Dark skin, flat noses, big lips and woolly hair, the women are fat, but that is how their men like them. The true Africans are portrayed wearing face paint and animal print and all nearly pitch-black skin. If you think I’m wrong just type, ‘Africans’ on google and search for images. It’s a common misconception that most people never truly discover until they visit Africa and discover the diverse individuals within this continent. Luckily, I have lived in Africa and visited many countries with the continent, therefore I feel responsible to feed you with the facts.
Africans come in all shades of black, we have the light skin dark people and medium dark skin people (brown), then the deep dark people, and surprisingly we also have white people of African Heritage. A majority of us categorize in the brown skin category but it really depends on the part of the country where you originate.Modern stereotypical images of black Africans are the starving kids with flies swarming all over them, probably in a hospital. Other deceptions are of bare-breasted women and enormous buttocks, some with plates in their mouths.The African continent is home to people of all sizes, both big and small and devoid of any special feature worth looking at. Nowhere in the world is one likely to come across people of the same size and this hold true even for Africa.
Many of these stereotypes are a result of media coverage and a lack of research on the part of individuals. Ignorance can only be cured through a pursuit of knowledge and until people begin to pursue facts, they will have closed minds and never know the true beauty of African culture and African people.
I really enjoy the setup of your blog, and I love your blog on skin color. I enjoy when people have an interest in their culture. Too many people forget their past or where they came from.
This is a disgusting stereotype that is shared by many people. I get so frustrated when I hear ignorant comments made towards a certain race or ethnicity or religion etc., and whenever I hear someone say something ignorant I call them out on it. If someone is going to speak about a topic they should be informed enough to make accurate statements.
This is a very insightful post and I’m glad that you brought up an issue like this. As a progressive society we would like to think that we are past stereotypes but as you pointed out we still have stereotypical ideas of what African people are like. Africa is a very diverse continent with a lot of interesting cultures and Its nice for someone to point out that our collective ignorance is preventing us from seeing that.
I like that you addressed this topic. It’s crazy how often people stereotype people of a certain race as all looking the same. They define by race and ignore all aspects of individuality. Furthermore, they believe that the images they see in movies or online of “starving kids with flies swarming all over them” or “bare-breasted women and enormous buttocks, some with plates in their mouths” are what everybody in Africa looks like. They don’t take the time to see that is simply untrue.
Great topic choice! I’ve discovered that people do this for races/nationalities/cultures that they aren’t familiar with, regardless of their race. I would have liked to read about an example of African stereotype images in the media, which you mention but do not describe.
I just heard a girl on my floor talk about how she thought that all black people looked the same and I was absolutely shocked at her ignorance. Thanks for bringing up a topic most people are either too ignorant or racist to comprehend. Can’t wait for your next post!
Thank you for finally bringing this up. Not all Asians look alike either! I love this post, because people really do stereotype every group to “look alike” and it stinks.
I honestly really love this post because it brings to light on how we as a culture can group entirely different cultures into one huge group. It’s not really fair because to say someone is simply from “Africa” is to take away part of their identity.
You know, it’s interesting that you pointed out the fact that people tend to stereotype people of color especially africans who come in different shades of brown. People tend to clump them together as looking alike. I can relate this to asians. Many people think asians look alike in terms of their facial features. I have to say, asians do some what look alike, but we certainly look different in many ways!