In this article Sofia Samatar presents herself as an academic of colo(u)r. She does not reveal immediately what colour she carries, but a few lines further down the road she reveals she is a Somali American. You may wonder if this geographical designation is an explanation of ‘ academic of colo(u)r’ or a different line of reasoning.

In an academic sense black is not a colour, it is the absence of light. In the experience of everyday black is attached to all kinds of different situations and qualifications.
The same could be said of ‘white’.

So when I read about an academic of colour I get confused.
What colour to think of? Is a mzungu academic in Tanzania an ‘academic of colour’? 
Is every academic an academic of colour (or of no colour)?
Why join the framing an ‘academic of colour’?

Read what Sofia Samatar has to say on this skin topic.