Black

:''This article is about the color black; for other uses, see Black (disambiguation).'' Black is a color with several subtle differences in meaning. ==Color or light== Black can be defined as the visual impression experienced in directions from which no visible light reaches the eye. (This makes a contrast with whiteness, the impression of any combination of colors of light that equally stimulates all three types of color-sensitive visual receptors.) Pigments that absorb light rather than reflect it back to the eye "look black". A black pigment can, however, result from a ''combination'' of several pigments that collectively absorb all colors. If appropriate proportions of three primary pigments are mixed, the result reflects so little light as to be called "black". This provides two superficially opposite but actually complementary descriptions of black. Black is the lack of all colors of light, or an exhaustive combination of multiple colors of pigment. See also Primary colors and Primary pigments. {| style="border:solid 1px black;" |+ † various CMYK combinations !c!!m!!y!!k |- |align=right|0%||align=right|0%||align=right|0%||align=right|100%||align=center|(canonical) |- |align=right|100%||align=right|100%||align=right|100%||align=right|0%||align=center|(ideal inks, subtractive color#limitations) |- |align=right|100%||align=right|100%||align=right|100%||align=right|100%||align=center|(registration black) |} ==Human== The term black is often used in the Western World to denote "race" for persons whose skin color actually ranges from light to dark shades of brown, and overlaps with some people that might be classified as "whites". For a discussion of usage, see the main entry at Blacks. ==Usage, symbolism, colloquial expressions== In the Western world, black is most often used with a negative connotation: * A "black day," in these cultures, would refer to a sad or tragic day. ** e.g. the Black September in Jordan refers to a month in which thousands were killed. **Black Monday, stock crash of October 19, 1987 ** Black Tuesday is the day of the stock market crash in 1929 which is the start of the Great Depression. **Black Wednesday caused Britain to pull out of the ERM. **Black Thursday, date preceding the stock crash of October 29, 1929, forecasting the stock market crash and the Great Depression **Black Friday, various tragic events. * In these cultures, the color black is often used in painting, film, and literature to evoke a sense of the fear or to symbolize death. *In English heraldry, black means darkness, doubt, ignorance, and uncertainty. (The American Girls Handy Book, p. 370) * Black is often a color of mourning. Historically, widows and widowers were expected to wear black for a year after the death of their spouses. * Black comedy is a form of comedy dealing with morbid and serious topics. * Black magic is an evil form of magic, often connected with death. * In computer security, blackhat is an attacker with evil intentions. * A blacklist is a list of undesirable persons or entities. However, black can have positive symbolism. * In the Maasai tribes of Kenya and Tanzania, the color black is associated with rain clouds, becoming a symbol of life and prosperity. * In Western fashion, black is considered reliably stylish. * Many priests of the older religious denominations traditionally wear black. * The colloquialism "the new black" is a reference to the latest trend or fad. * To say one's accounts are "in the black" is used to mean that one is free of debt. ** (being "in the red" is to be in debt—in traditional bookkeeping, negative amounts, like losses, were printed in red ink, and positive amounts, like profits, were printed in black ink.) Black can also be used in many non-judgmental ways. * In arguments, things can be black-and-white, meaning that the issue at hand is dichotomy. * Black frequently symbolizes ambiguity, secrecy, and the unknown. ** A ''black project'' is a secretive project, like Enigma machine, Narcotics, or police sting operations. ** Some organizations are called "black" when they keep a low profile, like Soci�t� Anonyme and secret societies. ** Black propaganda is the use of known falsehoods, partial truths, or masquerades in propaganda to confuse an opponent. * ''Black'' is often used in Western culture to refer to race. For more details, see Blacks. * The term "black hole" is applied to Gravitational collapse stars. This term is metaphorical in the extreme, because few properties of black objects or black voids apply to black holes. However, light emitted within a black hole's event horizon cannot escape, hence a black hole cannot be directly observed. * The national Rugby Union team of New Zealand is called the ''All Blacks'', in reference to their black outfits. * Football (soccer) referee (football) traditionally wear all-black uniforms, however nowadays other uniform colours may also be worn. * In auto racing, a black flag signals a certain driver to go into the pits. * Black is also used for anarchism flags, sometimes splitted in diagonal with other colors for further symbolism. It is also sometimes an anarchist dress code, with a practical benefit of not attracting attention and making later identification of a subject difficult. This strategy referred to as a black block. * In Germany politics 'black' is used colloquially to refer to the conservative parties Christian-Democratic_Union_of_Germany and Christian_Social_Union_in_Bavaria * In ancient China, black is the symbol of ''North'' and ''Water'', one of the main five colors. There is no any negative or positive meaning * Black is the colour of the snooker ball which has a 7-point value, and also the eighth billiard ball. In the game of eight ball, this ball is the ultimate object of the game, but, if accidentally sunk, means instant loss of the game. * A polished black mirror is used for scrying, and is thought to help see into the paranormal world without interference or distraction. * Goths dress predominantly in black. == See also == *List of colors colors scn:Niuru simple:Black vi:Đen (m�u)

