Who am I? And what makes me the way I am? How do I perceive myself and how does the world perceive me? How do I act accordingly as a black female? “Black girls that live and are being educated in a predominantly white environment experience hinder in their overall wellbeing and sense of identity” (Ricardo, 2015).
Growing up as a black Eritrean female in the Netherlands, I am perceived as a black Eritrean woman by white Dutch people, but my fellow Eritrean people see me as white washed. They never specifically told me why they think that, but if I had to fill that in myself I think that it’s because of the way I dress, act and talk. I suppose it’s because of the fact that I’m a little different from them. Urban dictionary explains being white washed as the following: A derogatory term used to describe a minority who has assimilated with western society. The “White washed” person does not necessarily abandon his/her own culture, but instead embrace others beside his/her own. By calling me whitewashed the person in question is implying that I’m not meeting my ethnic stereotype. People are products of their environment. So unless I’m surrounded by my heritage growing up, I’m more likely to become a product of where I am and who I’m with. I speak and understand the Eritrean language and I am also proud of where I come from, but I have also assimilated into my surroundings in the Western society.
The strange thing about me being labeled white washed, is that society is not surprised when a white person likes a group of different things. I will illustrate this with an example. At the beginning of high school, people always had a reason to make fun of me. If it wasn’t about my ethnicity or race, it would be about the way I dressed or my interests. That did not stop me from doing what I liked. I always wanted to try new things out and I wouldn’t limit myself to one thing. I wore a lot of vintage clothes and would always go to vintage kilo sales to buy some gems. People assumed that I bought these clothes, because I was poor and made fun of it. They said that I dressed like a grandpa. I also did not limit myself when it came to music. I like to listen to hip-hop, jazz, reggae, soul and afro music, but also to indie, hard rock, techno and house. When I tell people that I listen to hip-hop, jazz or other typical “black” music, nobody is surprised, while this does happen when I tell them that one of my favourite artists is an indie rock band. But is it strange that people are surprised by this? The remarkable thing about this is that when one of my white friends likes so many different things within a certain subject (like music for example), people are not surprised. Back to the definition of what it means to be white washed. In this case, I am indeed not neglecting my own culture as stated in the definition according to Urban dictionary, but I am also embracing something that is characterised as “white culture”. This makes me whitewashed according to the definition of the word. This is not the case when it happens to be the other way around, because there is no such thing as being black washed, and quite often white people are even being praised when they are interested in things that are not necessarily part of “white culture” (in this case, music). This is because black culture sells when white people hijack it (Mier, 2020).
I think that this phenomenon has to do with the fact that being white is not seen as something unusual in the western world. Whiteness is not acknowledged as a racialized/ethnicized positioning at all. Whiteness is generally seen as so ordinary, so lacking in characteristics, so normal, so devoid of meaning (Wekker, 2016). Being black, on the other hand, is something that is seen as different on it’s own. It’s a large part of your identity, if you do not meet a certain standard that is created for you, it all becomes a little too complex to comprehend.
I also noticed that there are different kinds of black, just like there are different kinds of white , if you observe people with different ethnicities and history. Slavery is not part of Eritrean history but we did have a colonialism history. Eritrea was colonized by Italy in 1882. When black people talk about their slavery history I feel like I can’t relate to them, but with certain parts I do. I have experienced that as a black person there are differences, but you get treated the same nonetheless.
For example: Sinterklaas - a Dutch tradition that is celebrated on the 5th of December - and his ‘lovely help’ black pete. When December arrives not one black person can escape from all the racism and terror that that month brings with it. Black pete is a product from slavery/colonialism and it has everything to do with racism. It’s racist because black pete is literally white people dressing up by painting their skin black, wearing an afro wig, putting on some lipstick/earrings, acting goofy and serving Sinterklaas (the white man). I personally hated the fact that I would get ridiculed for my hair and skin color as a little black girl due to this holiday. I always got to hear that I could be black pete without actually dressing up or painting myself. I would always laugh it off, because I did not feel comfortable confronting those people. It’s even harder to say it when it’s a big group of white people containing no persons of color at all. I don’t have a history with slavery within my culture, but I still experience the racism that comes with the holiday. That’s what I mean by that there are different kinds of black, but black people (in the western world) share the same disadvantages.
