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 The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik
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Nesrine Malik is a Sudanese-born writer and commentator who lives in London and works in the financial sector
Arabs like to imagine that their countries are comparatively free from racism. But it exists, nonetheless
Nesrine Malik
March 5, 2008
The word 'abd - Arabic for "slave" - was often used in our household when I was a child. In fact, it was so common that I had no awareness of its negative connotations until well into my teenage years. My father's family, a proud northern Sudanese clan, used it to refer to anyone who had darker skin than themselves - from southern Sudanese house servants to migrants from Darfur. Sometimes there was a clear intent to demean, but at other times it was used almost affectionately - for example, when addressing a particularly dark-skinned or thick-lipped child.
This was a kind of racism that no one ever challenged or addressed, and it was, through a child's eyes, very straightforward: on a scale of colour, lighter was good, darker was bad. The word 'abd, although strictly meaning "slave" or "servant", became synonymous with negritude. Even my Islamic heritage reinforced this with quotes from the Prophet Muhammad such as "You should listen to and obey your ruler even if he was an Ethiopian [ie black] slave whose head looks like a raisin" (Sahih Bukhari Volume 9, Book 89, Number 256).
When we moved to post-colonial East Africa in the 1980s, 'abd was seamlessly transferred to the locals with whom we interacted only in their capacity as domestic staff or grounds-keepers at international schools. While I myself was "black" of North African descent, my family believed its Arab roots were somehow genetically dominant, giving us smaller features and a marginally lighter skin tone - thus deeming ourselves to be an entirely a different race from the "pure" Africans.
Our next move was to Saudi Arabia, where the Arab ethnicity with which I identified so strongly was suddenly cast into doubt: now it was my turn to be the "slave". My belief that I was an Arab, racially superior to non-Arab Africans, became laughable in the heartland of Arabia - a place where "Arabness" was not only determined by skin colour but by whether you could uninterruptedly trace your lineage back to the founding father of your clan. In fact, ancestry is so important in Saudi Arabia that courts have the power to annul a marriage if gaps are later discovered in a person's lineage, opening up the possibility of blood line pollution.
Beneath the unforgiving scrutiny of such standards, my proud North African Arabic identity crumbled. Somehow, however, it still made some sense and fell into place in a racial spectrum where, at least, I was not on the bottom rung. I could scarcely complain, since among Saudi women themselves there was a brutal selection process where lighter-skinned women were preferred as wives, who in turn were trumped by the blonde blue-eyed babes from Lebanon who dominated satellite TV and the second-wife market.
Eventually, back in Sudan, I was introduced to another logic that negated all that had gone before. In some inverse double bluff, a new word was added to our lexicon: halabi, a pejorative term for Sudanese who are much lighter-skinned than the rest. Halabi actually means a person from Halab (Aleppo) in northern Syria but for some curious reason it was applied to the descendants of Egyptians or Arabian Bedouins who had settled in Sudan
Apparently, the halabis were just as contemptible as "slaves" and the categorisation of individuals as such seemed even more arbitrary. A marriage suitor would be dismissed if he came from a tribe of slaves, regardless of the colour of his skin, but would equally be frowned upon if he were of Levantine or Egyptian origin. The former was due to his race (irrespective of its physical manifestations) and the latter to his dubious ancestry. There seemed to be such a limited optimal colour/race/culture combination, all underscored by some vague definition of honour (which, naturally, everybody else lacked) and rooted in an even more intangible notion of "origin" (asl), the dubiousness of which implied a lack of breeding. Never mind bemoaning the lack of a common Arab identity, there seemed to be categorisations ad infinitum and constantly moving goalposts. The prejudices cannot even be explained away as reflecting different cultural perceptions of beauty. Throughout Sudan, halabi girls are universally regarded more attractive than their darker counterparts; it is the whiff of a questionable origin - a visceral suspicion of difference - that condemns them, somehow, as less than honourable
All this plays out against a backdrop of political and media messaging within the Arab world asserting that the Muslim Arab man, in human terms, is far superior to the occidental man. Bilal ibn Rabah, a black disciple of the Prophet Muhammad and first muezzin (caller to prayer) of Islam, is often held up by religious clerics as a symbol of the inclusiveness of Islam, while much is made of the perceived plight of African-Americans in the US
Egyptian and Syrian soap operas set in colonial times paint the western colonisers as one-dimensional pillagers while western media and films are accused of depicting Arabs in a poor light. Historically, the lack of a modern institutionalised slavery system in the Arab world in addition to the absence of laws enshrining racial segregation (like those that existed in the US until the 20th century) enhances this sense of superiority in comparison to what is perceived to be the "modern" occident
This sentiment in turn precipitates its own racial stereotype: that of a white man who is fundamentally racist ... polite and patronising ... but ultimately arrogant and fastidious in his belief that all other races are inferior
Even if that were the case, it is a welcome relief to know where one stands
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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Comments from the Guardian website
(1)
I remember seeing a series in which African-American academic Henry Louis Gates travelled around Africa. In one country (I forget which) he had a conversation with a very black, African looking man who nevertheless described himself as "an Arab" and proceeded to make various racist comments about black Africans. Gates seemed quite shocked and pointed out to the "Arab" that in America he would be considered black and no one would ever think of him as an Arab. The self-proclaimed "Arab" was very offended and their conversation ended soon after
(2)
A thought-provoking piece
In my experience, racism is everywhere. I guess the in-group/out-group dichotomy is too deep in our collective psyche to be ever fully eradicated.
