View source for Color terminology for race

{{Short description|Describing people by skin colour}}
{{About|arbitrary divisions of humanity by skin color|the anthropological concept of race|Race (human categorization)}}
{{Race}}
Identifying [[race (human categorization)|human races]] in terms of [[Human skin colour|skin colour]], at least as one among several physiological characteristics, has been common since antiquity. Such divisions appeared in [[early modern]] scholarship, usually dividing humankind into four or five categories, with colour-based labels:  red, yellow, black, white, and sometimes brown.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|last=Oliver|first=Pamela Elaine|date=2017-11-11|title=Race Names|url=https://osf.io/7wys2|doi=10.31235/osf.io/7wys2|journal=SocArXiv|type=preprint|url-access=subscription}}</ref>{{Failed verification|date=May 2023}} It was long recognized that the number of categories is arbitrary and subjective, and different ethnic groups were placed in different categories at different points in time. [[François Bernier]] (1684) doubted the validity of using skin color as a racial characteristic, and [[Charles Darwin]] (1871) emphasized the gradual differences between categories.<ref>[http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?itemID=F937.1&viewtype=text&pageseq=238 ''The Descent of Man'' p225],</ref> There is broad agreement among modern scientists that typological conceptions of race have no scientific basis.<ref>[http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/busting-myths-about-human-nature/201204/race-is-real-not-in-the-way-many-people-think Race Is Real, but not in the way Many People Think], Agustín Fuentes, ''Psychology Today.com'', 9 April 2012</ref><ref>{{cite AV media|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXfaXpUE2T8 |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211213/VXfaXpUE2T8 |archive-date=2021-12-13 |url-status=live|title=The Royal Institution - panel discussion - What Science Tells us about Race and Racism|date=16 March 2016}}{{cbignore}}</ref><ref name=":4">{{cite journal|last1=Jorde|first1=Lynn B.|last2=Wooding|first2=Stephen P.|year=2004|title=Genetic variation, classification and 'race'|journal=Nature|volume=36|issue=11 Suppl|pages=S28–S33|doi=10.1038/ng1435|pmid=15508000|quote=Ancestry, then, is a more subtle and complex description of an individual's genetic makeup than is race. This is in part a consequence of the continual mixing and migration of human populations throughout history. Because of this complex and interwoven history, many loci must be examined to derive even an approximate portrayal of individual ancestry.|doi-access=free|s2cid=15251775}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|author=Michael White|title=Why Your Race Isn't Genetic|url=https://psmag.com/environment/why-your-race-isnt-genetic-82475|access-date=13 December 2014|work=Pacific Standard|quote=[O]ngoing contacts, plus the fact that we were a small, genetically homogeneous species to begin with, has resulted in relatively close genetic relationships, despite our worldwide presence. The DNA differences between humans increase with geographical distance, but boundaries between populations are, as geneticists Kenneth Weiss and Jeffrey Long put it, "multilayered, porous, ephemeral, and difficult to identify." Pure, geographically separated ancestral populations are an abstraction: "There is no reason to think that there ever were isolated, homogeneous parental populations at any time in our human past."}}</ref>

==History==
{{Further|Historical race concepts|Physical anthropology|Scientific racism}}

===Antiquity to 1600s===
Categorization of racial groups by reference to skin color is common in classical antiquity.<ref>"Among the Greeks and Romans who have provided the fullest description of blacks, the Africans' color was regarded as their most characteristic and most unusual feature. In this respect the ancients were not unlike whites of later generations who used color terms as a kind of shorthand to denote Africans and those of African descent."  Frank M. Snowden, ''Before Color Prejudice: The Ancient View of Blacks'', Harvard University Press, 1991, [https://books.google.com/books?id=KWHMc-jNzlwC&pg=PA7  p. 7].</ref>  For example, it is found in e.g. ''[[Physiognomica]]'', a Greek treatise dated to c. 300 BC.

