Two Sides of a Story

Melanie Brown is the daughter of a White English mother and a Black Caribbean father. Her 'Brutally Honest' memoir discusses what it was like growing up as a Mixed Race person in the North of England. Melanie says that she wanted her skin to turn White as a child and she describes being 'horrified' to see that her younger sister was born with brown skin. Melanie remembers telling her mother that she 'wanted a sister with white skin and blonde hair'. While discussing her childhood experiences with racism, Melanie says the following: "The black girls often made it clearer than the white girls that I wasn’t part of their gang. I was in a no-man’s-land – or more like a no-child’s-land – of being mixed race; not one, not the other."

Kidada Jones is the daughter of a White mother (Peggy Lipton) and a Black father (Quincy Jones). In a Glamour magazine interview, Peggy said: "Kidada never wanted to be white. She spoke with a little...twist in her language. She had 'tude". Kidada experienced racism in her predominantly White school and she says that her skin and hair were 'inconveniences'. Peggy realised that Kidada 'wouldn't be comfortable unless she was around kids who looked like her', so she found 'a private school that had a good proportion of black students' when Kidada was 12. According to Kidada, 'that changed everything'. Kidada would go to her black girlfriends' houses and want their life because of the 'heart and soul' that she experienced in their families.

Kidada convinced her mother to enrol her into a predominantly Black public high school which she started at the age of 14. Kidada says that she 'fit in right away'. Her black girlfriends thought her 'skin was beautiful' and they loved to put their hands in her hair and braid it. I'm grateful that Kidada spoke about the love she received from Black girls because the stereotype of Black girls bullying Biracial girls is tiresome.