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Abstract

In recent years academic scholarship and the public imagination has focused on the love lives (or lack thereof) of black women. In response and reaction to the recent so-called black love epidemic I interrogate claims about black women's failure at love and critique the ways that black women are often blamed for their cultural positionality. Framing my personal story with Toni Morrison's fictional character Pecola Breedlove, I discuss the role of sexism and colorism in the context of heterosexual love narratives. I use autoethnography, references to popular culture, and interdisciplinary scholarship to discuss my personal journey of identity, identification, and transformation as an unmarried dark-skinned woman.

Keywords

Black women autoethnography heterosexual love narratives colorism The Bluest Eye

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Dark-Skinned Love Stories

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