Using Qualitative Interpretive Meta-Synthesis to Explore Colorist Privilege

This Qualitative Interpretive Meta-Synthesis (QIMS) method is used to highlight the sociological concept of colorist privilege, which characteristics of White privilege and colorism intersect to influence biopsychosocial outcomes on the African American population. Colorist privilege is first theoretically defined in this paper, then demonstrated within the synthesized studies to capture the experiences of colorist privilege among 155 African American participants utilizing secondary data. Three themes emerged from the essence of the lived experiences of participants that illustrate the mechanisms through which colorist privilege exists among both inter-racial and intra-racial relationships for African American people. Implications for education, teaching, and research regarding African Americans are discussed.