Kelly Rowland Opens Up About Learning To Love Her Brown Skin
I don’t remember when I learned about colorism, but I know it was early on in my childhood. Family members assessed my color in hushed whispers (“she’s getting darker, huh?”) and as I got older and began dating, compliments from the opposite sex always hinged on my skin tone (“You’re a pretty dark-skinned girl”). When your complexion isn’t always celebrated or idealized, you sometimes have to arrive at your own definition of beauty, free from society’s hangups. It’s freeing to learn other beautiful brown-skinned women came to that realization as well, like Kelly Rowland.
The singer opened up to Eurweb about her journey to embrace her complexion:
You know what I had great women in my life to help me overcome that. I remember I went through a period where I didn’t embrace my chocolatiness. I don’t know if that’s a word, but I didn’t embrace my chocolate lifestyle. Just being a chocolate, lovely brown skin girl and being proud of that. I remember being out in the sun and I was trying to shield myself from the sun and [Beyonce's mom Tina Knowles] said, ‘Are you crazy?’ She said ‘You are absolutely gorgeous’ and she just told me how beautiful I was and how rare chocolate is and how gorgeous the skin is, all of this stuff. And I was just like ‘Yeah!’ Like a light went off and so and my mother had me sitting out in the sun a little more, just to be a little more chocolate.
Kelly’s confidence shows and her story is inspiring to women who may be struggling with the same insecurities. With all the messages in the beauty industry and popular culture that may not readily embrace brown skin, it’s important to have role models like Kelly to reinforce the truth that beauty comes in different shades.
Check out the interview here:
What do you think about Kelly Rowland’s comments, Clutchettes?
I hear you @Amina! I think part of the dimissal
I’d imagine that’s what gave birth to the #teamlightskinned and #darkskinned maddness on twitter.
Like you it took me years to finally embrace my skin tone. and truly love the vessel by which my soul travels. I’m so glad you did. I know what a struggle that can be. :-)
I certainly was not trying to dismiss Kelly or any other woman’s struggle with their self image or self esteem. What I was saying why is eveytime a brown or dark skinned woman I speaking on her image it has to do with “learning” to love her color? Why can’t she already love it and know its beautiful the way it is? Like I said before not every brown girl is struggling with a skin color complex, myself included.
Oh dear, multitasking isn’t my strong suit today. My apologies for my previous bungled message. What I meant to say is sometimes the dismissal can stem from people in general and some women in particular not understanding the insidious effect colourism can have on one’s psyche.
For some of us it is about learning to love our skin colour. This is particularly true if one grew up hearing all sorts of negative messages about dark skin as I did..
I didn’t mean to sound accusatory. I say good on you for all the brown skin women who are and have been forever comfortable in their skin. That’s wonderful! It is however great to hear of the stories of women who have gotten a hang of loving the skin they are in because I can relate.
For those who stated they never had a color complex, that is awesome. Perhaps you grew up in a community or environment that didn’t distinguish you by your complexion. I’m around the same age as Kelly Rowland and in our day being told you’re pretty to be dark was the norm. It was detrimental to your self esteem. I was always referred to by my complexion. It didn’t help that both my best friends were very light and so was my mother and sister. So yes it was hard being “chocolate” growing up in the 90′s. But as I became an adult I changed my opinion on beauty and I started to see my beauty.
Thank you…..That was definitely my feeling when I read the article.
She addressed embracing her skin tone, but not her original nose?
I didn’t need to learn to embrace my skin tone because I already did. I am the darkest in my family. I didn’t learn of the negativity of tone differences until public school. Where people would ask me if I was adopted because I had significantly darker skin than that of my siblings. But because of the overwhelming positive presence that I got from my home and family, I paid those comments no mind.
In whose world does Kelly Rowland have “dark skin”? Why in 2013 are we still so divided by what slave masters did to us hundreds of years ago no matter what our skin tone is? Please stop the madness!
I couldn’t agree more. The sad thing is tha this ‘shadism’ [as we sometimes call it in Britain] is quite pervasisve in the African and African-descendant communities: whether in Africa, The Caribbean, The Americas etc. Our people manifest this inferiority complex.