The transmission of the "color terminology" for race from antiquity to early anthropology in 17th century Europe took place via [[rabbinical literature]].   Specifically, [[Pirke De-Rabbi Eliezer]] (a medieval rabbinical text dated roughly to between the 7th to 12th centuries) contains the division of mankind into three groups based on the three [[sons of Noah]], viz. [[Shem]], [[Ham (son of Noah)|Ham]] and [[Japheth]]: 
:"He [Noah] especially blessed Shem and his sons, (making them) black but comely [{{lang|he|[[:wikt:שחור|שחורים]] ונאים}}], and he gave them the habitable earth. He blessed Ham and his sons, (making them) black like the raven [{{lang|he|שחורים כעורב}}], and he gave them as an inheritance the coast of the sea. He blessed Japheth and his sons, (making) them entirely white [{{lang|he|כלם [[:wikt:לבן#Hebrew|לבני]]}}], and he gave them for an inheritance the desert and its fields" (trans. Gerald Friedlander 1916, [https://archive.org/stream/pirkderabbieli00frieuoft#page/172/mode/2up p. 172f.])

This division in Rabbi Eliezer and other rabbinical texts is received by [[Georgius Hornius]] (1666). In Hornius' scheme, the [[Japhetites]] (identified as [[Scythians]], an Iranic ethnic group and [[Celts]]) are "white" ({{lang|la|albos}}), the [[Aethiopia]]ns and [[Ham (son of Noah)|Chamae]] are "black" ({{lang|la|nigros}}), and the [[Indian people|Indians]] and [[Semites]] are "brownish-yellow" ({{lang|la|flavos}}), while the [[Jews]], following ''Mishnah [[Sanhedrin (tractate)|Sanhedrin]]'', are exempt from the classification being neither black nor white but "light brown" ({{lang|la|buxus}}, the color of boxwood).<ref>''Arca Noae, sive historia imperiorum et regnorum ̀condito orbe ad nostra tempora''. Officina Hackiana, Leiden 1666, p. 37. ''Alias pro colorum diversitate commode quoque distinxeris posteros Noachi in ''albos'', qui sunt Scythae & Japhetaei, ''nigros'', qui sunt Aethiopes & Chamae, ''flavos'', qui sunt Indi & Semaei. Ita ''Iudaei'' in Glossea Misnae tractatu Sanhedrin. fol. 18. dicuntur ut buxus, nec nigri nec albi, quales fere sunt omnes a Semo orti''.</ref>

[[François Bernier]] in a short article published anonymously in 1684 moves away from the "Noahide" classification, proposes to consider large subgroups of mankind based not on geographical distribution but on physiological differences. Writing in French, Bernier uses the term {{lang|fr|[[:wikt:race#French|race]]}}, or synonymously {{lang|fr|[[:wikt:espèce|espece]]}} "kind, species", where Hornius had used {{lang|la|tribus}} "tribe" or {{lang|la|populus}} "people".  Bernier explicitly rejects a categorization based on skin color, arguing that the dark skin of Indians is due to exposure to the Sun only, and that the yellowish colour of some Asians, while a genuine feature, is not sufficient to establish a separate category. Instead his first category comprises most of Europe, the Near East and North Africa, including populations in the Nile Valley and the Indian peninsula he describes as being of a near "black" skin tone due to the effect of the sun. His second category includes most of Sub-Saharan Africa, again not exclusively based on skin colour but on physiological features such as the shape of nose and lips. His third category includes Southeast Asia, China and Japan as well as part of Tatarstan (Central Asia and eastern Muscovy). Members of this category are described as white, the categorization being based on facial features rather than skin colour. His fourth category are the Lapps (''Lappons''), described as a savage race with faces reminiscent of bears (but for which the author admits to rely on hearsay). Finally, the natives of the Americas are considered as a fifth category, described as of "[[olive skin|olive]]" ({{lang|fr|olivastre}}) skin tone.  The author furthermore considers the possible addition of more categories, specifically the "blacks of the [[Cape of Good Hope]]", which seemed to him to be of significantly different build from most other populations below the Sahara.<ref>Anonymous [F. Bernier], [http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k56535g/f135.item "Nouvelle division de la terre par les différentes espèces ou races qui l'habitent"], ''Journal des Sçavants'', 24 April 1684, [[:File:Nouvelle division de la terre, par les différentes espèces ou races d'homme qui l'habitent.png|p. 133]]&ndash;140.
See also Charles Frankel, ''La science face au racisme'' (1986), [https://books.google.com/books?id=szfsLo3VSVAC&pg=PA41  41f.]</ref>[[File:Mankind1ma6.jpg|thumb|300px|1851 map of [[Johann Friedrich Blumenbach]]'s five races, labeled "Caucasian or White", "Mongolian or Yellow", "Aethiopian or Black", "American or Red" and "Malayan or Brown"]]

