Look, see me!

LAST week Jamaican-American actress Sheryl Lee Ralph made a pronouncement at the 80th Annual Golden Globe Awards in Beverly Hills, California, that made black people collectively pause.

Asked to offer some words of affirmation to her younger self, Ralph decided to address a touchy issue in the black community — Eurocentric beauty standards that have dogged many of us since our youth. She expressed that the things that made her question her beauty and worth as a teen – her lips and African features – were ironically what Caucasians were paying top money for today.

“There’s nothing wrong with your nose. There is nothing wrong with the shade of your skin. There is nothing wrong with the way your hair grows out of your head,” Ralph said when asked by a reporter what she would tell her 15-year-old self. “And there certainly is nothing wrong with your lips because there will be some people called the Kardashians and they will pay $10K for your lips. Hang in there 15-year-old Sheryl Lee Ralph. You’re good.”

Embracing black beauty is quite a novel concept for many of us who grew up convinced that more European features were better – “good hair”, a straight nose, and “high colour”.

“What has happened is that for so long these features have been demonised by the media, books, television, and even in our schools, that we were left with this feeling of ‘otherness’, of not belonging, of only existing as an error, a spoof, a glitch from the universe,” explained cultural studies PhD student, tutor, and researcher Glen O’Gilvie.

“Ironically, the things that make us African are often condemned, until white folks make it trendy, and then it’s accepted – the hairstyles, the tanning, the plumped up lips, and the larger hips and derrière. Only when it becomes sensational on social media because some celebrity or some influencer makes it OK do we embrace it.”

How can we apply Ralph’s words to our existence and ensure that the next generation isn’t raised believing that they are not worthy and not beautiful because of a wide nose, full lips, and dark skin tone?

Counsellor David Anderson says he’s glad it started with people like Ralph – celebrities we look up to, and he hopes the movement continues.

“Our African culture is so rich, so unique, and it’s important that we embrace it,” he said.

It’s an embracing that has been slow in coming, but for which they’re proud, for three professionals we spoke with. They share what their experiences were like growing up, how they’ve embraced who they are, and how they would tell their 15-year-old selves look, see me now.

Paula Scott, 37, lecturer:

My nickname as a child was “Blackie”, as I was the darkest child for my parents, one of whom was Indian and the other a light-skinned black woman. For years I was compared to my siblings – my hair wasn’t quite as long, my nose as straight, and I was just too dark. Even in my early 20s I still had this feeling of not being good enough. It was just life experiences that changed me, to be honest – getting a college education and being exposed to other cultures, living outside Jamaica and having people love me because I was ‘exotic’, and just growing up. Today I’d tell my teen self not to worry so much, as I’m beautiful.

Noreen Belnavis, 44, US-based registered nurse:

I never wore lipstick or gloss, ever. As a child my brothers said my lips were like liver and my eyes were big like stadium bulbs. We lived in the country so I never saw stadium bulbs until I came to town for university. Those kinds of things stick with you for life – I had zero self-confidence, even though they were joking and didn’t know better. My parents never made it any better. They said at least I knew how to work hard to make up for what I didn’t have in looks. It was probably during American Idol times, when Fantasia and Jennifer Hudson made being a black woman cool, that I started to embrace the way I looked. Today, I love my lips, my eyes, my body, because people are doing surgery to look like me. If I could tell that shy teenage girl something, it would be that it all gets better, you’ll see.

Jody-Ann Smikle, 46, senior loans manager:

I knew that back in the day I couldn’t hold the position I have now, not with my hair and skin colour. It was always simmering below the surface, even in high school when we were thinking of careers. I went to a school that was big on colour and class, and black girls just didn’t aspire to certain areas. I don’t think that I have any huge memory of being repressed, or maybe I suppressed it, I just knew that certain things were not for me or for my friends who looked like me. Nowadays all that has changed – my afro is a good thing, and I love how my skin glows.