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Brown people
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Brown people or brown race is a political, racial, ethnic, societal, and cultural classification, similar to black people and white people. Like these, it is a metaphor for race based on human skin color, reflecting the fact that there are shades of skin colour intermediate between "Mediterranean" (skin type IV) and "black" (skin type VI). Consequently, the term includes groups that have no connection other than their intermediate skin tone, especially but not limited to mixed race individuals.
appellation "brown people" has been applied in the 20th and 21st centuries to several groups, usually mixed race ones.
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Brown people or brown race is a political, racial, ethnic, societal, and cultural classification, similar to black people and white people. Like these, it is a metaphor for race based on human skin color, reflecting the fact that there are shades of skin colour intermediate between "Mediterranean" (skin type IV) and "black" (skin type VI). Consequently, the term includes groups that have no connection other than their intermediate skin tone, especially but not limited to mixed race individuals.
20th and 21st century concepts
The appellation "brown people" has been applied in the 20th and 21st centuries to several groups, usually mixed race ones. (Jack Forbes, an expert in the field, in pointing out the disconnection between the colour labels and actual skin colour, observes that "[b]lack and white when mixed as pigments may produce gray, but when 'black' and 'white' humans mix the result is usually some type of 'brown'".)
Edward Telles is another academic in this field. He and Forbes both argue that this classification is biologically invalid. However, as Telles notes, it is still of sociological significance. Irrespective of the actual biological differences amongst humans, and of the actual complexities of human skin colouration, people nonetheless self-identify as "brown" and identify other groups of people as "brown", using characteristics that include skin colour, hair strength, language, and culture, in order to classify them. Forbes remarks upon a process of "lumping", whereby characteristics other than skin colour, such as hair colour or curliness, act as "triggers" for colour categories "even when it may not be appropriate".
Coloureds in South Africa
In 1950s (and later) South Africa the "brown people" were the Coloureds, who were largely, and erroneously, believed to have been the production of black-white sexual union out of wedlock. The Afrikaans terms, which incorporate many subtleties of heritage, political agenda, and identity, are "bruin" ("brown") ,"bruines" ("browns"), and "bruinmense" ("brown people"). Some South Africans prefer the appellation "bruinmense" to "Coloured".
The South African pencil test is one example of a characteristic other than skin colour being used as a determiner. The pencil test, which distinguished either "black" from "Coloured" or "Coloured" from "white", relied upon curliness and strength of hair (i.e. whether it was capable of retaining a pencil under its own strength) rather than upon any colour factor at all. The pencil test could "trump skin colour".
Stephen Biko, in his trial in 1976, rejected the appellation "brown people" when it was put to him by Judge Boshoff:
- Boshoff: But now why do you refer to you people as blacks? Why not brown people? I mean you people are more brown than black.
- Biko: In the same way as I think white people are more pink and yellow and pale than white.
- Boshoff: Quite ... but now why do you not use the word brown then?
- Biko: No, I think really, historically, we have been defined as black people, and when we reject the term non-white and take upon ourselves the right to call ourselves what we think we are, we have got available in front of us a whole number of alternatives ... and we choose this one precisely because we feel it is most accommodating.
Oakes characterizes Biko's argument as picking "black" over "brown" because for Biko it is "the most valid, meaningful and appropriate representation, even though in an individualistic decontextualized sense it might appear wrong" (Oakes' emphasis).
This contrasts with Piet Uithalder, fictional protagonist of the satirical column "Straatpraatjes" (whose actual author was never revealed but who is believed to have been Abdullah Abdurahman) that appeared in the Dutch-Afrikaans section of the newspaper APO between May 1909 and February 1922. Uithalder would self-identify as a Coloured person, with the column targeted at a Coloured readership, introducing himself as "een van de ras" ("a member of the race") and characterizing himself as a "bruine mens".
Pardos in Brazil
In Brazil, the "brown people" are the "pardos", one of the official racial classifications ("branco", "pardo", "preto", "amarelo", and "indigena" being Portuguese for "white", "(grey) brown", "black", "yellow", and "indigenous", respectively) that have been used by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics since 1950. It is a broad classification that encompasses people of mixed race, mulattos, and assimilated indigenous people ("caboclos"). In the first census in the 20th century to ask a colour question, the census of 1940, the three available categories were white, black, and yellow. Colour was chosen by the census enumerator, and any respondent who did not fit one of the three was classified as "pardo". In the 1950 census, "pardo" was added as a choice, and colour was chosen by the respondent.
Unofficially, Brazilians also use a racial classification of "moreno", also meaning "brown". In a 1995 survey, 32% of the population self-identified as "moreno", with a further 6% self-identifying as "moreno claro" ("light brown"). 7% self-identified as "pardo".
Note that despite "moreno" is commonly used by some uneducated persons as a racial classification (mainly in Brazil), "moreno" is, in fact, the Portuguese equivalent to the English word "brunet(te)". It is used to describe a brown, dark brown or black haired person opposing to a blond (loiro/loira/louro/loura) one. In Portugal, it is also used to refer to skin colour, it is used usually referring to a heavily tanned white person. It is often preceded by the adjectives more or less, and is used to compare one person's colour to another. Recentley "mais moreno" (more "moreno") has been used to refer to black or brown peoples (especially non white Brazilians).
Austronesians
Kayumanggi is the Tagalog word for the color brown or brown hue, and is most often used to refer to the majority Austronesians of the Philippines.
Mestizo and Hispanic
In the United States some Hispanic Americans and mestizos are referred to by some as "brown people". There is a strong division over this, however. At opposite ends of the spectrum are those that take pride in calling themselves "brown", and those who assert that there is no such scientific classification and totally reject the idea. In the middle are those that assert that the combination of indigenous Indian and Spanish heritage has led to a group of people who are, informally, "brown".
Judith Ortiz Cofer notes that appellation varies according to geographical location, observing that in Puerto Rico she is considered to be a white person, but in the United States she is considered to be a brown person.
The 1960s in the United States saw the creation of "brown pride" movements such as the Chicano Movement and La Raza. However, in contrast, many people classified, mainly for cultural reasons, as "Mestizos" assert that they are white, and reject any assertion that they are not, finding such assertions to be offensive. Contreras, a syndicated newspaper columnist in the United States, states that "in fact, there are a lot of 'brown' people", observing that he sees this colour whenever he looks in a mirror. He states that "[w]e, who trace back to the union of the Spanish Conquistadors and Indian women, can choose one of three paths. [... We] can insist upon being white if, of course, we can prove at least 50.1% white blood. Or we can ignore our white blood and be 'indigenous' and refuse to participate in America [...]. Or we can assert ourselves as a new people, we of brown skin, of Spanish and Indian blood. [...] We are Mexicans and Americans of Mexican descent.".
South Asians
It is said that the racial qualities mentioned by Elliot Smith were the exact same as those mentioned by Giuseppe Sergi who wrote of the "mediterranean race". Sergi too spoke of a brown race although he discussed their distribution through Eurafrica. Perhaps this Mediterranean category can be extended to even Caucasoids of Latin America as Latin Americans descend from Iberia, which is classified by many within the Mediterranean race. Many see South Asia as an extension of the brown race.
The term 'Brown' was also used by British Empire as a derogatory term for Natives of Indian sub-continent, South Asia, and Australia. Later, the term 'Brown' began to be used as descriptor for British people of South Asian origin.
Some South Asian Americans will identify their race as brown which Sociologist A. Rajagopal thinks is a result of identifying with Hispanic Americans who are more likely to identify as brown. Although Indian Americans and Hispanic Americans who identify their race as brown may not identify each other as the same race.
Further reading
See also
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