Maiya Describes Herself As A Brown Child
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Perspectives
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MAIYA DESCRIBES HERSELF AS A BROWN CHILD
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Words by Maiya Michelle
Artwork by Javie Huxley
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At the tender age of four, my mum gave me a firm telling off for being a nursery bully. She’d been informed that I’d been telling my classmates that we shouldn't go to the birthday party of twins in my class, because they were white. My mum taught me quick time that it wasn't OK to be mean to these girls, especially not on account of skin colour. And I got it; from then on, I knew not to treat people differently based on skin colour. She knew that whilst in my nursery white children were the minority, this was not going to be the case in the big wide world. She knew that it would be me, metaphorically or literally not being invited to the party on account of race. But this was more than the shock and disappointment of finding out that your child can discriminate. My mum was white too, so was also confused and hurt. And I guess this might have been the first moment where our racial difference, her whiteness and my brownness came to clash.
When it comes to reflecting on my relationship with my mum and the relevance of race in that, I am more mixed than ever. I am part English, part Jamaican and I am Black British; part compassion, part anger and confused.
For a long time, my only narrative was that for all her flaws, my mum did an incredible job of raising me with race in mind. I felt that she truly empowered me in my skin. When we moved to an almost all white area, the racism I received hurt but I was certain that these kids were stupid and that there was nothing wrong with my colour. I thought it was weird that they hadn't had the same telling off and learnt better. Little did I know then that their parents were probably the ones teaching them this shit. Mum told me that my colour and hair were utterly beautiful. She loaded me with one-liners like "your mum goes on a sunbed to be my colour" and "I'm not black but my shoe is and I'll hit you with it". I never did use that second one. Without her, I wouldn't have developed my sense of worth and coped with racism. It is a shame though, that as well as empowering me in the beauty of my blackness, she also displayed her whiteness and ignorance along the way, making jokes and comments that didn't support her quest to make me feel secure in my identity. I ignored the strange jokes that she made and put them down to her being a "wind up merchant". Whilst in her mind she was joking, I know that the reason these comments stuck in mind is that they always made me feel annoyed and sad.
For years, there was the running joke that I was actually just dirty, not black and that I just needed a good wash. She told me that I wasn't actually hers and that she had swapped me with the Indian woman in the bed next to her- a confusing idea, given that I’m not Indian.This was a particularly unsavoury joke given that I was dealing with kids at school saying that she couldn't be my mum because she was white.
She teased me about my nose and my forehead. It's only recently that I don't feel entirely self conscious in sunglasses because when I put them on, she would incessantly tease me about how they wouldn't stay up because the bridge of my nose was "too flat". Of course, these comments are mean in their own right, but the bigger issue was that my mum had no understanding of how these comments fit within my bigger picture. When she was joking about me needing to wash off my blackness, she had no idea that years later, I would attend a group for 'dual heritage' children at school and listen to a classmate tell the story of her little sister putting bleach in her bath in attempt to do just that. My mum's whiteness protected her from understanding the realities of the impact of racism, and that there was no room for those jokes in our relationship.
There are social work reports written about me that say I describe myself "as a brown child" and when I read that I felt proud that my mum had instilled such pride in me. I still do, and there is something beautiful about the perfection that parents perceive in their children. It was uncomfortable to realise that when she meant that my skin and hair were perfect, she meant just that, that they weren't "too black" or "too white" but instead just the right brown and just the right texture of curls. Of course, by “right” we know that I mean closer to white beauty standards but you know, a little different: a little exotic, as a man on tinder might say!
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"EXCESSIVE PRIDE ALONE WILL NOT DO BECAUSE IT MAKES FOR CONFUSION IN A WORLD THAT IS RACIST."
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Meanwhile, she told me that I mustn’t even think about having kids with a white man because she didn't want "yellow" grandchildren. Later we would move somewhere with two quarter black children across the road and she pointed them out to me, asking me to agree that I didn't want children that looked like that. I was confused, because I thought that they looked beautiful with their pale brown complexion, blonde afro hair and freckles. On the other hand, she told me never go to black hairdressers because they'd be jealous of my 'good hair' and cut it all off.
I am interested in talking about this because I came to realise that my experience isn’t unique. And because of experiences such as that with a white woman that sat down next to me, and within seconds, proudly announced "I have mixed race kids". And there is such complexity in that pride; it’s the very same pride that my mum had about me when she wasn't taking the piss. A parent telling me that they have mixed race children isn't a one off. I don't know what they expect to happen next. Am I supposed to feel some shared bond with them? Are they trying to let me know they aren't racist? Do they want me to be impressed as though they made some sacrificial life choice? Am I supposed to be excited for them that they had sex with a black person and reproduced? There is zero consciousness in how odd it is to do that; and this is the problem. The racial dynamic in the relationship is so spoken about, yet so un-examined. More time is spent reinforcing colourism and fetishisation that the realities of the one drop rule. It seems that some parents spends more time bolstering their own pride in the colour of their child's skin, than actually thinking about how to give that child a secure understanding of what it means to be mixed race and how this will actually play out in the world. There is more time spent feeling certain that they are now entirely excluded from being a perpetrator of racism than thinking about how they might be just that.
Excessive pride alone will not do because it makes for confusion in a world that is racist. No amount of my mother’s pride meant that it wasn't me that was picked out and reported to the police to be falsely accused of having a friends cheating boyfriend beaten with metal bars at school. But when a boy at school said my nose was like Shrek’s, I did wonder if glasses would stay up Shrek’s nose. Hang on…does Shrek have a black nose? How did we end up here? Confusing, right?
But as I close, I reflect on the compassion I have for my own my mum. The reality is, she had a lot of problems and a tonne of drugs, alcohol and mental health difficulties clouding her judgement at all times. She was ignorant and disinhibited but she loved me and truly believed that I had every reason to be proud of the skin I'm in. She was a single mum, with more knowledge of some parts of me than others and there was no black dad to pick up the slack. It would shock her to know that her jokes still hurt and she would be filled with regret were she around to feel it. I don’t want to be the confused mixed race cliché, but I've certainly spent some years as the confused mixed race cliché.
Instagram: @Maiyamichelle
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