Through dating I also found myself uncomfortable or changing/deblackening myself. Remaining silent or laughing it off when I could’ve said something. I have mostly dated white men in the past.The thing is: I don’t have a specific type, or at least I like to think that I don’t attach too much value to skin color and ethnicity, because for a reason most of the guys that I have dated so far are white. I came to terms that me being mostly attracted to white men has to do with the cultural archive as Gloria Wekker describes in White innocence. How dutch people - including me - look at the world and therefore also what we find (sexually) attractive has everything to with the cultural archive (Wekker, 2016). I don’t have a lot of criteria when it comes to dating, but I find political views and norms and values the most important thing. As a left oriented person I could never date someone who is very far right orientated, that just clashes with my beliefs. To avoid this kind of inconvenience, I often ask someone’s political affiliation on the first date. This also happened with the last guy that I have dated. I immediately asked him what party he voted for in the last elections and he voted for a central party. While answering that question he also asked me in a ludicrous way, if I asked the question because I wanted to make sure that he did not vote for a far right party. And that was exactly the reason why I asked. Time passed after that first date and I heard him saying the N- word*. I asked him afterwards in what context he used that word - in a more private setting - and he felt attacked. He asked me why I asked that and said that he didn’t feel like having this discussion. He was always surrounded by black people growing up and meant no harm. That was the moment that I needed to end it but I did not. On the third date, we went to watch the programme First dates together. A friend of his and a girl I knew happened to go on a date with each other. The girl in question told her date that she could not date a right orientated person. This led into me and my date having a conversation and I again stated that I felt the same way. He told me that he thought that I was narrow-minded, discriminating and that he might even vote for FVD (far right) or BIJ1 (radical left) himself one day. I said that I thought that was odd because they were two extreme opposites of each other and that I couldn’t date someone who didn’t have the same values as I did. Even if you only vote for the FVD because you agree with one point and disagree with the rest. I like to think that he was very much not aware of his white privilege, because he considered voting for a far right party without taking the racism, classism, misogyny etc of that party into account. I obviously told him that I didn’t want to see him again after that.
I always tell myself that because of these experiences I would like to end with a person of color and in the best case scenario: a black man, because a white man will never really understand me anyway and the other way around, but you can’t control who you are attracted to. The best thing that I can do in this instance is being open to and lucky enough to date a (white) person who doesn’t understand, but is willing to put in work and trying to understand. The fact that I dated a few white men also made people think even more that I was white washed. Even though I mostly dated white men I also dated men from other races including black men but that didn’t matter. Black women who engage in relationships with white men encounter Black community norms that question their commitment to Blackness (Collins, 2021). So it doesn’t matter how much I act on my blackness and the things that being black brings with it, because who I date also defines how committed I am to blackness.
The thing is that I have a ‘very strong’ opinion on politics - as said by people who don’t feel the same - but I keep finding myself in these situations where I feel like I’m assimilating my opinion, because of the discomfort that these situations bring along. These values are very important to me but it feels like I can’t speak out on them, because white people will see me as the angry black woman or person again. Even though I’m not even stating something unusual. The angry black woman is a social control mechanism that is employed to punish black women who violate the societal norms that encourage them to be passive, servile, non-threatening, and unseen (Pilgrim, 2008). So in situations like these I refrain myself from expressing my feelings in order to distance myself from the angry black woman stereotype. Oppressed groups are frequently placed in the situation of being listened to only if we frame our ideas in the language that is familiar to and comfortable for a dominant group (Collins, 2021). Me and all the black people are allowed to be part of the club, you’re allowed to be ‘dutch’, as long as you behave, share exciting recipes, smile a lot, don’t talk about racism, happily go along with everything, and pretend it’s all fun and cozy (Nzume, 2017). Nzume in “Hallo witte mensen” written in 2017 has argued that it’s always about how we, black people should change or adapt ourselves and rarely about what white people can change about themselves it was so refreshing to read this book written for white people about what they can do for us black people, but we need to be realistic. Rome was not built in one day and we - society - have a lot of work to do in the Netherlands or the western society in general, but the only thing that I can do as a black woman in the meantime is to figure out how to deal with these problems. I’m already doing this by sharing and gaining as much knowledge as possible. By sharing things on social media, talking with friends or even strangers. By talking to people I understood that I’m not the only person that has to deal with these things. I have been thinking about starting a podcast with a dear friend of mine to talk about these things, to let other person’s of color who struggle with this know that they are not online. Writing this essay gave me more insights and motivation to start with that. Society is slowly changing and becoming more accepting, but maybe not as fast as me and many others would like.
All these events often make me feel like I don’t know where to belong, but I am coming to terms with the fact that you can not in fact answer the question “who am I?”, with one answer. When asking this question one answer is not enough to encapsulate the multiplicities of our spirits and the many selves we embody. We are all multidimensional beings and that’s what makes us so special. So it’s okay for me to be black and to do, like and say the things that I want, without fitting in a narrative that was made for me. I can create my own narrative.
Collins, P. (2021). Black Feminist Thought, Thirtieth Anniversary Edition. Routledge.
Mier, T. (2020a, juni 10). The Afterword: White people take everything from Black culture but the burden. Daily Trojan. Geraadpleegd op 5 december 2021, van https://dailytrojan.com/2020/06/09/the-afterword-white-people-take-everything-from-black-culture-but-the-burden/
Mier, T. (2020b, juni 10). The Afterword: White people take everything from Black culture but the burden. Daily Trojan. Geraadpleegd op 6 december 2021, van https://dailytrojan.com/2020/06/09/the-afterword-white-people-take-everything-from-black-culture-but-the-burden/
Nzume, A. (2017). Hallo witte mensen (1ste editie). Amsterdam University Press.
Ricardo, J. L. (2015). The only one : exploring identity development in Black adolescent girls who are both educated and raised in White spaces (Thesis). https://scholarworks.smith.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1766&context=theses
The Sapphire Caricature - Anti-black Imagery - Jim Crow Museum - Ferris State University. (2008). Ferris State University. Geraadpleegd op 6 december 2021, van https://www.ferris.edu/HTMLS/news/jimcrow/antiblack/sapphire.htm
Wekker, G. (2016). White Innocence. Amsterdam University Press.
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