===Early Modern physical anthropology===
In the 1730s,  [[Carl Linnaeus]] in his introduction of [[Binomial nomenclature|systematic taxonomy]] recognized four main [[human subspecies]], termed
{{lang|la|Americanus}} (Americans), {{lang|la|Europaeus}} (Europeans), {{lang|la|Asiaticus}} (Asians) and {{lang|la|Afer}} (Africans). The physical appearance of each type is briefly described, including colour adjectives referring to skin and hair colour: {{lang|la|rufus}} "red" and {{lang|la|pilis nigris}} "black hair" for Americans, {{lang|la|albus}} "white" and {{lang|la|pilis flavescentibus}} "[[:wikt:flavescens|yellowish]] hair" for Europeans, {{lang|la|luridus}} "yellowish, sallow",  {{lang|la|pilis nigricantibus}} "swarthy hair" for Asians, 
and {{lang|la|niger}} "black", {{lang|la|pilis atris}} "coal-black hair" for Africans.<ref>Linnaeus, ''Syst. Nat.'' ed. 10 Vol. 1. [https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/80764#page/31/mode/1up p. 21].</ref>

The views of [[Johann Friedrich Blumenbach]] on the categorization of the major races of mankind developed over the course of the 1770s to 1820s. He introduced a four-fold division in 1775, extended to five in 1779,  later borne out in his work on [[craniology]] (''Decas craniorum'', published during 1790–1828).  He also used color as the name or main label of the races but as part of the description of their [[physiology]].  Blumenbach does not name his five groups in 1779 but gives their geographic distribution.  The color adjectives used in 1779 are {{lang|de|weiss}} "white" ([[Europid|Caucasian race]]), {{lang|de|gelbbraun}} "yellow-brown" ([[Mongoloid|Mongolian race]]), {{lang|de|schwarz}} "black" ([[Negroid|Aethiopian race]]), {{lang|de|kupferrot}} "copper-red" ([[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|American race]]) and {{lang|de|schwarzbraun}} "black-brown" ([[Malay race|Malayan race]]).<ref name="Blumenbach">{{cite book |last=Blumenbach |first=Johann Friedrich |date=1779 |title=Handbuch der Naturgeschichte |url=http://www.deutschestextarchiv.de/book/view/blumenbach_naturgeschichte_1779?p=85 |page=63}}</ref> Blumenbach belonged to a group known as the [[Göttingen school of history]], which helped to popularize his ideas.

Blumenbach's division and choice of color-adjectives remained influential throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, with variation depending on author. [[René Lesson]] in 1847 presented a division into six groups based on simple color adjectives: White (Caucasian), Dusky (South Asian), Orange (Austronesian), Yellow (East Asian), Red (Indigenous American), Black (African).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Smith |first1=Charles Hamilton |last2=Kneeland |first2=Samuel |date=1851 |title=The Natural History of the Human Species |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oUgLAQAAIAAJ |publisher=Gould and Lincoln}}</ref> According to Barkhaus (2006)<ref>A. Barkhaus, "Rassen" in: Hansjörg Bay, Kai Merten (eds.) ''Die Ordnung der Kulturen: zur Konstruktion ethnischer, nationaler und zivilisatorischer Differenzen 1750-1850'' (2006), p. 39&ndash;44.</ref> it was the adoption of both the colour terminology and the French term {{lang|fr|race}} by [[Immanuel Kant]] in 1775 which proved influential. Kant published an essay ''Von den verschiedenen Racen der Menschen'' "On the diverse races of mankind" in 1775, based on the system proposed by  [[Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon|Buffon]], ''[[Histoire Naturelle]]'', in which he recognized four groups, a "white" European race ({{lang|de|Race der Weißen}}), a "black" Negroid race ({{lang|de|Negerrace}}), a copper-red Kalmyk race ({{lang|de|kalmuckishe Race}}) and an olive-yellow Indian race ({{lang|de|Hinduische Race}}).<ref>Kant (1775:432), cited after Barkhaus (2006:44).</ref>

