Living Color: The Biological and Social Meaning of Skin Color

It is a very rare phenomenon for a major scholar like Nina Jablonski to write both for an academic audience (see her 2006 book, Skin: A Natural History) and a general audience a few years later. The challenges are enormous: how to summarize vast amounts of research that move across many disciples (evolutionary biology, human anatomy and physiology, paleontology, anthropology, nutrition, psychology, and culture -- to name just a few) without trivializing the insights of specialists OR numbing the mind of non-specialist readers. Anyone who wants to understand why skin color has acquired the meanings we give it should read both books, but I suspect that most readers will find the more recent book entirely sufficient. But "Living Color" is far,far more than sufficient: it is provocative without being polemical. Jablonski marshalls an astonishing academic literature that sheds light on the historical development of skin color -- why and how it developed -- and then illuminates the various ways that culture have attributed meaning to visual difference. So deeply was the instinct not just to "see" but to "evaluate" that the travel literature from early European explorers confirmed prejudices that they had brought to their voyages. "Color" thus became an integral feature of colonization. Being "color blind" was never an option. But everyone already knows this, right? What was new for me was how "color" was as a signifier within the same color group -- not just between groups. I didn't know about the differences between genders either. The adjectives that we have learned to name races are just that -- and very imprecise at that. (I am old enough to remember a Crayola named "flesh.") Who knew that Vitamin D plays such an important role in human development and health? I didn't. Where would I learn about the impact of "tanning salons" for cultures that value a particular hue or "skin whitening" for cultures that seek to avoid it? The book is lavishly illustrated and carefully indexed -- a rarity in books written for a general audience. It even has a first-rate bibliography. I cannot imagine a more helpful or humane introduction. The author is erudite but wears her learning lightly. The use of side boxes is a bonus for clarifying complex issues, and there is not a single illustration that I would omit. I do wish, however, that the publisher had reprinted all of the plates found in the 2006 volume in this book -- they are relevant here as well. Serious readers? Read both books, but if you have time for only one, I strongly recommend "Living Color."

Absolutely excellent and flawless. Nina Jablonski's "Living Color" should forever put to rest any arrogance, ignorance or self-serving arguments that breathe air into racism, racists of all colors, or any subtle justifications supporting or tolerating it. This should be a standard text in every college and junior-senior year of high school that wants to genuinely educate and enlighten its students about humanity. Dr. Jablonski has authored an indisputable book on the obvious irrelevance of race and so-called racial differences, with great photos, illustrations and clear details. This book greatly enhances her "Skin Deep" lectures and documentaries on YouTube. Nevertheless, until much of human nature and racially socialized people discards this human weakness, we'll have to occasionally suffer from every knuckle-dragging knucklehead that believes they have an ounce of superiority or entitlement over other humans. Even in this 21st century, we're still on a disastrous race-based journey to the bottom --- no matter how we disguise it through rhetoric, politics, politricks, policies, religion or one's own sense of (false) entitlement over other people. After reading Living Color, I concluded that any form of racism practiced or tolerated by anyone is actually the expression and clear evidence of one's own inferiority.

Jablonski does an excellent job in detailing why and how the concept of "race" is constructed, not discovered. A vivid exercise in postmodern deconstruction, it seems also to construct, itself, a sword of Damocles. It is this discussion that is missing from Jablonski's book. Precarious is the pronouncement that race is not real when such also marks the very context of the pride of a people defined by this thing called race. Racial pride was the civil-rights wave that carried black Americans out of the internalized oppression hoist upon them by the dominant culture, and racial pride is threatened by the very idea that race is not real - however positive the intent in so doing. While I understand and highly value the postmodern urge to deconstruct harmful binaries, sometimes such a process, while valid in an intellectual sense, just doesn't go down well. It is a process grounded in a value system that the dominant culture (that uses 'race' to oppress) does not adhere to. Telling a KKK member that race is not real is as absurd as telling a Jew in Auschwitz that race is not real -- it flies in the face of personal experience. Unless and until the dominant culture can accept the concept as valid, it is largely an exercise in futile, if not deadly, absurdity for the non-dominant people to accept it. I write this from personal experience, as I have encountered a marked degree of insult by those minority populations with whom I have attempted this feat (deconstruct race). Unfortunately, it is a deconstruction with very limited influence, and it does not, alone, address the consciousness which drives the judgemental quality of racism. If the judgementalness is removed from "race", then what is remaining is distinction. And distinction, pure distinction, does not require further deconstruction to remedy harm. It is harmless, indeed, necessary. Steven Brody