Why relatively lighter skins are universally prized is something of a mystery (excepting the San Tropez self-tanning brigade.) Legend and myth the world over typically make gods of the fair, while demons are dark.
Maybe it's something of an atavism, when our ancestor didn't have any nightlight but the stars
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(3)
Very interesting article
I'm curious about the reference to the lack of "a modern institutionalised slavery system in the Arab world." When the British invaded Sudan at the request of the Egyptians they did all they could do eliminate the Arab-dominated slave trade (that part was not at the request of the Egyptians). According to some estimates the Arab (or Arabophile) elite had 80 per cent of the Sudanese population in slavery. There is of course still a great deal of slavery in the world today, much of it in Islamic lands
How does all this compute
(4)
Race and religion has always been a course for mankind, but as far as color, even animals are partial. Racism and class society is just not something exclusive to the west but much more predominant of Eastern and African cultures. But then again, for some reason, more tolerable and accepted from ones own kind
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(5)
A fascinating account
As regards racism, this piece underlines, I think, how it isn't in fact a question of colour
It's a question of them and us, of group dynamics. I'm sure evolutionary psychology would have something to say about this which might go something like this
The progress (or survival in the worst case) of the group depends on promoting members of your group at the expense of others
How do you define group?
By a mixture of language, appearance, culture for example
And appearance being the first thing you perceive, it dominates
Once the pressure slackens, once the community becomes more secure, this unpleasant tendence should fade.
But I'd argue it's always hiding under the surface. Them and us
Football fans from the UK raging at, say, footbal fans from Belgium are an example. They've never met them, have no knowledge of these opponents they instinctly despise
Even though they look identical
Make them look identifiably different - and it strengthens this built-in prejudice, and strengthens the bonds with "your side".
Hence: Flag waving, scarves, and tribal chants to make the distinctions clearer and make a big fight easier to kick off.
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The only solution is the hippy dream of making everyone feel they belong to the same side
I reckon it's not without hope though, peace and flowers everyone
(6)
They used to say the Irish Republic was free of racism - until immigrants and asylum seekers began going there. They said much the same of Scandanavia
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(7)
Racism, unfortunately exists everywhere and no matter what your tilt on this topic is i'm sorry to say this but everyone is racist to some degree!
America, a nation built from a "cultural melting pot" proves this. It's been over 230 years since its independance, and with a population of 303,483,000, is by and large the largest mixed population, still there are cultural divisions everywhere you go. Iraq is another example with its inter clan fighting and divisions. This story is just another of many...