Two historical anthropologists favored a binary racial classification system that divided people into a light skin and dark skin categories. 18th-century anthropologist [[Christoph Meiners]], who first defined the Caucasian race, posited a "''binary racial scheme''"<!--p.34--> of two races<!--p.19--> with the Caucasian whose racial purity was exemplified by the "''venerated... ancient Germans''"<!--p.34-->, although he considered some Europeans as impure "''dirty whites''"<!-- page 36 -->; and "''Mongolians''", who consisted of everyone else.<ref name="Painter">[[Painter, Nell Irvin]]. Yale University. "Why White People are Called Caucasian?" 2003. September 27, 2007. {{cite web |url=http://www.yale.edu/glc/events/race/Painter.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=2014-05-13 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131020105628/http://www.yale.edu/glc/events/race/Painter.pdf |archive-date=2013-10-20 }}; Keevak, Michael. <u> Becoming Yellow: A Short History of Racial Thinking.</u> Princeton University Press, 2011. {{ISBN|0-6911-4031-6}}.</ref><!-- page 34 -->  Meiners did not include the [[Jew]]s as Caucasians and ascribed them a "''permanently degenerate nature''".<ref>Eigen, Sara. <u>The German Invention of Race.</u>  Suny Press:New York, 2006. {{ISBN|0-7914-6677-9}} p.205</ref> 
Hannah Franzieka identified 19th-century writers who believed in the "Caucasian hypothesis" and noted that "Jean-Julien Virey and Louis Antoine Desmoulines were well-known supports of the idea that Europeans came from Mount Caucasus."<!--p.84--><ref name="Franzieka">Franzieka, Hannah. Berghahn Books: 2004. {{ISBN|1-57181-857-X}} <u>James Cowles Prichard's Anthropology: Remaking the Science of Man in Early</u></ref>  In his political history of racial identity, Bruce Baum wrote, "Jean-Joseph Virey (1774–1847), a follower of Christoph Meiners, claimed that "the human races... may divided... into those who are fair and white and those who are dark or black."<!--p. 98--><ref name="Baum">Baum, Bruce David. <u>The Rise and Fall of the Caucasian Race: A Political History of Racial Identity.</u> New York University: 2006. {{ISBN|0-8147-9892-6}}</ref>

[[File:Stoddard race map 1920.jpg|thumb|300px|Stoddard's map of the distribution of the five primary races of the world (1920)]]
[[Lothrop Stoddard]] in ''[[The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Supremacy]]'' (1920) considered five races: White, Black, Yellow, Brown, and Amerindian (Red).  In this explicitly [[white supremacist]] exposition of racial categorization, the "white" category is much more limited than in Blumenbach's scheme, essentially restricted to [[Peoples of Europe|Europeans]], while the separate [[Brown (racial classification)|"brown"]] category is introduced for non-European [[Caucasoid]] subgroups in North Africa, Western, Central and South Asia.<ref>{{cite book |last=Stoddard |first=Lothrop |date=1920 |title=The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Supremacy |url=http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/37408 |location=United States |publisher=Charles Scribner's Sons |isbn=4-87187-849-X}}</ref>

===Racial categories after 1945===
<!--Racial classification according to skin color became more complex when anthropologists added other, less obvious characteristics, in their attempt to achieve a scientific classification of races. It was later found{{year needed}}{{by whom}} [exactly what Bernier said back in 1684, and everyone in between explicitly used the color terminology as a shorthand]  that skin color depended essentially from the amount of [[melanin]], and could vary widely in the same community. Thus, it could not provide a satisfying way to classify [[ethnic groups]], much less "races". -->

[[File:Flag of Suriname (1959–1975).svg|thumb|The old [[flag of Suriname]] (1954–1975) symbolized unity between the five "races" in the country: red ([[Indigenous peoples in Suriname|Indigenous Americans]]), white ([[White Surinamese|Europeans]]), black ([[Afro-Surinamese|Africans]]), brown ([[Indo-Surinamese|South Asians]] and [[Javanese Surinamese|Javanese]]) and yellow ([[Asian Surinamese|East Asians]]).]]