Black

==South Africa== Was "Black" an official category in apartheid South Africa? The article says ''It is sometimes used to refer to all non-white people, especially in a political context. This has also been the case in South Africa.'' I think that this is incorrect. I'm sure that some people of colour are or were known as 'coloureds' in that country. :Coloureds in the South African context refers to people of mixed race. Coloured communities in South Africa refer to themselves with that label, and Black South Africans also term themselves "Black". Hence such things as Black Economic Empowerment. So it's an official category even now, and not viewed as being offensive. :Under the classification system used during Apartheid, only members of the Bantu races were classified as black, though officially it may have been "Bantu" in documentation. Those who descended from the Indian subcontinent were referred to as Indian. So Coloured, Black or Bantu, Indian and White were the main areas of classification under Apartheid, though the former three groups were usually classed, as a group, as "non-whites". Nowadays the broad race labels have survived, with the exception of "Bantu". Thus for people to discuss "Blacks", "Whites", "Coloureds" or "Indians" in South Africa is fairly normal and not considered offensive. However, some people prefer to use the term "African" as opposed to "Black". An interesting development in post-Apartheid South Africa, possibly due to things like Black Economic Empowerment, is for Coloured and Indian South Africans to either identify themselves as Black or be identified as Black. Thus affirmative action and BEE are job reservation and empowerment programs for Black African, Indian and Coloured people, despite BEE for instance specifically being called "Black Economic Empowerment". User:Impi 22:05, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC) I also think that the article should refer to the term 'people of colour'. :'people of colour', as a term, is hardly used in South Africa. Don't forget that the offensiveness of many words varies from country to country. Neither "Black" nor "White", "Coloured" or "Indian" are considered offensive in SA. User:Impi 16:42, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC) As one of many millions who were active in the anti-apartheid movement, I just had to simply say how nice it is to see it referred to in the past tense. Such evil! :-D User:Deeceevoice 06:00, 13 Nov 2004 (UTC) ------------- ==Intensity== 'Black' is not generally the total lack of pigment - or have I mis-parsed that sentence? It it intensity == luminous intensity or intensity == print density? User:The Anome I meant lack of intensity, but I will rephrase it so its clearer. Thanks. --Alan D ---- =="White gene pool"== "many so-called "white" Americans are of African descent," Recent mtDNA, Y-Chromosome, and autosomal DNA analysis suggest that African admixture into the White gene pool has occurred at a negligible (<1%) frequency. :Well, technically, ALL humankind is of African descent. User:Deeceevoice 06:08, 13 Nov 2004 (UTC) ---- ==Debt== Isn't being "free of debt" very positive in a non-capitalist societies? == What pigments absorb == I removed this 'graph rather than trying to fix it: :This can be explained as follows: The red pigment, for example, absorbs all light except red light; red light is reflected, and thus our eye sees the pigmented object as red. When many pigments are combined, whatever would have been reflected by one of the pigments is absorbed by the others. Thus no visible light escapes. An accurate replacement might just be too long to be worth the info it conveyed. I'm sure that it would take me too much effort to be worth my creating it today, and the 'graph is wrong enough to be better gone than in the article.
--User:JerzyUser talk:Jerzy 18:06, 2004 Aug 16 (UTC) == Registration black == What is registration black, or 255 255 255 255?? How is it different from 0 0 0 255, which is black in CMYK?? User:66.32.249.176 20:19, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC) :Registration black uses all four CMYK ink colors at full intensity for purposes of processing color seperations. The black color used in most printing is ususally about 50% C 25% M 25% Y 100% K, because 0% C 0% M 0% Y 100% K tends to look "flat". --User:B Touch 04:49, 27 Feb 2005 (UTC) ---- Should I have reverted User:129.59.21.126's edits? I dunno. I feel dumb. User:Evil saltine 04:16, 9 Sep 2004 (UTC) ---- Deleted the UK Usage section, in included: ===United Kingdom usage=== In the United Kingdom, the term "black" refers to the simian-like people from subsaharan africa that probably are the most related to apes. User:PaulinSaudi_04:30,_9_Sep_2004_(UTC)">User:PaulinSaudi 04:30, 9 Sep 2004 (UTC) :Is this meant to be a joke? User:Quill 22:16, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC) :PaulinSaudi, you're a racist idiot. User:Deeceevoice 05:55, 13 Nov 2004 (UTC) ===Other "Black" Populations=== In ancient times, there were/are black aboriginal groups closely resembling Bantu throughout Asia. Presently, the so-called "Black Thai," or Tai Dam, whose facial characteristics and skin color very closely resemble those of the San of the Kalahari, are found in Thailand, Cambodia, parts of India and China. Tamils, in southern India are black -- blacker than many Africans -- and are commonly referred to as "black." And the rest of India is pretty much "black" by U.S. standards (even though most wouldn't admit it! :-p). And then, of course, there are the peoples of Melanesia, in Greek, the "Black Islands": New Guineans, for example. I've no time to add any of this to the main article, but perhaps someone else will. User:Deeceevoice 06:17, 13 Nov 2004 (UTC) == Humans == This should be at Blacks consistent with Whites. It's very badly placed here, especially as it has expanded and continues to expand. I intend to move it, but it will take some time to fix all the links to this page. Help would be appreciated. User:Quill 21:42, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC) ==Structural Change Proposal== There are actually several items in this page which appear to be more appropriate on a disambiguation page: * Black hole * The New Zealand team ''All Blacks'' * The note about soccer referees * The note about the black flag in auto racing * The note about the color of the snooker ball. * The note about the scrying mirror. (As a clarification: I think the discussion of societal uses of the color black are fine here.) Therefore, I propose that this article and the disambiguation page should be restructured as follows: * This page should be moved to ''Black (color)''. Links to the existing ''Black'' article should be reviewed to determine which ones should be pointed to ''Black (color)'', to the disambiguation, or to another article. * The items noted above should be moved to ''Black (disambiguation)'', with the exception that some of the text around black hole should be moved to that article. * That ''Black'' should be changed to a redirect to ''Black (disambiguation)''. Thoughts? User:CoyneT 00:53, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC) :It is OK to move some items to Black (disambiguation); however, there is no need whatsoever to rename the article. Black color is the primary and the most often used meaning of the word "black". — User:Monedula 09:20, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)

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