Navigating White Spaces in a Black Body: ‘Weird’ Black Girl Edition

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There’s a moment in every Black child’s life — especially those raised in predominantly white environments — when the world quietly informs them that they are different. It doesn’t always arrive with cruelty or clear malice. Sometimes, it’s subtle. A shift in tone. A double-take. A question that wasn’t asked of anyone else. But once it happens, it’s irreversible. The world tilts, and suddenly, you start seeing yourself through a lens you never chose to look through.

I was not aware that the world would consider me ‘different’ before I started school in the UK. Before attending, my world was simple, warm, familiar, and most importantly, unified. My earliest years were surrounded by individuals who looked like me — at church, at family events, in my neighbourhood. Everyone looked like me. Then, white people were more of an abstract idea than a tangible presence, and in my early life, they happened to be the minority. It was not until I started attending school at the age of four that this narrative took a sharp turn. Suddenly, I was one of the only black children in a sea of white faces.

This new environment caused my then outgoing, bold and charismatic charm to withdraw due to the unsettling sense of otherness, I did not know how to navigate this new setting where I was the anomaly and the cold and…