Following [[World War II]], more and more biologists and anthropologists began to discontinue use of the term "race" due to its association with political ideologies of [[racism]]. Thus, ''[[The Race Question]]'' statement by the [[UNESCO]], in the 1950s, proposed to substitute the term "ethnic groups" to the concept of "race".
Categories such as [[Europid]], [[Mongoloid]], [[Negroid]], [[Australoid]] remain in use in fields such as [[forensic anthropology]].<ref>Adams, Bradley J. (2007). Forensic Anthropology. USA: [[Infobase Publishing|Chelsea House]]. Page 44. {{ISBN|978-0-7910-9198-2}} Retrieved June 12, 2017, from [https://books.google.com/books?id=tZUPBYdqLNsC&pg=PA44 link.]</ref>

Color terminology remains in use in some countries with [[multiracial]] populations for the purpose of their official [[census]], as in the [[Race and ethnicity in the United States|United States]], where the official categories are "Black", "White", "Asian", "Native American and Alaska Natives" and "Native Hawaiians and Other Pacific Islanders" and in the [[Demographics of the United Kingdom#Ethnicity|United Kingdom]] ([[United Kingdom Census 1991|since 1991]]) with official categories  "White", "Asian" and "Black".<ref name="Census"/> Conversely, it is uncommon in English speaking countries to use "Yellow" to refer to [[Asian people]] or "Red" to refer to [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas]]. This is due to historic negative associations of the terms (ex. [[Yellow Peril]] and [[Redskin]]).<ref name="yang">{{cite web| last=Yang| first=Tim| title=The Malleable Yet Undying Nature of the Yellow Peril| publisher=Dartmouth College| date=19 February 2004| url=http://www.dartmouth.edu/~hist32/History/S22%20-The%20Malleable%20Yet%20Undying%20Nature%20of%20the%20Yellow%20Peril.htm| archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20150102102520/http://www.dartmouth.edu/~hist32/History/S22%20-The%20Malleable%20Yet%20Undying%20Nature%20of%20the%20Yellow%20Peril.htm| archive-date=2 January 2015| url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="oxford">{{cite web| url=http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2014/08/definition-redskin/| title=What is the definition of redskin?| publisher=Oxford University Press| archive-date=September 16, 2016| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160916082935/http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2014/08/definition-redskin/| url-status=dead}}</ref> However, some Asians have tried to reclaim the word by proudly self-identifying as "Yellow".<ref name="back">{{cite news |last=Wong |first=Joan |date=December 21, 2018 |title='Beautiful and empowering': Was 2018 the year Asian Americans took 'yellow' back? |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/beautiful-empowering-was-2018-year-asian-americans-took-yellow-back-n947181 |work=NBC News}}</ref><ref name="yellow">{{cite podcast |url=https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2018/09/27/647989652/if-we-called-ourselves-yellow |title=If We Called Ourselves Yellow |website=NPR |host=Kat Chow |date=September 27, 2018 |time=6:25 AM}}</ref> Similarly, some Native Americans have tried to reclaim the term "Red".<ref name="ross">{{Cite web| last = Ross| first = Gyasi| title = "Redskins": A Native's Guide To Debating An Inglorious Word| work = Deadspin| date = 2013-10-16| url = http://deadspin.com/redskins-a-natives-guide-to-debating-an-inglorious-1445909360| archive-date = 2014-11-12| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20141112211825/http://deadspin.com/redskins-a-natives-guide-to-debating-an-inglorious-1445909360| url-status = live}}</ref>

