COLOR INITIATIVE 12 & 13: People with Albinism and Their Place in the Sun

Albinism worldwide

By Clark Boyd ⋅ July 28, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment

"Albinos" in much of sub-Saharan Africa are in danger. People with albinism lack the pigment melanin in their eyes, skin, and hair. It’s a genetic defect, but in much of Africa, it’s also reason for extreme, and deadly, prejudice. Phillip Martin has been reporting for our program on race and color around the world. This is the first of two stories Martin prepared on the growing threat to albinos. As one interviewee told him:

I can tell you that throughout the whole area of Africa, beliefs exist that people with albinism are cursed, that the mother had sex with the white man, that she had sex with a European ghost, that these people are evil, that they’re possessed, that they’re substandard, that the disease is contagious. There’s a host of myths that prevail for hundreds of years for people with albinism in large parts of Africa.

Listen to Part 1:
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To see more photos from Tanzania, click here.

In part two of Phillip Martin’s series on albinism worldwide, he surveys global efforts to show albinos in a more favorable light. Martin interviews Rick Guidotti, a fashion photographer who, in 1999, photographed a young albino woman named Christine (at left) for a Life Magazine photo essay entitled “Redifining Beauty.” Guidotti remembers:

“She walked into my studio with her head down, shoulders hunched, eyes down as well, one word answers, no eye contact. This kid had zero self esteem because of being teased her entire life because of her albinism. So I thought, well I’m going to photograph her in respect to the way I would photograph anyone, Cindy or Claudia. So the lights went on, the music the fan. I grabbed a mirror, and was like, ‘Christine look.’ This kid looked in the mirror, and for the first time, saw a beautiful girl.”

Listen to Part 2:
Download MP3

To see more of Rick Guidotti’s pictures, click here, or visit Rick’s website, Positive Exposure.

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The Color Initiative is funded by the Ford Foundation, with additional resources provided by the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities and the Funding Exchange (Paul Robeson Fund).

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORTS 10 and 11: THE INCREDIBLE WHITENESS OF BEING IN ASIA

THE COLOR INITIATIVE: A TWO-PART REPORT ON SKIN WHITENING IN ASIA: On PRI's The World

**Honored with the 2010 Asian American Journalism Award for RadioMarch 11th, 2009  PART ONE

Skin whitening is a growing industry in China, Japan, and India. For many Asians whitening is part of a long tradition, but these days it's also the result of the powerful influence of white western culture.
http://www.theworld.org/node/25036

March 12th, 2009   PART TWO

However not everyone in Asia wants whiter skins, Phillip Martin tells how many middle class Asians are now moving away from creating white complexions and going for a Western-style tan. http://www.theworld.org/node/25061 THE COLOR INITIATIVE on PRI's The WORLD (the BBC, WGBH and PRI) -- March 11 and 12.

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The Color Initiative is funded by the Ford Foundation

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ON NPR's TELL ME MORE    --PRESIDENT  OBAMA, RACE and DIVERSITY in CHINA

President Obama was in China in November of 2009 where he addressed a range of issues, chief among them, trade. But President Obama's visit was also sparking questions about another issue in the region: race and diversity. NPR's Anthony Kuhn and Public Radio International's Phillip Martin, who have reported on minority issues in Asia, discussed the plight of ethnic minorities in the region and the significance of President Obama's visit.

Listen to the Interview on NPR's Tell Me More

Are You Worthy? It's Time to Question Meritocracy

Rick Santelli's rant on the floor of the Chicago Board of Trade has been repeated ad nauseum on You Tube and cable TV, and the effect lingers. His self-righteous outburst directed at down-on- their-luck foreclosed home buyers amounts to what the late sociologist William Ryan termed "blaming the victim" or more specifically ''justifying inequality by finding defects in the victims of inequality.''
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/phillip-martin/are-you-worthy-its-time-t_b_172277.html

Comments on the Huffington Post site
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CAPTURING HISTORY: Inauguration Day 2009

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORT 9: AFRICANS & AFRICAN AMERICANS

THE COLOR INITIATIVE  -  December 2nd, 2008:

I report for The World (BBC/PRI/WGBH) on how the election of Barack Obama might help bring together two groups that haven't always had a good relationship: African Americans and African immigrants. 

