“How it Feels to Be Colored Me” is an essay by Zora Neale Hurston originally published in the 1928 edition of The World Tomorrow.  She explores her unique experience with race in her customary wry, forthright manner.

Zora makes clear that she speaks only for herself,  as the tone of this essay doesn’t necessarily reflect the more proudly propagandist Black writing that characterized the 1920s New Negro movement (also known as the Harlem Renaissance.

Yet she clearly critiques the rampant segregation and bias that were woven into the fabric of American life, North and South. Following is the full text of “How it Feels to Be Colored Me,” now in the public domain. The only alteration to the text has been to break up long paragraphs, for easier readability on devices. Read More→