I Can See Me, an initiative of Black Albinism ↩ Return to blackalbinism.org
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I Can See Me

A child who has never seen someone like themselves in a story learns, quietly, that the story is not about them. We are changing what is on the page.

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The hook

Ask a child with albinism to draw themselves as a hero, and watch what colour pencil they reach for.

Most of them will not draw themselves at all. They will draw someone else, the person they have seen on a poster, in a schoolbook, on television. Not because they lack imagination, but because nobody has ever shown them a version of the story where they are the one who matters.

i.

A story is a mirror

Children work out what is possible for them by looking at who gets to be the main character. When the mirror is always empty, they stop looking into it.

ii.

A story is also a window

The classmate who reads a book about a child with albinism stops staring and starts talking. The same page does two jobs at once.

iii.

A story is cheap and it lasts

A book costs less than a campaign, stays in a classroom for years, and is read by children we will never meet.

Give it forward

Somebody's story got you here. Pass it on.

Fund a book set for a school. Sponsor a mentor pairing. Or tell your own story and let it do the work for the next child.

Closing

Every child deserves to look at a page and think: that is me.

That is the whole project. Everything else, the books, the schools, the mentors, the funding, is logistics.

Be part of it