Much of the color-based classification relates to groups that were politically significant at different points in US history (e.g., part of a wave of immigrants), and these categories do not have an obvious label for people from other groups, such as people from the Middle East or Central Asia.<ref name=":0" /> However, many Middle Eastern and South Asian people in the Anglophone world self-identify as "[[Brown (racial classification)|Brown]]", considering their skin color central to their [[Brown identity|identity]].<ref name="bayoumi">{{cite web |last1=Bayoumi |first1=Moustafa |title=I'm a brown Arab-American, and the US census refuses to recognize me |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/14/arab-american-census-america-racism |website=The Guardian |date=14 February 2019}}</ref><ref name="schiavenza">{{cite web|last=Schiavenza|first=Matt|title= Why Some 'Brown Asians' Feel Left Out of the Asian American Conversation|url=https://asiasociety.org/blog/asia/why-some-brown-asians-feel-left-out-asian-american-conversation|date=October 19, 2016|website=[[Asia Society]]}}</ref> Many Hispanics, particularly mestizos, have self-identified as the [[Bronze (racial classification)|Bronze race]] ({{Lang|es|la raza de bronce}}) since the 20th century.<ref>{{cite book |last=Nervo |first=Amado |date=1902 |title=La Raza de Bronce |url=https://www.poesi.as/anlh020.htm}}</ref> The term [[Olive skin|"Olive"]] has sometimes been used to refer variously to Mediterranean, South Asian, Latin American, and Pacific Islander people.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/olive-skin-countries |title=Olive Skin Countries 2023 |date=2023 |website=World Population Review}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Gates |first=Clifford E. |date=1922 |title=The Polynesians: Caucasians of the Pacific |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/6551 |journal=The Scientific Monthly |volume=15 |issue=3 |pages=257–262|bibcode=1922SciMo..15..257G }}</ref>

== Symbolism and uses of color terminology ==
{{further|Black people|White people}}

The Martinique-born French [[Frantz Fanon]] and African-American writers [[Langston Hughes]], [[Maya Angelou]], and [[Ralph Ellison]], among others, wrote that negative symbolisms surrounding the word "black" outnumber positive ones.  They argued that the good vs. bad dualism associated with white and black unconsciously frame [[Black#Usage.2C symbolism.2C colloquial expressions|prejudiced colloquialisms]]. In the 1970s the term ''black'' replaced ''Negro'' in the United States.<ref>[http://www.poynter.org/content/content_print.asp?id=51320 Black, black, or African American?] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090413052122/http://www.poynter.org/content/content_print.asp?id=51320 |date=2009-04-13 }}, Aly Colón</ref>

=== Tone gradations ===
In some societies people can be sensitive to gradations of skin tone, which may be due to [[miscegenation]] or to [[albinism]] and which can affect [[colorism|power and prestige]]. In 1930s [[Harlem]] slang, such gradations were described by a tonescale of "[[High yellow|high yaller (yellow)]], yaller, [[Paper bag test|high brown]], vaseline brown, seal brown, low brown, dark brown".<ref>[http://aalbc.com/authors/harlemslang.htm Zora Neale Hurston's - Glossary of Harlem Slang] "Tonescale"</ref> These terms were sometimes referred to in [[blues music]], both in the words of songs and in the names of performers. In 1920s [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]], Willie Perryman followed his older brother Rufus in becoming a blues piano player: both were albino Negroes with pale skin, reddish hair and poor eyesight. Rufus was already well established as "[[Speckled Red]]", Willie became "[[Piano Red]]".<ref>''The Blues Collection'' issue 68, ''Piano Red'', Contribution by Tony Russell, 1996</ref> The piano player and guitarist [[Tampa Red]] from the same state developed his career in [[Chicago]] at that time: his name may have come from his light skin tone, or possibly reddish hair.

More recently such categorization has been noted in the [[Caribbean]]. It is reported that skin tones play an important role in defining how [[Barbados|Barbadians]] view one another, and they use terms such as "brown skin, light skin, fair skin, high brown, red, and mulatto".<ref>[http://www.ediplomat.com/np/post_reports/pr_bb.htm Barbados - Post Report - eDiplomat]</ref> An assessment of racism in [[Trinidad]] notes people often being described by their skin tone, with the gradations being "HIGH RED – part White, part Black but 'clearer' than Brown-skin: HIGH BROWN – More white than Black, light skinned: [[Dougla people|DOUGLA]] – part Indian and part Black: LIGHT SKINNED, or CLEAR SKINNED Some Black, but more White: [[White Trinidadian and Tobagonian|TRINI WHITE]] – Perhaps not all White, behaves like others but skin White".<ref>[http://www.laotse.com/manuscripts/Agostini-RacisimTrinidad.pdf RACISM IN TRINIDAD] (pdf)</ref> In [[Jamaica]], albinism has been stigmatized, but the albino [[dancehall]] singer [[Yellowman]] took his stage name in protest against such prejudice and has helped to end this stereotype.