Everywhere you go around the World, there are pockets of Cultural or religious groups. I'm looking forward to a time when somebody will actually stand up and be counted and admit that multi-culturalism is a nice idea but actually doesn't on the whole work. Instead of forcing this idealism we need to look at ways of promoting tolerance and to find ways of living side by side with agreed differences
(8)
The fact about human society is that humans like other animals seem to like to structure their living group arrangements on hierarchies. And this applies even to the barely cogntively aware bee
Only rational humans would know how to avoid such animal-like modes of thought and just judge phenomena purely in terms of their agencies
SUDAN AND COLOUR
The LOL self-deflating about lineage and Northern Sudan is that less than 2% of Northern Sudanese have any Arabian--i.e. from West Asia and the Arabian peninsula--according to batteries of genetic tests especially on the male populations. Northern Sudanese are almost 100% of the African male lineages(Y Haplogroups) of E3a and E3b. So if some Northern Sudanese male with an acquired Arabic name that seems to go on and on--which he proudly proclaims as evidence of Arabian descent or even directly descended from the Prophet himself--declares himself to be different stock from his southern neighbours[and by the way Southern Sudanese are arguably the darkest people in Africa on a strictly percapita basis]then he would be quickly disabused by the stark truth-telling of DNA analysis
All this is confirmed by any casual glance at any haplogroup map of Africa. For those unfamiliar with this just google "African haplogrop map"
Concerning the attributed statements on race to Muhammad, one must be cautious here because after all Muhammad had no taperecorder when he recited the Koran and it was supposedly compiled many years after his death. So there is no real confirmable evidence that he actually recited or said what is attributed to him
Perhaps one of the earliest statements on skin colour and its association with human worth both moral and intellectual is that of Aristotle--the Greek master philosopher. He wrote in PHYSIOGNOMICA some 2,500 years ago: "Too black a hue marks a coward as is the case with Egyptians and Ku####ies(today's Northern Sudanese?), so too white a complexion as in the case of women. The best colour is that intermediate between those 2 extremes. As in the case with lions who have a a twny colour"
Of course, in all of this it should be recognised that Arabism and its "racial aspects" as exemplified in the lead essay is not unlike French, British and Portugese colonialism in Africa. After all, Arabism entered North Africa and most of West Asia through colonial force of arms then imposed its language and religion on the various populaces in much the same way that the other colonialisms did
Just as the lands invaded, colonised and settled by the French, British, Spaniards and Portugeses built up compex "race" hierarchies based on carefully calibrated quantities of European DNA in ones genome so too this kind of social structuring has been found in Arab language societies
All of this though does bring in lots of money for those who sell skin lighteners and relaxers for Africanoid hair in North Africa and West Asia
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(9)
I don't doubt for a second the author's narration. It is obvious to most people that racism can exist anywhere. By that obvious logic it would be surprising for racism to be absent in Arab countries. That some consider themselves to be free from racism isn't really a surprise either - self delusion is also a fairly widespread human trait
However, I think we should be cautious about generalising from this account and making sweeping statements about the entire Arab world. It's not just about colour either. I have encountered similar use of abusive language in West Africa where terms referring to lineage are also used by some as insults
Unfortunately some trolls are already dancing with glee and using the piece as a stick to beat "the Arabs" round the head with - delicious irony (endofdays I mean you - and I invoke Godwin's law
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(10)
Fascinating article. Thank you. Of course there is racism everywhere, but it's important to understand the way that it links into cultural traditions in each case.
"Stick to beat the Arabs"? Did I hear someone say? If anybody's reason for defending Arabs in any context is that Arabs are supposedly immune from racism they should start beating their own brains with a stick in an attempt to goad them into some kind of life
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(11)
Please more Middle Eastern writers who highlight the worse of the Middle East, for it just might help the pledge of a region that is not only in a crisis, but finding it hard to prove their "humanness"
Btw, your description of Sudanese culture is not correct, why distort reality by not mentioning the many who do not call ppl 'abeed' and marry into such families (my own family who are of Hashemite descendant for many generations found no problem in marrying those who others will refuse for being 'abeed')
Your article is well written, and thought provoking, but is badly timed, and should not be publically published. It is like backbiting a patient in intensive care, and speaking about their questionable morals in front of doctors and nurses. Swap the Middle East in place of this patient and you will find that it makes sense, to not publically moan about the ill character of someone people in the middle east
As for your 'islamic heritage'. You will find that 'your' prophet was not a racist, and was anti-racism. Why not mention the hadeeths that show that? E.g. when he admonished a man for calling another 'a son of a black woman', or when he said the Salman the Persian is of his household after other Arabs were racist towards him. Why not mention that the prophets adopted son was black, and also the son of his adopted both of whom me loved greatly. Why not mention how he married his adopted son to his cousin. Why not mention how he insisted that a companion marry his sister to Bilal repetitively adding that he is one of the companions of paradise?
As for the hadith you mentioned is in fact anti racism, he said you must obey those of authority even if were slaves. He was addressing a society where there were many slaves (whom the prophet and Islam encouraged to free). Saying that this hadith is proof for Mohammed allowing people to call others racist slurs is like saying that the law encourages racism as is mentions the word 'nigger'. Mohammed admonished his wife Aisha for making a sign with her hand to say that another of his wives was short, he said to her what you signalled is so bitter that not the ocean waters can weaken. This is not a man who encourages racial slurs
If you knew your Islamic history you would have known that one of the reasons the non-Muslims Arabs fought Mohammed was because he declared that the slaves and their masters were equal, and they feared losing their slaves because of this
Here is an extract from Mohammed's last sermon. "All mankind is from Adam and Eve, an Arab has no superiority over a non-Arab nor a non-Arab has any superiority over an Arab; also a white has no superiority over a black nor a black has any superiority over white except by piety and good action."