This book will likely change your thinking about race and evolution. It is based on science but can make us more sensitive to humanity. The author also has a great TED talk.

I love this book. It is not too over your head but breaks a lot of things down. This is the type of book and information I have been looking for. I am very interested in Social Psychology especially racial relations. This is the first stop on my journey! Love it!

I enjoyed it. It was educational and the informative. I will definitely look into her other books. But it is always good to find the science that supports what you knew to be true.

This product was informative and an easy read. Some points that the author wanted to make were repeated too often. The author could have discussed the scale that dermatologists use to assess skin types as described several years ago by Tom Fitzpatrick to make the readers aware of how their doctor might evaluate their skin when they walk into the office.

The merchandise was in better condition than expected and the price paid was excellent. This is why I shop at Amazon.

Amazing life changing book. Read it!

Fantastic book. Very informative. Helping me a LOT to overcome any prejudces.

Truth, bring really important light your enemies do not want you to know.

Really enjoyable book which I bought after watching her on Ted Talks. It prompted me to get some Vitamin D tablets to ensure my skin stays Beautiful!!

I was very keen to get hold of a copy of Living Colours. I was glad and thankful after I read it. Most of my own research and papers circle around this very same matter covered in this book. Living Colours is an excellent work which Dr Nina G Jablonski has done. It is a well compiled historical evidence on the prejudices and stereotypes that has been costing precious human life and damaging human relationship over the centuries. In this book, Nina clearly evidences the social value system attached to pigmentation by exploring this matter from various streams of inquiries including biology, anthropology history and religion. Part Two of the book- Society, is perhaps the most profitable one for a reader eager to quickly see what the writer says on the social effect of colour prejudice. As I argue elsewhere, the "white" vs "black" prejudices stem from a specific reading of the Bible within Euro-American ecclesiastical circles/western Christianity. For those unaware of the so called "Curse of Ham", a wishful, hypothetical, myth-based, yet influential, western religio-political ideology and propaganda concept. Nian touches on some of the influences of Puritanical interpretation of the Bible in the west, specifically in North America, where "the negro" is viewed as an embodiment of all evil, a soulless beast as a result of this exagerated "sin of Ham" (Genesis 9:18-27). Nina gives a quick read and summarises that the historically biased reading of the Bible in Western Christianity gave rise to racism and skin colour obsession and prejudice. Down the centuries, this reading of the Bible with pre-conceived ideas within the Western ecclesiastical circles fomented ongoing social problems within families of hmanities. Nina has made an excellent contribution. The book is an easy read with clear line of evidence and discussion. I very much recommend this book. There is another excellent piece of work that can be added to your reading list together with this one, and that is the one by Fay Botham on American Antimiscegenation Laws and the so called "interracial marriage", the title is something like "Almighty God created the races: Christianity, Interracial Marriage &American Law" (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2009). It shows the long battle for individuals' freedom of choice and the errors of Puritanical, western Christianity's hegemonic doctrines on marriage in which marriage between a "white" and "black" person was perceived and portrayed as a sin against God and a criminal act against civil government. The state of Virginia, for instance, forbade such marriage for over 300 years. Though far from suggesting that society is perfect now, it just shows how social concepts have changed with such amazing results despite the ranting of western christianity's clerics and their bigotted worldview. The book is well worth it. Well done to Dr Nina Jablonski (and also to Fay Botham for the other book). Live and peace to all, Tegegn Bayissa, Manchester, England