Nina G. Jablonski

Living Color is the first book to investigate the social history of skin color from prehistory to the present, showing how our body’s most visible trait influences our social interactions in profound and complex ways. In a fascinating and wide-ranging discussion, Nina G. Jablonski begins with the biology and evolution of skin pigmentation, explaining how skin color changed as humans moved around the globe. She explores the relationship between melanin pigment and sunlight, and examines the consequences of rapid migrations, vacations, and other lifestyle choices that can create mismatches between our skin color and our environment. Richly illustrated, this book explains why skin color has come to be a biological trait with great social meaning— a product of evolution perceived by culture. It considers how we form impressions of others, how we create and use stereotypes, how negative stereotypes about dark skin developed and have played out through history—including being a basis for the transatlantic slave trade. Offering examples of how attitudes about skin color differ in the U.S., Brazil, India, and South Africa, Jablonski suggests that a knowledge of the evolution and social importance of skin color can help eliminate color-based discrimination and racism.

The Biological and Social Meaning of Skin Color

Living Color

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For young adults, appeals to vanity may strike a more resonant chord than portents of death. 

“In short, there are neither four nor five races, nor are there exclusive varieties on earth. The colors run into one another; the cultures serve the genetic character; and overall and in the end everything is only a shade of one and the same great portrait that extends across all the spaces and times of the earth. It belongs less to the systematic history of nature than to the physical-geographic history of humanity." 

Races were born from this urge to categorize. Created by men considered to be intellectual leaders, races were defined as authoritative categories.

Race becomes a destination, not just a label.

Motivation is critical to the elimination of color-based discrimination. The bodies of understanding we now have about skin color need to be matched by the will to change. This is a process in which no one is a spectator: we are all participants.

Living Color quotes

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