Are dark-skinned girls often pushed into womanhood before they are allowed to experience girlhood? And is tomboyism more common among dark-skinned girls as a response to these expectations? These questions reflect a reality many have quietly felt for much of their lives. Dark-skinned women are known for facing skin-tone penalties in several markets, including the markets of marriage, beauty, and femininity. Skin-tone penalties, as discussed by the National Bureau of Economic Research, don’t stop at physicality as dark-skinned, African-American children face a higher risk of school suspension and, as men, are more likely to be found guilty in court (Abramitzky et al., 2023, p. 15). Skin-tone penalties often manifest as unexplainable microaggressions or a dismissive glare that is difficult to justify or explain. It’s important to know that though these penalties are socially created, the burden of their weight falls largely on dark-skinned women and children. This burden shapes how dark-skinned girls move through their childhood, sometimes encouraging tomboyism and pushing womanhood before they have fully experienced girlhood.
The American Psychological Association conducted a qualitative study examining the influence of colorism on Black girls’ psychological and sexual development. The journal concluded that, “Black girls reported that they receive messages painting dark-skinned girls as aggressive, hostile, undesirable, and strong while painting light-skinned girls as desirable and acceptable due to their racial ambiguity and proximity to white physical features.” This bias contributes to the lack of self-esteem that most dark-skinned girls generally face. The journal also finds that many dark-skinned girls who report average or high self-esteem often develop it through strong support from their families, who actively counteract the negative effects of colorism. The benefit of familial support, unfortunately, does not spread widely because of how internalized and perpetuated colorist stigmas are in the Black and African communities. Colorist beliefs, internalized early on by young girls and boys, influence the developmental trajectories by influencing self-esteem and perceptions of worth, which often carry into adulthood.
Adultification bias also plays a central role in this process, as it frames Black girls as older than their actual age and consequently less in need of protection and care. Dark-skinned girls face the brunt of this bias, often being perceived through an aligning lens of hypersexualized stereotypes historically imposed on Black women, like the “Fast girl” or the Jezebel. This sexualized lens can lead to premature exposure to sexualization and an early, imposed awareness of sexuality that disrupts the natural course of childhood development.
A Refinery article takes it a step further to dissect the erasure of dark-skinned teen actresses from Hollywood. The article discusses the reboot of Gossip Girl and popular Netflix shows namely: Ginny and Georgia, Never Have I Ever, and Outer Banks. Author Kahleen Newman-Bremang expresses that if a darker-skinned actor is casted they are hardly ever in desirable roles and, if at all, the actors in desirable roles are darker skinned men and boys. Kathleen goes on to say that, “the erasure of dark Black femininity is an insidious way the lie that lightness links to soft, delicateness and that darkness is akin to all the things society pegs to masculinity — strength, aggression, cockiness — continues to spread. It is true that representation in itself is worth more than no representation at all; however, what kind of rhetoric does Hollywood perpetuate when it repeatedly prioritizes casting light-skinned actresses while failing to introduce meaningful roles for dark-skinned actresses who represent the other half of the shade spectrum in the Black community?
Summing up harmful colorist rhetoric being internalized at young ages, the adultification of Black girls, but especially darkskinned girls, and a lack of shade representation in the media, it’s understood that these factors do not operate in isolation and collectively shape how dark-skinned girls and boys experience childhood. In the context of dark-skinned women and girls, tomboyism and premature entry into womanhood may emerge not as inherent traits, but as adaptive responses to often contradictory expectations. For dark-skinned girls, these expectations are contradictory in that they are simultaneously perceived as more mature and less in need of protection, while also being denied access to traditional markers of femininity and softness. Notably, it’s important to highlight the confusion this contradiction brings to developing girls and how it affects their sense of self-perspection, worth, and public identity. Dark-skinned girls are often pushed into feeling that they must either perform a form of early womanhood or adopt a tomboy identity, rather than being allowed a straight and all-accepting passage into girlhood. This analysis serves as one part of a broader effort to understand how structural and cultural forces shape identity among dark-skinned girls, particularly the factors that limit them to a narrow set of archetypes.
Delivered by Fatoumata Traore
