Racism In Titus Andronicus

The issue of race is one filled with controversy and passion, even today in the twenty-first centaury. In today’s day and age it is more shuttle and underground then it was in its most recent ‘hay-day’. In our time today we see it as more of a shameful, offensive and intolerant thing, but it was the norm in the early 15th and 16th century. Today those people that are outwardly racist are seen as outcasts. In this essay I will tempt to show how even though it was the norm in Victorian England, Shakespeare already had another mind set, and was trying in this creative way that the mind set of the people was not correct even for that time. How and why did Shakespeare purposely portray Othello the Moor as a tragic hero, like Hamlet or King

These different types of prejudices ranged from poverty-stricken, to opposing religious beliefs, to different skin-toned individuals. Shakespeare often makes references to these characters as the ‘other’ in his plays. The ‘other’ in Shakespeare’s works is often the character(s) that are divergent from the other characters in the play. We can easily categorize this as a form of racism because the characters that are native civilians in the plays are badgering on the ‘other’ character(s) in the play. In his play Titus Andronicus, Shakespeare uses the male character Aaron the Moor to represent the ‘other.’

If a black woman had dark skin she would resemble a man, therefore making her ugly in society’s standards. This pressures black women to constantly be "compatible with the white female standard of beauty" (Ashe 580) in order to be socially accepted in society. Intuitively black women understood that in order to be considered desirable, the less black they had to look. This unfortunate perception of beauty stems from a long pattern of "sociohistorical racial injustices" (Bealer 312) towards darker skinned African Americans. Maria Racine states in her review that since slavery black people who approximated closer to whites were sexually sought after by black slave men and white plantation owners and were considered to live a somewhat "easy coexistence" because of their appearance (Racine 283). Since it’s start, colorism laid the pathway of racial prejudice towards dark skinned individuals. The result of treating dark African Americans as subhuman beings led to the altering of the black psyche by creating a "pervasive hierarchy" of beauty that black woman constantly combated or were forced to accept. (Bealer 312).

        It may appear that anything could be twisted into a typological pattern. Such interpretations appear to suffer from the structuralist faults of skating too lightly over actual texts, ignoring details that cannot be forced into a preconceived mold, and robbing narratives of their concrete shapes through abstraction. I would stress that there is more to Shakespeare than typology, but I would also insist that typology is often an important part of his drama. To make this claim plausible, however, requires more detailed attention to the text of his plays. In what follows, I will call attention to the textual and dramatic details that justify a typological reading of

Back in the early 1800’s, the color of one’s skin mattered amongst African Americans and Caucasian people. There was infidelity between the Caucasian slave owners and the African American slaves. Of course, the outcome of that produced a fairer toned child. In most cases the child could pass as white. The mixed toned kids got to be inside doing housework, while the dark Negroes worked in the fields, under extraneous work conditions,”their dark-toned peers toiled in the fields”(Maxwell). From the early 1800’s to modern day, there is controversy that light or bi-racial African Americans are better than dark colored African Americans. African Americans had to go through tests to see if they were able to receive priviledges

Red is also a color to symbolize blood and that the handmaids still get their period and hope to have it miss on one month in hopes that they are pregnant. Although not all the girls are handmaids there are also different classes such as wives and Martha’s. Each that is classified wears a different color. The wives blue and the Martha’s green. The reason why the wives wear blue is because then other people can notice that they are a wife of a certain commander.

When the reader begins reading the novel, they are able to see how the protagonist Mare is shaped by her cultural surroundings. One night she sneaks out of the palace with Cal to go see her family. When she sees her family again, they question whether she has forgotten who she is. As Mare is being questioned by her family she argued," Give me a knife and I'll settle this right now." Then she adds," I'll show you what color I bleed," (pg. 159). Mare is proving to them that being forced to be a silver princess isn't making her forget who she really is. She knows she is raised Red and she is not going to let anything change that.

In A Red Record, written by Ida B. Wells-Barnett, the issue of chivalry and virtue is presented to the reader. In this specific case, the author is speaking of virtue in the sense of purity. “ Virtue knows no color line, and the chivalry which depends upon complexion of skin and texture of hair can command no honest respect.” (674) Virtue or the idea that women in that time should be women of virtue, or purity, had no boundary between white and black women. It was something that was required and expected of a woman no matter what her station, color, or occupation. The issue with that standard is the fact that white men at that time only had a sense of chivalry when it came to white women. The evidence was “ . . . written in the faces of the million mulattoes in the South . . .”. (674) The idea that a woman was a display of purity was not a concept that was

Mathee uses skin colors in positive and negative connotation throughout the book with certain characters, like the magistrate. “At the beginning you will find it strange to be back amongst your own people but you will soon get used to it. I am very disappointed, though, that no one reported that you were there with the colored people in the Long Kloof.” Mathee shows how the magistrate speaks so poorly of Fiela and her family by referencing to them as colored and assuming that Benjamin wasn’t well taken care of and that black people aren’t capable of having nice lives so he’ll have to adjust to being among white people but, as we see later on in the boo, Mathee contradicts this stereotype by having the komoeties be a white family that struggles to have money to the point where all the kids work so they can make more product and get more money but, on the other hand Fiela works yet, is doing well providing for her family. Another occasion is when fiela is speaking to Mater Petrus about his visit with the magistrate. “You know why not, Fiela. He’s white.” In this we see again how master Petrus uses white in a positive way like superiority. Mathee uses Master Petrus to break this news because Master Petrus is a character that mathee uses to once again break that barrier of prejudice and stereotype by having him respect Fiela and treat her fairly as she treats him even though

William Shakespeare’s exaggeration of

He turns against his friend, Othello, and labels him as a lesser person because of his race. Iago's easy provocation of an important Venetian senator by using Othello's racial characteristics shows how prevalent racism is in the play.

In literature, the color red symbolizes many things, each with its own emotional impact. Red can be associated with violence and bloodshed, or it can be associated with love and intense emotions. In The Handmaid’s Tale, Offred, chosen to be a “baby-maker” for a couple she was assigned to, desires to escape the dystopian society that she lives in. Thus, Margaret creates a fictional government that uses totalitarianism, violence, and the reoccurring pattern of the color red to illustrate the negative impact it has on women, especially the Handmaids.

Modern day society hinders racial diversity, even if it doesn’t quite seem like it. Generations today are more open to ethnic assortment, but yet still are stuck to racial stereotypes. Everyone who is racially diverse is quietly but surely judged based on their different dialect and skin color. Many people today undermine any other race, making their opinions based off of stereotypical theories. Society today obtains high standards of unity. When something is different from the normal, it threatens the unity. This threat often produces fear, leading to the attempt to push out the diversity from the united culture. This judgement also affects the racially diverse, making them of a timorous and cautious nature. The act of being singled out creates a self confidence decline, pushing doubt and insecurity into the mind of the divergent. In result of these racial insecurities, the planting of uncertainty in the mind of Othello was simply facilitated. Through a racial lense, Shakespeare conveys the quintessence of racism through his vivid racial insecurity and the manner in which Iago and other characters speak about the different race of Othello. This is showcased by the vulnerability Othello presented when confronted with doubt. Connecting to modern society, many people still judge on race, creating a barrier of insecurity between the racially different and conventional

Shakespeare expresses the racial prejudice that is evident in his period through the characters of Iago, Roderigo and Brabantio. The

He uses many terms that are unusual in our time as well as countless examples of figurative language. Shakespeare uses blank verse, oxymorons, and strong vocabulary in order to give insight and meaning to the written word..