AUGMENTATON OF SELF FROM THE PAROXYSM OF RACISM AND COLORISM: A STUDY ON MAYA ANGELOU

Abstract

The word ‘color’ first brings a binary paradigm into one’s mind- white/black or light/dark. This binary image itself offers a contrary archetype from which most of us prefer white or light. This results from a sort of hidden influence of white-supremacist agenda. Colorism acts as a system of oppression in white-supremacist spaces. In United States, the questions of who is black? and what constitutes the so-called ‘blackness’? - are simply matters of consciousness. Culture and race act only as a secondary part in it. Maya Angelou’s life narrative I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings clearly explores the nuances of such ‘coloured’ identity and the influences of skin color in a Black-American woman’s life. It reflects a history of slavery and racism in America. Being an Afro-American activist, Maya Angelou subverted all the boundaries of colorism and acted out her identity beyond the lines of prejudices. This paper is an attempt to shatter all the preconceptions on racial/’colored’ identity of a person through the bolshie life of Maya Angelou.