"We have to learn from the history of blackface to understand why it’s wrong to do today... it is unacceptable to portray black people as less than they are." --Ava Losee-Unger
Recently, blackface has been appearing more and more in the media by companies or social media users. Blackface is wrong for many reasons, but many people don’t know why.
Let’s get to the history of blackface. Where does it come from? According to Wikipedia, blackface is a form of theatrical make-up used predominantly by non-black performers to represent a caricature of a black person. The practice gained popularity during the 19th century and contributed to the spread of racial stereotypes.
These racial stereotypes were also brought about by the dehumanization of slaves before 1863 when Abraham Lincoln declared all slaves free. Slave owners believed that, instead of slaves being labored “human” captives, they were just things on farms doing work for their owners. Therefore, their mistakes and personality traits were turned into commercialized hijinks perpetuating a stereotype about the black race for many years to come. Since enslaved black people were forced into unpaid jobs as plantation workers, personal servants, and chefs, many white theatre troupes did blackface as a way to play a black servant on stage without illegally casting one—as if black people would subject themselves to that ridicule just to be mocked and unpaid.
Ralph Northam, the democratic governor of Virginia, is currently under fire for a recently surfaced 1984 medical school yearbook picture of the governor standing with a man in a KKK (Ku Klux Klan) costume while he wears blackface. Mr. Elwood, a doctor at the school, said he did not recall laying out Mr. Northam’s page, but he did recall the yearbook including a picture of three men dressed in wigs, dresses and blackface, pretending to be The Supremes. It did not offend him and he did not think twice about whether the photo should have been in the yearbook.
This response ties into the “it was years ago” approach to a controversial topic in someone’s past, claiming that since the incident in question happened before they knew much about it, they should some sort of a free pass. This is wrong. Blackface has and always will be unacceptable, even in the 80’s and before. Why does it happen?
“Painting oneself hearkened back to traditional popular celebrations and to paint oneself as a Black person, given American realities at the time, was to throw reason to the winds,” historian David Roediger wrote in his 1991 book, The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class. When slaves fought for their rights, white slave owners and white supremacists couldn’t help but try to lower the commotion of these activists by making fun of them. He notes later that blackface was a form that “implicitly rested on the idea that Black culture and Black people existed only insofar as they were edifying for whites and that claims to ‘authentic’ blackness could be put on and washed off at will.”
According an article entitled “Blackface is the Tip of the Iceberg” by Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times, blackface is so thoroughly associated with the worst of American racism that we should expect immediate condemnation of politicians and public figures who have any association with it—even if it’s a decades-old offense. In a video called “Unmasking the Racist History of Blackface” from CBS News’ Sunday Morning, Eric Lott, a professor at the graduate center at the City University of New York, says that “blackface represents a strange mix of envy, fascination, desire and fear… [White groups] are afraid of black groups, mobs, rising up and taking the power.”
Recently, brands like Gucci and Prada have come out with clothing items that included black face. A Prada store in Manhattan’s Soho shopping district displayed and sold black monkey-like figures with large red glass lips standing in their merchandise window. Gucci released a black turtleneck intended to go over the mouth with an opening for lips, and many were outraged to see the large red fabric lips around the slit for the user’s mouth. Katy Perry, as of Monday, had released shoes in nude skin colors with eyes, lips, and mouths. Unfortunately, the nude colors were more than dramatized when instead of a normal, accurately colored nude shoe, a dark, mocking black color was used for the shoes. (See bottom of article for pictures.)
Many instagram accounts have posted pictures of selfies and videos of themselves with black makeup while they are nonblack. Pictures that included dirt thrown on the face with the hashtag “#slave” and full face makeup looks with dark foundation above captions like “Today I decided to turn myself into an African-American, at least I tried it!!” These posts are disrespectful and blatant blackface. Instagram has a large variety of insensitive accounts and posts under unacceptable hashtags, and even when reported, these posts keep coming back.
We have to learn from the history of blackface to understand why it’s wrong to do today. Even if blackface is portrayed by a glass figure, shoe or turtleneck, it is unacceptable to portray black people as less than they are by mocking the color of the skin or exaggerating their personality traits to fit a cartoon stereotype. Unity in all races and genders is crucial to a functioning society and should be accepted everywhere.
