Reframing Blackness

Many years ago, I wrote a piece about my problems with Blackness being an identifier. I have been thinking about it again recently, especially within the context of professional development and progression for those of African and Caribbean heritage.

This may sound ironic, given I am the co-founder of a company called Black Founders Hub, a judge for the Black Talent Awards and a big supporter of causes and development programmes for those defined as Black. But I’ve realised that my discomfort centres around the fact that this labelling has come from outside the community that adopts it so freely.

This homogenous term Black is rooted in Whiteness. It is an othering term. It is applied to those with a pantone south of olive who have heritage in the African and Caribbean diaspora. It is the only other group in the racial pantheon (other than White) that is referred to by colour. In contrast, everyone else gets defined first by region.

I was raised in a Pan-African tradition. We celebrated men and women who were active in getting representation across the diaspora around healthcare, governance, education and enterprise. Steeped in the ideologies rooted in displaced African identity I learned so much from those who pushed back against colonialism and its systems of thinking. It also opened a window for me on the influences of Sino and Indo activism and impact in the shaping and stories of culture. I say all this to say that, as a result, I feel more alignment with being Caribbean than this generic grouping of being Black.

To be clear, I feel no shame in being identified as Black. My issue is more in the danger of this collective labelling missing out on nuance.

Let me take Notting Hill Carnival, for example. Many people in the Black community in the UK have no idea of the broader context of Europe’s largest street festival: The history of rebellion in song, dance, story and costume that started as Canboulay and is continued today in J’Ouvert, Panorama, floats and sounds. People misunderstand the backstory of Dame Lorraine, Moko Jumbie and Jab Jab - which often results in just an excuse for people to dress up, drink too much rum and catch a whine. A festival which has been repeatedly threatened with closure in a now gentrified area has its roots and format still as a reminder of pushback against colonialism. It remains one of the few festivals celebrating Black culture in the UK, primarily through a Caribbean lens. One that is repeated across the country and is equally misunderstood.

There have been and continue to be schisms in the Black British community. The narratives of the first large migrations from the Caribbean, aka The Windrush Generation, and the subsequent West African and broader African movements from East, Central and Southern Africa opened up a whole new dialogue about being Black. Indeed, most who came here did not know they were ‘Black’ until they landed here. Having to fill in migration or census forms was the first time many were identified by anything other than country or ethnicity.

We see these fractures from a young age. Whether in our church services which are divided mainly along those country or ethnic lines, or in the well-intentioned but often poorly managed African and Caribbean Societies in higher education. This also presents a challenge in professional settings.

There are few Black leaders or groups of senior figures in business, government or social spaces. It leaves many of us questioning expectations and solidarity as to how we address not only this shortfall but the development of talent to bridge that gap.

I for one have been outspoken on the need to expand the narrative beyond the singular Black senior voice in those spaces. Desperate to move the conversation beyond awards, power lists and honours to something wider and deeper. Working both behind the scenes and in partnership with some large organisations in the private and public sector to address this void. Recognising that organisations that are incredibly diverse and colourful at recruiting early careeer Black talent into their ranks, end up losing them soon after, or struggle with understanding why they feel uncomfortable navigating spaces where they have been told they belong.

A large part of this pushback comes not from White or other ethnic groups (although there is plenty of that) but from within the "Black" groupings. Many will point to their journey of working hard to get where they are, refusing to play “the victim” (a whole other post). But they are oblivious that even if they choose not to wear such a badge, they are role models to a generation of Black professionals who see possibility through their journey and would love to learn how to navigate such spaces.

And so we come back to reframing this notion of Blackness.

What exactly is it?

Whether you are Black, Black Mixed or whatever other identifier forms and censuses present us with, we must understand its meaning because even if we don’t want to define ourselves as Black, specific outcomes related to this large grouping affect us as a whole. Be it education, healthcare, the justice system, advertising and media, recruitment or access to finance. Blackness has a penalty. And even those of us who are fortunate by means of postcode, higher education or network to circumnavigate some of the more negative aspects associated with Blackness in wider British society, we are the exception and not the rule.

I will be honest and say I have no clear answers here. Even if the identity narrative was to change to focus on, say, that direct link to Africa or the Caribbean, for a generation born and bred here (the UK), they still have no place to call home. Black British is the catchall. It is not only a different framing than our parents or grandparents, but also very different than experiences of the same groupings on mainland Europe, North America, South America or other locations where being Black is about survival.

I return to the point I started with: my discomfort with the term Blackness is that Whiteness shapes it. The aspirational racial identifier that so many others want to be or be in proximity to. Black and Proud. Black Lives Matter. Black Liberation Theology. Black Employment Resource Groups. They are all still rejoinders and pushbacks to Whiteness and hardly ever platforms to stand on by themselves. Surely there is a way to honour and celebrate our shared heritages, world views, and differences without just being Black when those of African and Caribbean heritage deserve a more complex classification than jut this?

Again, I have no answers here. Just thinking out loud. Compassionately provoking a different view.