In the skin of a Black

In the skin of a black (original title Black Like Me , “Black as me”) is an autobiographical account written between on October 28th, 1959 and on August 17th, 1960 by John Howard Griffin, writer and journalist American, and published in 1961. The French publication will follow little, the following year (1962), sign of the interest which France for the condition of the Afro-Americans in the American South carries then. This book is a six weeks experiment for Griffin, white of Mansfield to the Texas, grimé as an Afro-American, with for objective knowing the reality of the existence of a black in the south of the United States.

Origins of the book

Historical context

For historical reasons related on the draft of the blacks and the persistence of the States of the South to maintain slavery, the fate of the Afro-Americans was more precarious there than elsewhere in the United States and in particular in North. The writer Richard Wright for its part gives of them two poignant testimonys in Black Boy and in a hunger of equality . It is to say that many years after slavery was abolished, the life in the States of the South for an Afro-American was characterized by the segregation which made of him a second-class citizen.

Parallel to these historical facts, it is with the reading of a report/ratio on the rate of Suicide of the Afro-Americans in the South, higher than elsewhere, and with the report according to which " they had reached the stage where little was essential to them to live or of mourir" that Griffin matures the idea to be disguised in black. The more so as he is convinced by it, the barrier which separates the two communities completed to cut the dialog between them. To restore it, it must become black, be one of them. It will be made thing.

The process

Griffin will call upon several doctors in his transformation, and one in particular will help it by prescribing drugs usually prescribed to him in the event of vitiligo (the Oxsoralen). In addition, it will undergo meetings of rays in order to supplement the effect of the treatment. Lastly, it will make use of a dye be applied directly to the skin. To be truer, the weather will shave cranium.

Concerning the Oxsoralen, a rumor will run according to which it would have caused at his place a mortal cancer of the skin. It of it is nothing and the only symptoms which one could charge to the undergone treatment are nauseas and tiredness.

In addition to steps to blacken its skin, Griffin will take the precaution to prevent FBI and also to seek the support of the magazine bound for the Afro-Americans Sepia to which it will offer the exclusiveness in its experiment, despite everything the risks that can comprise. The book is thus initially a journalistic report.

Lastly, for obvious reasons of safety but also in order to make its experiment authentic, it will make the decision to cut his completely, except a phone call in a cabin passed during the experiment.

The book

Form

The book is appeared as a log book, held day after day, without the regularity being perfect. John Howard Griffin found of it the title (in English Black like me ) starting from worms of a poetry of Langston Hughes entitled " Dream Variations":

Rest At blade evening…

has tall slim tree…

Night coming tenderly

Black like me.

It alternates the descriptions and dialogs restored with reflections on the situation of the Afro-Americans.

Contents of the experiment

During his voyage, John Griffin decides to preserve his name and to change only his color. Carrying some businesses with him, it New-Orleans will cross 5 different States on the basis of the which have as a characteristic to practice the segregation towards the blacks. The topicality will guide sometimes its tour, in particular a business of lynching which was judged in an iniquitous way.

Two separate worlds

One of the first outstanding points of the account is the separation as well physical as mental which exists between the white and the black. They do not attend the same places, have places determined in the buses, met have their respective codes. A black will not speak with a white frankly, knowing the risks which it can incur, and also knowing which opinion it has of him. Pareillement, a white will not be able to be made accept easily knowing which treatment the white inflict with the black. The two worlds are thus côtoient never frontally. This caesura supports the prejudices between the two types of men.

Promiscuity of the existence of the black

Griffin tried out it all length: for a black, outward journey with the cabinet, to nourish themselves or place themselves becomes a challenge. All is returned to him difficult. It must go in places which are reserved to him and which are in general rare. In addition, Griffin is struck by extreme poverty, hitherto accustomed to the comfort which the white enjoy. From this promiscuity in which the blacks live, the white will draw their prejudices: the blacks would like to live in misery, they do not pay taxes and do not have by there any right, they are lustful, etc For Griffin, all that comes from the condition of the blacks, reduced not to have any prospect and not having like only pleasures that those for the body. In addition Griffin depicts us blacks concerned of the future, educated sometimes, eager to go from the front one. He often says it, the " racaille" white the " is worth; racaille" black. The line of demarcation is not racial.

Insidious discriminations

Griffin notices quickly at which point discriminations of which are victims the blacks are insidious. White tradesmen can trade very well with the blacks, they are not less racist or scorning. A man can smile you very well or to take your party, it is not less paternalist. Discrimination in the human relations is done mainly by a diffuse environment in which the black is treated unequally with outside of equality. That reinforces the thesis of Griffin according to which it is necessary to be black for the food and to see it.

Beyond over-simplification or other-worldliness

Griffin does not fall into the Manicheism. Moreover, the condition of possibility of its book is the director of Sepia, magazine for the Afro-Americans directed by a white. The question is thus that of the equality, which is not a racial question but a political question. Men of good will as well white as black are depicted in the book. From this report is born the hope from a change.

Beyond the book

Consequences of the book

John H. Griffin was victim of death threats and his portrait placarded in his city. That did not prevent Griffin from collecting an international success thanks to its book and with becoming one of the members of the Mouvement of the civic rights as well as a militant of the human rights.

The film