Let’s get to the history of blackface. Where does it come from? According to Wikipedia, blackface is a form of theatrical make-up used predominantly by non-black performers to represent a caricature of a black person. The practice gained popularity during the 19th century and contributed to the spread of racial stereotypes.
These racial stereotypes were also brought about by the dehumanization of slaves before 1863 when Abraham Lincoln declared all slaves free. Slave owners believed that, instead of slaves being labored “human” captives, they were just things on farms doing work for their owners. Therefore, their mistakes and personality traits were turned into commercialized hijinks perpetuating a stereotype about the black race for many years to come. Since enslaved black people were forced into unpaid jobs as plantation workers, personal servants, and chefs, many white theatre troupes did blackface as a way to play a black servant on stage without illegally casting one—as if black people would subject themselves to that ridicule just to be mocked and unpaid.
Ralph Northam, the democratic governor of Virginia, is currently under fire for a recently surfaced 1984 medical school yearbook picture of the governor standing with a man in a KKK (Ku Klux Klan) costume while he wears blackface. Mr. Elwood, a doctor at the school, said he did not recall laying out Mr. Northam’s page, but he did recall the yearbook including a picture of three men dressed in wigs, dresses and blackface, pretending to be The Supremes. It did not offend him and he did not think twice about whether the photo should have been in the yearbook.
This response ties into the “it was years ago” approach to a controversial topic in someone’s past, claiming that since the incident in question happened before they knew much about it, they should some sort of a free pass. This is wrong. Blackface has and always will be unacceptable, even in the 80’s and before. Why does it happen?
“Painting oneself hearkened back to traditional popular celebrations and to paint oneself as a Black person, given American realities at the time, was to throw reason to the winds,” historian David Roediger wrote in his 1991 book, The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class. When slaves fought for their rights, white slave owners and white supremacists couldn’t help but try to lower the commotion of these activists by making fun of them. He notes later that blackface was a form that “implicitly rested on the idea that Black culture and Black people existed only insofar as they were edifying for whites and that claims to ‘authentic’ blackness could be put on and washed off at will.”
According an article entitled “Blackface is the Tip of the Iceberg” by Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times, blackface is so thoroughly associated with the worst of American racism that we should expect immediate condemnation of politicians and public figures who have any association with it—even if it’s a decades-old offense. In a video called “Unmasking the Racist History of Blackface” from CBS News’ Sunday Morning, Eric Lott, a professor at the graduate center at the City University of New York, says that “blackface represents a strange mix of envy, fascination, desire and fear… [White groups] are afraid of black groups, mobs, rising up and taking the power.”
Recently, brands like Gucci and Prada have come out with clothing items that included black face. A Prada store in Manhattan’s Soho shopping district displayed and sold black monkey-like figures with large red glass lips standing in their merchandise window. Gucci released a black turtleneck intended to go over the mouth with an opening for lips, and many were outraged to see the large red fabric lips around the slit for the user’s mouth. Katy Perry, as of Monday, had released shoes in nude skin colors with eyes, lips, and mouths. Unfortunately, the nude colors were more than dramatized when instead of a normal, accurately colored nude shoe, a dark, mocking black color was used for the shoes. (See bottom of article for pictures.)
Many instagram accounts have posted pictures of selfies and videos of themselves with black makeup while they are nonblack. Pictures that included dirt thrown on the face with the hashtag “#slave” and full face makeup looks with dark foundation above captions like “Today I decided to turn myself into an African-American, at least I tried it!!” These posts are disrespectful and blatant blackface. Instagram has a large variety of insensitive accounts and posts under unacceptable hashtags, and even when reported, these posts keep coming back.
We have to learn from the history of blackface to understand why it’s wrong to do today. Even if blackface is portrayed by a glass figure, shoe or turtleneck, it is unacceptable to portray black people as less than they are by mocking the color of the skin or exaggerating their personality traits to fit a cartoon stereotype. Unity in all races and genders is crucial to a functioning society and should be accepted everywhere.
