By Gary Younge
Sunday, October 6, 1996; Page C5

BEFORE I came to America from England three months ago, I asked an American journalist in London what kind of reactions to expect. "Well, when they hear an English accent Americans usually add about 20 points to your IQ. But when they see a black face they usually don't," he said. "You'll be an anomaly."

Recalling that the authors of the book "The Bell Curve" had claimed that black people have an IQ 15 points lower than whites, I was heartened to think that even in the eyes of the most hardened racist I would still come out at least five points ahead.

After three months here I am left wondering whether "anomaly" quite covers the mixture of bemusement, amazement and curiosity I have encountered since I arrived. Often people just think I am showing off. This is especially the case with African Americans. All I have to do is open my mouth and they prime themselves to ask, "Who are you trying to impress with that accent?" They don't actually say anything. Their thoughts are revealed in the downward trajectory of the eyebrows and the curl of the lip.

Once I say I'm English, the eyebrows go back up and the lips uncurl. Now they are in shock. At times I have had to literally give the people I have met here a couple of minutes to compose themselves. "I had no idea," said a white woman near Baton Rouge, La., in a tone my grandmother might use if I came out as a cross-dresser.

Then there was the woman in the bank who called her colleagues over to hear my accent. "Listen to this, listen to this," she said. "Go, say something," she demanded, as though I was a circus marmoset.

Most people here who have not traveled much abroad seem astounded to learn that black people exist outside of America and Africa at all. Their image of England is what they see on television ("Fawlty Towers" and "Upstairs Downstairs") and what they read in the papers (Lady Di and Mad Cow's Disease). Whether that is the image that England wants to sell or the one that America wants to buy is not quite clear – my guess is that it's a mixture of both – but either way it doesn't leave much room for black people.

Once I have told someone I am English they are generally prepared to take me at my word, which is more than can be said about people I meet back home. A typical conversation goes something like this:

"Where are you from?"

"London."

"Well where were you born?"

"London."

"Well, before then?"

"There was no before then!"

"Well, where are your parents from?"

"Barbados."

"Oh, so you're from Barbados."

"No, I'm from London."

Although there have been blacks in Britain for centuries, they only came there in sizable numbers after the second world war. During the 1950s and 1960s they came from Africa and the Caribbean – alongside those from the Indian subcontinent – to do the sorts of jobs that the indigenous white population wasn't eager to do.

My parents came to England from Barbados in the early '60s and I was born there. Like many immigrants they only planned to stay for a few years, work hard, earn some money and then return home. But like many immigrants they ended up staying, starting a family and building a life there. Blacks now make up about 3 percent of the British population.

Britain's sense of national identity is still trying to catch up. But in the meantime questions like "Where are you from?" are often interpreted to mean, "Please tell me you are not from here."

Which is why meeting so many Americans with names like Gugliotta, Biskupic and Shapiro is so refreshing. Almost everybody here is originally from somewhere else. Even the white people. And most people lay claim to another identity – Italian American, Irish American, Hungarian American – which qualifies their American identity but does not necessarily undermine it.

The same is true for black Briton. They are two separate words relating to two very distinct and often conflicting identities. If black people in Britain define themselves as British at all – I was 17 before I would admit it publicly – then they will usually put black in front of it to show that they do not see themselves as fully British and are not always accepted as British. At the NAACP's annual convention, which I recently attended in Charlotte, N.C., there seemed to be only three higher authorities to which the speakers called upon – God, the Constitution and the American flag.

The NAACP may represent the "old school" of African American politics but throughout my time here I have yet to meet an African American who does not place some faith in these common reference points. Britain, in contrast, doesn't have a written constitution, is far less religious, and you wouldn't get a Union Jack (the British flag) within five miles of a political meeting full of black people, regardless of how moderate the organization may be.

This may change in time. But for now the difference seems stark. Black Americans who feel aggrieved can, and often do, look to the symbolism of their national flag as a form of redress. Black Britons see their flag not as a possible solution but as part of the problem.

For Americans, this seems to breed a kind of confidence that allows a more open discussion of race issues than in my country. During my interview for the fellowship at The Washington Post that brought me here, I was asked what problems I faced as a black journalist in Britain. An Englishman would never ask that sort of question. It would be considered ... well, rude.

I was amazed, on a day trip to Harper's Ferry, W. Va., recently, to see an all-white group of cub scouts learning all about how John Brown fought alongside black abolitionists and the legacy of Frederick Douglass. White kids learning about black history on a day out during the summer holidays. At the time I felt like I had died and gone to heaven.

Upon reflection it was much more like purgatory. I know that one of the reasons that Americans discuss race so much is because there is so much to talk about. Both the present – affirmative action, the demise of the inner cities, poverty, church burnings – and the past – civil rights, slavery, segregation – offer no end of subjects that can and should be debated.

Nevertheless, in England, which has similar but nowhere near as acute social problems affecting the black community, race ranks alongside sex, politics and religion as a topic not to be brought up in polite conversation. At my newspaper in London I was once described to someone as "the short, stocky guy with an earring," even though I am one of only half a dozen black journalists in the building.

Here I look local and sound foreign – an object of intrigue in public places. At home I look foreign and sound local – and everybody tries hard not to notice. To say one is better or worse than the other would be too simplistic. The bottom line is that I will soon return to a racism I understand.

But I will miss those extra 20 IQ points for my accent.

Gary Younge, a reporter for the Guardian in London, completed a three-month reporting fellowship at The Washington Post in 1996.