3. Author’s Introduction
• Frantz Omar Fanon born in
July 20, 1925 and in
December 6, 1961.
• He was West Indian Psycho
Analyst and Social
Philosopher known for his
theory.
• He was a part of ‘Negritude
Movement’ too.
4. His major works
• Black Skin, White Masks (1952)
• A Dying Colonialism
• The Wretched of the Earth
• Towards the African Revolution
5. About The Book-‘Black Skin, White Masks’
• Is a significant work by Fanon
• His doctoral thesis for getting degree in
psychiatry.
• Left its tremendous effects upon post- colonial
minds
• It speaks about mindset or psychology of
racism and racists
6. • This book looks at what goes through the
minds of blacks and whites under the
condition of white rule and the strange effects
especially on black people.
7. • White men’s belief
• “We are the chosen people- look at the color
of our skins, the others are black or yellow:
that is because of their sins.”
New Testament
8. The Idea of ‘Language’
• ‘The Black Man and The Language’ suggests
that if you do not learn white man’s language
perfectly, you are unintelligent. Yet if you do
learn it perfectly, you have washed your brain
in their universe of racist idea.
• “You speak such a perfect French!”
9. Example from ‘A Tempest’
• Caliban: Uhuru!
• Prospero: What did you say?
• Caliban: I said, Uhuru! (in Swahili it refers to
‘Freedom’)
• Prospero: Mumbling your native language
again! I have already told you, I don’t like it.
You could be polite, at least; a simple “hello”
wouldn’t kill you.
10. • “ To speak a language is to take on a world, a
culture. The Antilles Negro who wants to be
white will be the whiter as he gains greater
mastery of the culture tool that language is…”
- Fanon
11. Caliban as a ‘rival voice’
• Prospero: Since you’re so fond of invective,
you could at least thank me for having taught
you to speak at all. You, a savage …..a dumb
animal, a beast I educated, trained, dragged
up from the bestiality that still clings to you”
(superiority complex)
12. • Caliban: In the first place, that’s not true. You
didn’t teach me a thing! Except to jabber In
your language so that I could understand your
orders: chop the wood, wash the dishes, fish
for food, plant vegetables, all because you’re
too lazy to it yourself. And as far your learning,
did you impart any of that to me? No, you
took care no to. All your science you keep for
yourself alone, shut up in those big books.”
- Cesaire’s ‘A Tempest’.
13. Craving for having a white tone Skin
• ‘The Woman of colour and the White Man’
present the psyche of black woman to marry a
white man. Black woman wants white man
not because of love but they want them for
their own hang-ups about race. It is her secret
desire to be white and marrying white is
fulfillment of her desire.
• Exp, Pauline Breedlove- ‘The Bluest Eye’- Tony
Morrison
14. • “All I know is that he had blue eyes, blond hair,
and light skin and that I loved him.” –Fanon
• Pecola Breedlove- ‘The Bluest Eye’- Tony
Morrison
15. Both The Complexes
• “The Negro enslaved by his inferiority, the
white man enslaved by his superiority alike
behaves in accordance with a neurotic
orientation.” – Fanon
• Superiority complex in Whites
• Inferiority complex in Blacks
• Results- ‘Dependency Complex of the
Colonized’= Identity Crisis = ‘Nothingness of
the Personality’
16. ‘The Black Man and Psychopathology’
• Why white people are so afraid of black men?
– Black men are seen as being way less moral.
– White men fear they will take white woman from
them.
17. Hidden Psyche of ‘Whites’
• “Blacks are good in Bed.”
• They are having bigger penises and once their
women (white women) will sleeps with them
she will never want a white man again.
18. Why White Women too afraid of a Black
men?
• Fanon see it for himself when he fought in
Europe in the Second World War.
• White women shrink back in fear if he asked
them for a dance
• Fear of being harmed by them
• Their physical appearance and capacity
• “Black men are seen as little better than
animals.”
19. For basic understanding
White men’s racial mindsets
• Whiteman can have relation with Brown,
Mulatto
• Blackman cannot have relation with Mulatto or
White
• White woman cannot have relation with Mulatto
or Black or Brown
• Brown or Black woman cannot have relations
with Mulatto or Whiteman
20. Continuing…
• Mulatto woman cannot have relation with
Black or Brown man, Excepting Whiteman or
Mulatto man
• Mulatto man cannot have relation with Black
or Brown woman, Excepting White woman or
Mulatto woman
(Lectures by Balaji Rangnathan Sir)
21. Summing up…
• At last he concludes by saying that he wants to
be a black man, he wants to be a man , plain
and simple man.
• He says further that the problem with blacks
and whites is that both have become
prisoners of their pasts: both have to move
away from the inhuman voices of their
respective ancestors so that a genuine
communication can be born.
22. Few Quotes
• “The white man is sealed in his whiteness, The
black man in his blackness.”
• “I should have liked to be married, but to a
white man. But, a woman of color is never
altogether respectable in a white man’s eyes,
even when he loves her. I knew that!”
• “One is white as one is rich, as one is
beautiful, as one is intelligent.”
23. Few Contemporary Examples
“Hoe ‘Racism’ conducts minds in U.S.A”
• “In my Florida
hometown, there
is a train track that
splits the town
into two colors.”
-Chris Arnade
24. • It is discovered that potential employers were
more likely to hire a white man with a
criminal background than a black man with a
clean record, given the same level of
education. Racism is just so ingrained in
many people's minds.
25. • The best example is Milwaukee, a city where
black women are 9.6% of the population, but
30% of those evicted.
26. • Since New York City implemented stop and
frisk policies in 2002, over 53% of all those
searched were black and around 30% were
Latino. Only around 10% were white.
27. • sometimes, they face stricter punishments for
lighter crimes, as can be seen from these two
headlines. According to the Supreme Court's
Sentencing Commission's findings, black men
receive 20% longer prison sentences than
white men for committing the same crime.
28. • Media presentation
• Stereotype- beautiful white lady and angry black
woman
• The same can be seen like black woman portrayed
as thug while a white woman portrayed as a
murderous and ‘mentally unstable’
