Examining how African American women interpret their skin tone within their culture

Little is known of how African American women interpret their skin tone within their culture. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to understand in a deeper sense what meaning African American women assigned to their skin tone and how various cultural influences have impacted their interpretations. African American women were recruited from a local church in the area utilizing a snowballing sampling technique. The African American women's skin tone ranged in varying shades from dark skinned to light skinned. The conceptual framework consisted of an all-encompassing philosophy of social constructivism that merged with a theoretical structure of an ecological theory system and cognitive dissonance theory. These systems combined to illuminate African American women's lived experiences and observations about their skin tone. Phenomenology as a research approach obtained comprehensive descriptions of African American women's experiences and what those experiences meant within a social and cultural context. All of the African American women in this study described their experiences in relation to their interpretations about their skin tone. The expectation was for participants to provide a clear and thoughtful narrative of their perceptions about the color of their skin. All 10 participants highlighted the progressive aspects of having a heavy melanic skin tone rather than concentrating on the social stereotype typically associated with people of color. Each interpretation, when discussed, was followed by a positive affirmation. African American women in this study expressed experiences of frustration but generally reported that they have adapted to mainstream society's standing views regarding skin tone through their constant battles and by maturing with society's acceptance over time.