http://www.themodernreligion.com/prophet/prophet_lastsermon.htm
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(12)
Prophet Mohamed's Last Sermon
Date delivered: 632 A.C., 9th day of Dhul al Hijjah, 10 A.H. in the 'Uranah valley of Mount Arafat
All mankind is from Adam and Eve, an Arab has no superiority over a non-Arab nor a non-Arab has any superiority over an Arab; also a white has no superiority over a black nor a black has any superiority over white except by piety and good action
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(15)
The Qur'an doesn't claim the innate superiority of any racial group but the enslavement of black Africans was an entrenched part of the culture of Andalusia under Islamic rule. So was racism
In his 'Proverbs', al-Maydani (d. 1124) wrote, "the African black when hungry steals, and when sated he fornicates". Traveling through Africa, Ibn Battuta (1207-1377) claimed that blacks were stupid, ignorant, cowardly, and infantile
These attitudes could be found throughout the Islamic world. In the 'Arabian Nights', the worst thing about the adultery of the wives of kings Sahzman and his brother Shariyar is that their infidelity was with black men. In 'Nights 468', a black slave is rewarded for his goodness by being transformed into a white man. A similar case occurs in the 11th century 'Epistle of the Pardon' by al-Ma'arri, where a black woman, because of her good behavior, ends up as a white houri in Paradise
In 1068 in Muslim Toledo, the Arab Sa'id Ibn Ahmadi wrote a book classifying the nations of the world. In it he accounted the inhabitants of the extreme North and South as barbarians, describing Europeans as white and mentally deficient because of undercooking by the sun, and Africans as black, stupid, and violent because of overcooking. In contrast, Arabs were done just right
Racial self-consciousness led the Andalusian Ibn Hazm to insist that the Prophet Muhammad, his family, and his predecessors, were all white skinned
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(16)
There is a North African saying (in this case I heard it in Morocco) that claims that "Blacks are overcooked, Whites are undercooked and God made us just right" - hinting at the olive skin
Another was with a Ethiopian government official I went to school with at SOAS who felt that Rastafarians were dirty and unwanted in his country and candidates for deportation as undesirables. He guffawed at the religion's association with HIM Haile Selassie wondering how backward people can be
Racism in Africa is alive and well
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(17)
Great article. Thank you for highlighting the fact that racism is restricted to white folk. We are all guilty of this idiocy
Here in India "fairness" is higly prized, particularly in women. There are even products on the market that supposedly lighten your skin in X days!
I wonder if an earlier poster was right dark = night, scary, light = day, less frightening? Alternatively, at least in India, this may date back to the Arayan reaction to the local dark-skinned Dravid population
Is there some kind of human need to stratify society? I have a older friend, a Brit born in India. Apparently in their all white society, people who arrived from Britain looked down on their fellow Brits who had been born in India
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(18)
Racism has probably always existed ever since mankind began to develop a strong group identity. There are also different kinds, the self-love formed racism is relatively weak and mild - the more negative racism that forms from fear/war is much more potent. Anti-Black racism is of the first kind, that's the good news, bad news is racist attitudes against them are extremely pervasive and with us for the long haul
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Re: The Guardian :A paler shade of black by The Sudanese Nesrine Malik (Re: Mohamed Omer)
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(19)
I found the article informative but not at all surprising. People will always find some characteristic in others to place them apart. This can be lighthearted mockery which all parties enjoy, or it can turn into murderous lunacy - and either can happen anywhere. Surely this can't be news to anyone?
On the light-hearted side I remember a line in Frank McCourt's 'Angela's Ashes' in which some aged aunts talk disparagingly about an in-law 'who was from Galway and had the look of a Spaniard.' This made me laugh as it reminded me of the sort of thing I used to hear from my Irish relatives as a child. My own Dad has some, shall we say unusual, views about Dubliners
An Asian man I know makes frequent jokes about his brother being a Bangladeshi interloper due to his skin tone. I don't know the significance of this within the family but it seems to go down well in his household
Examples of how this turns to murderousness are legion. But the main example I can recall within the Arab world was a piece I saw in the Sunday Times about three/four years ago when the Iraqi insurgency was beginning in earnest. A leading Sunni insurgent was interviewed saying that his group specifically targeted black US soldiers and even sometimes abandoned operations if there were too few black soldiers in the unit they were due to attack. He added (the quote has stuck with me): "It is an especial humiliation for us to be occupied by negroes."
We're stuck with this as a planet
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Mohamed Omer
Deng
فيس بوك
تويتر
انستقرام
يوتيوب
بنتيريست