Listen To Report

THE CHANGED MEANING of RED CHINA

China's communist party (5:15)
October 3, 2008 download permalink email
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Tarun Khanna, Harvard Business School professor and author of “Billions of Entrepreneurs”
"You have to ask why the party is expanding its membership so dramatically. And in fact if it was only open to ideologically red then you couldn't possibly have 80 million members of the party. And the answer is ideology has been thrown to the wind and anybody who thinks it to be in their interest to be part of the party and is willing to work for economic development the way the party hire-ups interpret economic development, is welcome to be a member."

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THE COLOR INITIATIVE

The 'Color Initiative'
In the 'Color Initiative' series Phillip Martin examines complex global issues of politics, culture, history and society through the framework of human perceptions and experiences related to color.

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORT 8: PUERTO RICO'S RAINBOW

THE COLOR INITIATIVE - Puerto Rico's RAINBOW

Color identity in Puerto Rico is nuanced. Its large historic mix of African, indigenous and Spanish is why some over the decades have referred to Puerto Ricans as the “rainbow people”. But how do Puerto Ricans see themselves and how wide, diverse and enduring is the rainbow, really? A new report challenges the notion of racial harmony in Puerto Rico. The latest in my series of reports on color around the globe.

Racial attitudes in Puerto Rico (8:30)
August 20, 2008 | download | permalink | email | Yahoo! Buzz

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Color Initiative series
Your comments on this series
http://www.theworld.org/?q=node/20318

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The Color Initiative is funded by the Ford Foundation, with additional resources provided by the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities and the Funding Exchange (Paul Robeson Fund).

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORT 7: BROWN

July 14, 2008

BROWN: What's in an ethnic name? (6:00) PRI's The World

How do Mexican Americans (among other Latinos/Hispanics) see themselves? And why is this significant in the discussion of color, race and the question of what it means to be Latino? The writer Richard Rodriquez sees contemporary Mexican-American identity symbolized by the color "Brown". But while this self-identification may resonate for many Chicanos, how is "brown-ness" viewed by Mexicans on the other side of the border? Reporter Philip Martin explores how Mexican-Americans see themselves today.

http://www.theworld.org/node/19450

LUZ GONZALEZ, dean of the School of Social Sciences, California State University at Fresno:

Mexicans have no clue what we go through in this country to defend our rights. They have no clue. In Mexico they deal with their own issues. See, their issues there are among Indians and themselves and Mesticos. They deal with social status, so you’re not going to get this brownness, cause it doesn’t mean anything to them over there.

A shop keeper named Geraldo says he never hears Mexicans refer to each other as brown – even if he says he's open to the idea.

GERALDO IN MEXICO: The actual word brown says a lot by itself. REPORTER—HAVE YOU EVER THOUGHT ABOUT YOURSELF AS BROWN? Actually, yes, because even though I’m not that brown. I know that I have half-Indian and half Spaniard, the blood running through my veins.
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The Color Initiative is funded by the Ford Foundation, with additional resources provided by the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities and the Funding Exchange (Paul Robeson Fund).

Georgia: The Logical Conclusion of Un-checked Neo-Nazism in Russia

Read my full analysis on The Huffington Post
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/phillip-martin/neo-nazism-in-russia-was_b_119509.html

EVEN THE WEALTHY ARE HAVING WOES

MARKETPLACE RADIO

Thursday, August 14, 2008

Stacey Vanek-Smith: We've heard a lot about people struggling in the current housing market having trouble making ends meet. But what about the monied masses? New York's upper-east side was recently named the most privileged area in the U.S. But even there, concerns about the economy abound. We sent Philip Martin to caviar country to check it out.