===United States===
[[Racial segregation]] in the [[United States]] was based on a binary classification, white vs. non-white, in which "white" was held to imply "purity" so that anyone with even the slightest amount of non-white ancestry was excluded from white privileges, and there could be no category of racially mixed people.  In 1896 this doctrine was upheld in the ''[[Plessy v. Ferguson]]'' Supreme Court case. Traditionally the main distinction was between "white" and "black", but [[Japanese Americans]] could be accepted on both sides of the divide. As further racial groups were categorized, "white" became narrowly construed, and everyone else was categorised as a "[[person of color]]", suggesting that "white" people have no race, while racial subdivision of those "of color" was unimportant.<ref name=Zack>{{cite book|first=Naomi|last=Zack|title=American Mixed Race: The Culture of Microdiversity|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=G9vLpONQLXMC&pg=PA53|year=1995|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|isbn=978-0-8476-8013-9|pages=53–56}}</ref>

At college campus protests during the 1960s, a "Flag of the Races" was in use, with five stripes comprising red, black, brown, yellow, and white tones.<ref>{{cite web|title=Symbols of Pride of the LGBTQ Community|publisher=Carleton College|url=https://apps.carleton.edu/campus/gsc/ally/lgbtsymbols/|access-date=2018-03-17|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080907001747/http://apps.carleton.edu/campus/gsc/ally/lgbtsymbols/|archive-date=2008-09-07|url-status=dead}}</ref>{{unreliable source?|date=March 2018}}

In the [[2000 United States Census]], two of the five [[Race and ethnicity in the United States Census|self-designated races]] are labeled by a color.<ref name=Census /> In the 2000 US Census, "White" refers to "person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa."<ref name=Census /> In the 2000 US Census, "Black or African American" refers to a "person having origins in any of the Black racial groups of Africa."<ref name=Census />

The other three self-designated races are not labeled by color.<ref name=Census>[http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/meta/long_68178.htm US Census Bureau. Race. 2000. Accessed July 14, 2008] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090831085310/http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/meta/long_68178.htm |date=August 31, 2009 }}</ref> This is due to historic negative associations of terms like "Yellow" (for East Asians) and "Red" (for Native Americans) with racism.<ref name="yang"/><ref name="oxford"/> However, some Asian Americans and Native Americans have tried to reclaim these color terms by self-identifying as "Yellow" and "Red", respectively.<ref name="back"/><ref name="ross"/>

Though not an official color or racial designation in the United States census, "[[Brown (racial classification)|Brown]]" has been used to describe certain peoples such as Arab Americans and Indian Americans.<ref name="bayoumi"/><ref name="schiavenza"/><ref name="Ms. Magazine">{{cite magazine|last=Kulkarni|first=Saili S.|title=South Asians Are Asians Too. When Will Our Racial Reckoning Be?|url=https://msmagazine.com/2021/04/24/south-asian-racism-fedex-indianapolis-sikh-shooting/|magazine=Ms.|date=April 24, 2021|access-date=March 24, 2022|quote=yet we didn’t similarly rally for the Brown, South Asians killed in Indianapolis.}}</ref>  Many [[Middle Eastern Americans]] have criticized the United States Census for denying them a racial designation, as they are classified as "White" by the United States census.<ref name="bayoumi"/> Furthermore, though ''Asian'' as a racial term in the United States groups together ethnically diverse Asian peoples such as the Chinese, Indians, Filipinos and Japanese, its common usage has been criticized for only referring to East Asians. This has led some South and Southeast Asian Americans to use the term "Brown Asian" to separate themselves from East Asian Americans.<ref name="schiavenza"/> Additionally, some Middle Eastern Americans will check “Asian” as their race, as technically, the region of the Middle East is located in Western Asia.{{cn|date=April 2025}}

== See also ==
*[[Biological anthropology]] (also known as physical anthropology)

==References==
{{Reflist|35em}}

{{Human skin color}}
{{Historical definitions of race}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Color Terminology For Race}}
[[Category:Color in culture|Race]]
[[Category:Race (human categorization)|Color terminology]]
[[Category:Human skin color|Race]]
[[Category:Scientific racism|Color terminology]]