library. http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.0642292.0034.018. Accessed 10 Oct 2011.
Collins, P. H. (2000). Black feminist thought, knowledge, consciousness, and the politics of empowerment. New York: Routledge Press.
Dayan, J. (1999). Women, history, and the gods: Reflections on Mayotte Capécia and Marie Chauvet. In Haigh Sam (Ed.), An introduction to Caribbean Francophone writing: Guadeloupe and Martinique (pp. 69–82). Oxford/New York: Berg.
De los Reyes, P., & Mulinari, D. (2005). Intersektionalitet: Kritiska reflektioner over (o)jämlikhetens landskap. Malmö: Liber.
Dill, B. T., & Zambrana, R. E. (2009). Critical thinking about inequality: An emerging lens. In B. Dill & R. E. Zambrana (Eds.), Emerging intersections: Race, class and gender in theory policy and practice (pp. 1–22). New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Duffus, C. (2005). When one drop isn’t enough: War as a crucible of racial identity in the novels of Mayotte Capécia. Callaloo, 28(4), 1091–1102.
Earley, S. M. (2002). Review of textual politics from slavery to postcolonialism: Race and identification. African Studies Quarterly, 6(1–2), 335–337.
Fanon, F. (1986). Black skin, white masks. London: Pluto Press.
Fish, J. M. (2011). The myth of race. In J. Fish (Ed.), Race and intelligence: Separating science from myth (pp. 113–143). Mahwah: Taylor & Francis [e-library].
Gates, H. L., Jr. (1991). Critical Fanonism. Critical Inquiry, 17(3), 457–470.
Gauch, S. (2002). Fanon on the surface. Parallax, 8(2), 116–128.
Gordon, L. R. (2006). Through the zone of non-being: A reading of black skin, white masks in celebration of Fanon’s eightieth birthday. Worlds and Knowledge Otherwise, 1(3), 1–30. http://www.jhfc.duke.edu/wko/dossiers/1.3/1.3contentarchive.php. Accessed 10 Oct 2011.
Hall, R. E. (2006). The bleaching syndrome among people of color: Implications of skin color for human behavior in the social environment. Journal of Human Behavior in the Social Environment, 13(3), 19–31.
Hancock, A.-M. (1998). When multiplication doesn’t equal quick addition: Examining intersectionality as a research paradigm. Perspectives on Politics, 5(1), 63–80.
Hook, D. (2004). Frantz Fanon, Steve Biko, “psychopolitics,” and critical psychology. In D. Hook (Ed.), Critical psychology (pp. 84–114). Lansdowne: UCT Press. http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/961. Accessed 10 Oct 2011.
Hooks, B. (1992). Black looks: Race and representation. Boston: South End Press.
Hooks, B. (2000). Feminist theory from margin to center (2nd ed.). Boston: South End Press.
James, W. (1992). Migration, racism and identity: The Caribbean experience in Britain. New Left Review, 1, 193.
Lane, L. (2004). Trying to make a living: Studies in the economic life of women in interwar Sweden. Meddelanden från Ekonomisk-historiska institutionen, Handelshögskolan vid Göteborgs universitet, 90. Göteborg [Gothenburg], Sweden: University of Gothenburg.
Macey, D. (2000). Frantz Fanon: A biography. New York: Picador.
Macey, D. (2004). Frantz Fanon, or the difficulty of being Martinican. History Workshop Journal, 58(Autumn), 211–223.
Macey, D. (2005). Adieu Foulard. Adieu Madras. In M. Silverman (Ed.), Frantz Fanon’s black skin, white masks: New interdisciplinary essays (pp. 12–32). Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Makward, C. P. (1999). Mayotte Capécia ou l'aliénation selon Fanon. Paris: Karthala.
Murdoch, H. A. (2007). Resistance to Vichy in the novels of Raphaël Confiant. L'Esprit Créateur, 47(1), 68–83.
Senghor, L. (1962). Some thoughts on Africa: A continent in development. International Affairs, 38(2), 189–195. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2610377. Accessed 19 Oct 2011.
Sharpley-Whiting, T. D. (1996). Anti-black femininity and mixed-race identity: Engaging Fanon to reread Capécia. In L. R. Gordon, T. D. Sharpley-Whiting, & R. T. White (Eds.), Fanon: A critical reader (pp. 155–162). Cambridge, MA: Blackwell.
Sharpley-Whiting, T. D. (1998). Frantz Fanon: Conflicts and feminisms. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.
Shohat, E. (2006). Taboo, memories, diasporic voices. Durham: Duke University Press.
Stith-Clark, B. (1997). I am a Martinican woman and the white negress: Two novelettes of the 1940s by Mayotte Capécia. Pueblo: Passeggiata.
Tinsley, O. N. (2010). Thiefing sugar: Eroticism between women in Caribbean literature. Durham: Duke University Press.
Wilder, G. (2004). Race, reason, impasse: Césaire, Fanon, and the legacy of emancipation. Radical History Review, 3(90), 31–61.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Lane, L., Mahdi, H. (2013). Fanon Revisited: Race Gender and Coloniality Vis-à-Vis Skin Colour. In: Hall, R. (eds) The Melanin Millennium. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4608-4_11
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4608-4_11
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-007-4607-7
Online ISBN: 978-94-007-4608-4
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawSocial Sciences (R0)