AUDIO: http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/08/14/wealthy_woes/

ALSO SEE: http://measureofamerica.org/

TOUGH ECONOMIC TIMES IN FRESNO

***Honored with the 2009 Ruben Salazar Journalism Award http://www.ccnma.org/GenInfoSalazar.htm

Tough Economic Times In Fresno
by Phillip Martin Listen Now

Day to Day, July 21, 2008 · For some people in California's central valley, life resembles scenes from The Grapes of Wrath. A report called "Measure of America" names Fresno, Calif., the least economically developed part of the country. Opportunities to make a decent living can be very hard to find there due to drought and unemployment. As part of our "California Dreamin'" series, Phillip Martin looks at what makes Fresno such a difficult case.

It was 115 degrees when the United Airlines jet landed in Fresno under a brilliant mid-day sun. Once outside the terminal I was greeted by a blast of desert air and a Punjabi taxi driver who explained why he moved to this city of 500,000. Farming. That one word explains why communities representing eighty different ethnic groups have come to call Fresno home. This is America's bread-basket, and it requires all levels of work to get fresh fruits and vegetables from the ground to the marketplace. Farming also helps explain why Fresno County ranks dead last on the American Human Development Index, which measures aggregate health, education, income, longevity and other indicators on a congressional district by district basis.

Photo by Phillip Martin, NPR

Pesticides, air quality and back-bending labor mean that people in Fresno die on average four-and-a-half years earlier than folks at the top end of the index. Farming is seasonal, and when the planting is good, farm workers can scratch out a living--barely. When it's bad--as it is now with a drought that has reduced water output by forty percent--it can be disastrous. I held a tomato in my hand that was as dry as a deflated beach ball.

For 39-year old Felipe Jesus Perez, California has been both a dream, and lately, a six-year continuum of restless nights. He lost his job in the fields in 2003 after his foot and tendons were crushed in a cotton harvester. He gets around the town of Firebaugh in Fresno, County these days with a cane. With a smile on his face he told me he's willing and ready to work.

Felipe Perez: I get my diploma in auto mechanics and I did some applications for different kind of job, but they watch me with a cane and tell me 'let me call you later' and they never call me. And I stay in the same place with the same money, with the workers comp that they're paying me.
Phillip Martin: And you say you're recieving Workman's Compensation? Felipe Perez: Yeah that's right. Phillip Martin: Any other compensation? Felipe Perez: No just that.

Farmworker Felipe Jesus Perez Photo by Phillip Martin, NPR

Felipe joins the ranks of almost 30 percent of the population of the County who are jobless and depend on seasonal agricultural employment.

Before flying West to Fresno I was on the New York City's Upper East Side interviewing residents there about lifestyles, concerns and worries. The economic disparities highlighted in the new American Human Development report were brutally sharp on the ground when comparing this neighborhood to Fresno. Melissa Morris, an amiable and prolific blogger, gave me a tour of her Carnegie Hill neighborhood on the Upper-East-Side, which the American Human Development Index lists as the number one district in the country in terms of human development.

Melissa Morris: Well there's a lot of little fashion boutiques for women. There's a lot of upscale children's clothing boutiques. There are fancy sort of dog grooming salons for my dog, and gourmet food shops. Just being a home cook for many years I know what's in season in terms of fruits and vegetables and I try to buy those.

28 year-old Morris--whose popular blog might best be described as the "lifestyles of the rich and preppy"--lives with her multimillionaire husband Chappy and a miniature Italian greyhound named Monty. If human development is predicated on opportunities and choices to improve one's life, than the upper east side of New York is a showcase of privilege. "The sidewalks are very clean," Melissa explains. "They're kept clean largely by the doormen who will be out there sweeping if there's trash strewn about."

Jose Bermudez has been opening doors at thehigh rise apartment building where Melissa resides for more than 15 years. He says it's no mystery why Upper East Side residents live relatively longer lives than people on the bottom half of the American human development scale: "People are relaxed and down to earth. I guess it's the lifestyle."

A homeless encampment in Fresno Photo by Phillip Martin, NPR

According to the American Human Development Index, half of the residents of Fresno, County earn less than 17 thousand dollars a year. Upper East Side residents on average earn about 116,000 dollars. Many, like the Morris's, bring in much, much more. Melissa and her husband, like many residents of the Upper East Side, also own a large, spacious second home in Connecticut. But money is not the only resource that makes life here so comfortable. There's also easy access to world class museums, well stocked libraries and a sea of other amenities. The gulf between Melissa and Felipe' most pressing worry when I spoke to them is about as wide as the continent that divides them:

"Currently right now I'm worried about my little dog with his broken leg," says Melissa. "This has been an ongoing series of injuries with him and he's very fragile. I love him very much, so I'm worried about him making a full recovery."

For Felipe, the worries are bit different: "I'm worried that I have three kids, my wife and I don't have a job we don't find any kind of job for my wife. She is doing some applications in different kind of jobs and nobody call her."

You can take a more comprehensive look at the American Human Development Index here and here.

--Phillip WD Martin (You can visit Phillip's blog here.)

11:25 AM ET 07-21-2008 permalink

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IN COLOR

THE COLOR INITIATIVE

“The Color Initiative” is an on-going series of reports on PRI's The World (with the BBC/WGBH) that examines complex global issues of politics, culture, history and society through the framework of human perceptions and experiences related to skin color. The project is made possible by a grant from the Ford Foundation and additional funding from the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities and the Funding Exchange.

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORT 6: Whiteness and New Immigration to America

COLOR REPORT SIX: Color and the New Wave of Immigrants--Part 2 of How European Immigrants Became White.
http://www.theworld.org/?q=taxonomy_by_date/1/20080414

April 14, 2008
Immigration and skin color (6:00)
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I report on how recent immigrants to the United States feel about American notions of race and skin color.

Download (mp3)

Between 1881 and 1920 about twenty-four million immigrants from southern and eastern Europe put down roots in the US. In COLOR terms they were regarded as neither black nor white, but as a sort of "IN-BETWEEN” people –who would gradually become white –often after petitioning to the courts. To be white was to be more privileged--in the context of America’s strict racial pecking order. Beginning in the 1970’s a NEW WAVE of olive, tan and beige skinned immigrants arrived to these shores seeking the same opportunities. But color had become far more complex says David Roediger, author of “Working Toward Whiteness”.

Acceptance as fully white for this group of immigrants is VERY open to question: To Islamic immigrants or people who look like they might be of Islamic faith, particularly after 9/11. It’s open to question on the part of Asian immigrants because of the tremendous weight of the history of exclusion in the United States. Similarly but more complicated is the case with Latino immigrants.

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The Color Initiative is funded by the Ford Foundation, with additional resources provided by the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities and the Funding Exchange (Paul Robeson Fund).

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORT 5: Coloring Iraqis

THE COLOR INITIATIVE: On The WORLD-PRI/WGBH/BBC

Color and the US view of Iraq (4:30) http://www.theworld.org/?q=taxonomy_by_date/1/20080321
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Mike Prysner was 21 when he was deployed to northern Iraq in 2003. Prysner said just about every day, for the entire year he was in Iraq, he heard derogatory language being used to describe the Iraqi people; Phrases like……:

" …..Towel head and camel jockey and most disturbing of all, sand nigger. And these words did not initially come from my fellow soldiers but from my platoon leader, my sergeant, my company first sergeant."

An added barrier is Americans’ wholesale ignorance of Islam, says Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban. She teaches the anthropology of race and racism at Rhode Island College and is an advisor to the US military:

"Right after Baghdad had been secured one of my students says they heard in the early morning hours the dawn call to prayer and they thought it was a call to arms and they were at the battle ready –ready to shoot anything that moved. He came back and said how awful he had felt—because he is an African American man—He had stereo-typed people the way that he had been stereo-typed at home."

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The Color Initiative is funded by the Ford Foundation, with additional resources provided by the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities and the Funding Exchange (Paul Robeson Fund).

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORT 4: Malaysia's Ethnic Indians

THE COLOR INITIATIVE: On The WORLD-PRI/WGBH/BBC






March 7, 2008
COLOR REPORT FOUR:Malaysia's ethnic Indians protest (5:00)
http://www.theworld.org/?q=taxonomy_by_date/1/20080307
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Ethnic Indians in Malaysia have long supported that country's ruling party. But not this time around. On the eve of Malaysian elections, ethnic Indians are taking to the streets to protest discrimination. I report from Kuala Lumpur as part of my series on the role of color and culture in shaping national identities.

The Color Initiative is funded by the Ford Foundation, with additional resources provided by the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities and the Funding Exchange (Paul Robeson Fund).

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORT 3: European Immigrants, Whiteness and Why it Matters Today, Part I

COLOR REPORT THREE: My third report in the COLOR INITIATIVE series on The World (BBC/WGBH/PRI) looks at how some European immigrant groups to this country--many whom were originally regarded as NON-white--became white, and the relevance to current immigration concerns. This is part one of two reports on this issue.

(Listen to report on The World by clicking on the link below and scroll down to January 21st story)

http://www.theworld.org/wma.php?id=0121088

I traveled to Chicago's Greektown and also spoke with Iranian, Italian and Brazilian immigrants in putting together these two stories. A key resource for understanding the role of color in America's hierarchical construction is the book:

Working Toward Whiteness: How America's Immigrants Became White: the Strange Journey from Ellis Island to the Suburbs by David R. Roediger, who was also interviewed for this story.

The Color Initiative is funded by the Ford Foundation, with additional resources provided by the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities and the Funding Exchange.

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORT 2: US Race Relations and American Film

THE COLOR INITIATIVE: On The WORLD-PRI/WGBH/BBC

For many people outside the U.S, race is an essential part of what defines America. And it is Hollywood that is helping to supply many of the images. That's the subject of the second in our on-going series on Color around the world-- TODAY on The World. http://www.theworld.org/?q=taxonomy_by_date/1/20071219

The Color Initiative is funded by the Ford Foundation, with additional resources provided by the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities and the Funding Exchange.

COLOR INITIATIVE REPORT 1: "Race as a marketing tool"

THE COLOR INITIATIVE: On The WORLD-PRI/WGBH/BBC
Race as a marketing tool (6:00)
November 8, 2007 | permalink | email | Yahoo! Buzz
Tune into the BBC program The World to listen to the first color report in my year-long Color Initiative series. It's about BENETTON, a European company that champions racial diversity (even as racism escalates across the continent). Learn how Benetton built a global brand on skin color. 

The World - a joint production of WGBH, BBC and PRI - is a daily news program heard on 236 public radio stations across the United States. Check local listings for broadcast times.

MALAYSIA DIARY: Journeying Through a Black Experience Not My Own

THE COLOR INITIATIVE

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READ THIS ARTICLE AND WRITE A COMMENT ON THE HUFFINGTON POST - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/phillip-martin/journeying-through-a-blac_b_89436.html

Traveling on an air-conditioned bus along Malaysia's North-South Highway to Kuala Lumpur can not sensibly be compared to the freedom ride from Selma to Montgomery. But for the dark-skinned man seated near me, it could well have been a similar historic journey. He was a Malaysian activist of Tamil-Indian descent traveling from Johor Bahru to lend political support to five Indian lawyers detained indefinitely without trail under Malaysia's draconian internal security law. The lawyers are leaders of the Hindu Rights Action Force or HINDRAF, which led a demonstration of 20,000 Indians in the capital last November. Two of them, M. Manoharan and S. Pushpaneela, are campaigning for seats in Parliament from their jail cells in next Saturday's general elections (on March 8th). Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's National Front coalition is expected to win hands-down, but with far less Indian support than in 2004 where it received close to 80 percent of Indian votes HINDRAF's real aim is to weaken Badawi's allies in the Malaysian Indian Congress, whom many Tamils say have done little to address racial discrimination leveled at their communities. Indian resentment has been building up for decades over what they see as substandard housing, separate but unequal education, and until it was recently halted, the demolition of half a dozen Hindu temples.

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As a rule, Indians here do not consider themselves "black" in any Westernized racialized sense of the word. But the man on the bus was the color of charcoal. He and his fellow Indians form less than ten percent of the country's twenty-five million people. Chinese make up twenty-four percent. The majority are Malays, who benefit from the New Economic Policy enacted in the 1970's that grants them special preferences in education, housing and civil service employment. The Tamil man on the bus compared Malay dominance to white skin privilege in the United States. That may be overstating the degree to which Malays are favored, but as I traveled from city to city documenting the treatment of Indians I encountered a set of "black experiences" not unlike my own.

Like "your 1963 March on Washington," said Giwi Katharah of the Tamil Foundation, an NGO representing the educational interests of Malaysia's Indians, " the (November 25th) rally woke up a traditionally passive population that's been tolerant too long of their second class citizenship. It gave Tamils a common sense of purpose."

On a former rubber plantation not far from the capital, I walked through a muddy field to speak with a 43-year-old mother named Shantie. Hers, along with fifty other Tamil families, is being evicted from the land harvested by her grandfather and his father before that. The tiny Tamil plantation school is slated to be rebuilt on a plot of land abutting a cemetery. That was the final straw for Shantie, who told me before this happened she had never protested anything. "I never get proper schooling for my children, so I joined demonstrations on November 25th. The tear gas, the water hoses. I can not breathe. If government consider Indian rights than we can see our future."

Another black woman a long time ago told me something along those same lines. One night in Detroit while watching grainy TV images of civil rights activists being bitten by police dogs my mother decided to take part in her first demonstration. She said it was for us -- her children. A few years later our neighborhood went up in smoke with news of Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination. It was a turning point in my young life, as I set out to report on race as a direct consequence of that period.

The worst race riots in Malaysia's history had a similar impact on M. Kulasegaran, an Indian MP from Ipoh. The violence of May 13, 1969 pitted Malays known as Bumiputra or "sons of the soil" against the economically dominant Chinese. Indians for the most part stood on the sidelines. Kulasegaran was picked up by police one day while he was out selling biscuits. When his mother arrived to pluck him from the station he said he saw "powerlessness in her eyes". That was the spark for his life-long obsession with politics, culminating in his election to Parliament thirty years later. Today Kulasegaran is part of the main Indian opposition, which has seen its influence grow since November 25th. "Those days when we would go and speak and get one hundred people is over. Now the minimum that show up to hear us is one thousand to two thousand people."

The now frequent Tamil demonstrations have triggered a backlash from the Malay majority. Government critics and editorial writers for the two major newspapers accuse HINDRAF and its allies of trying to re-ignite the fires of 1969. Tamil leaders in turn have accused the government of fomenting ethnic cleansing. But I have found nothing to suggest the existence of such a policy. Still, the fact that many Indians believe this to be true should be of concern to the Malaysian government, which has worked hard over its 51 years of independence to cultivate a worldwide image of tolerance and racial harmony. That idyllic projection is now threatened by activists who say they will continue to turn out Tamil communities in a show of force. A Tamil academic, Dr. S. Nagarajan , said in the same way that the 1963 march on Washington embarrassed the U.S into enforcing basic constitutional rights, Indians hope to use international media attention to force Malaysia to live up to its creed.

Imprisoned HINDRAF leaders do not have high expectations for next Saturday's Parliamentary elections. But they are looking to build a permanent grassroots opposition to the Malay and Indian political status quo in the form of an organization they call Makkal Sakthi or Peoples Power. Like many African Americans, some even dream of one day having a "black" president. Says MP Kulasegaran, "There is a new civil rights movement here. And I believe some changes can take place. It's like Barack OBama says, "'yes, we can'."

But the wishes of most ordinary Tamils are far more modest. Shantie, for one, says she simply wants well-built schools that are situated no where near cemeteries or any other marker for the dead.