The History Of Minstrel Shows Took America By Storm

The black stereotypes in Spike Lee’s film “Bamboozled” are very evident in the main characters in the minstrel show, Mantan and Sleep n’ Eat. For the show, Mantan and Sleep n’ Eat are depicted as lazy, unintelligent, and foolish. Their stereotyping is intentionally obvious to shock and shame the viewers of the show using satire. In addition to the obvious stereotypes in the television show, Lee uses the other character in the film to showcase other stereotypes. Lee uses the characters: Pierre Delacroix, Thomas Dunwitty, Sloan Hopkins, and Big Black Africa and his group as additional, slightly less obvious views of black stereotypes.

Eileen Southern’s The Music of Black Americans: A History she examines the influence that African Americans had in the holiness churches in music and worship. She initially starts with the landing of the first Africans to the colonies and she creates a phenomenal conversation of the musicians in the new world. She details the progression in the gospel, classical, jazz, rap, blues and the contributions they made.

Minstrel performers where as the film described, a group of white Caucasians that would perform with black face paint and mock African Americans. This form of entertainment grew popular and provided one of the strongest depiction of the Sambo. Right next to the Sambo was the Zip Coon, a dandy, and a buffoon, a Zip Coon would attempt to imitate whites. But with poor grammar and with little to no intelligents the Zip Coon's attempts proved to be a nothing more then a racist mockery. Therefor creating a generalization of Stupidity with in the African American population and creating a notion of Racial inequality. Also with the Sambo and Zip Coon was the Mammy. The mammy is described and viewed as a jolly, obese, African American women, the strongest Mammy depiction was first evident in the film Judge Priest in 1934. The Uncle figure was depicted in similar nature as the Mammy but in male form and a depiction called the Pickaninny provided a generalization of silly and worthless African American Child.

Released in 2001, Disney Channel’s The Proud Family was a Black cartoon frequently watched by children who grew up during its airplay. Not vulgar or satirical, The Proud Family centered around Penny Proud and her family as she grew up through her years. As a child, I innocently watched this show, but picked up on unintended implications based off of the character’s skin color. The main character Penny was a lighter skinned girl, who appeared to possess “more Eurocentric phenotypic characteristics (Steele),” exhibited more intelligence, wealth, and virtue, as opposed to her darker skinned best friend, Dijonay, who was associated with deviance and sassiness, while speaking with a more Ebonic style of talking and possessed a more “ghetto” name. Although the show attempted to provide an accurate representation of a “traditional African American family,” it still regardlessly instilled these stereotypes of the African American community into my mindset, which were not disproved in my mind until later in my life (Steele).

appeared, and the 1870's, the minstrel show was one of the most popular forms of entertainment in America. White performers wearing burnt cork or black shoe polish on their faces assumed the roles of African American men and women. A typical minstrel show would have songs, dances, jokes and grand hoe-downs. The minstrel show tried to capture the "happy-go-lucky" slave that ate watermelon and shuffled about. However, this idea of the "happy slave" was very wrong. Since this was before the civil rights movement, African Americans were caricatured and often stereotyped as the lazy, shuffling,

a real life, current-day issue is that black lives matter. Black lives matter about the lives of black people in America are being seriously threatened by the suppression of the white police. They may be beaten or killed if they oppose the police even though they had no weapons in hand. That is why more and more protests broke out across the country to protest the actions of white police against blacks. They want to be treated equally as other citizens in the United States, where many races in the world. it is not mentioned in popular culture because the concept of a white parts they do not respect the blacks. When it comes to black people often think of the bad things that black people have done to America as drug trafficking, looting, rape,

The 19th century was a mark of new things to come about in different countries, these new things were music, theater, and other forms of entertainment. Because of the many wars fought during this time there was much depression and people needed a relief. We all know theater has been around for many decades, but it really started to scatter during this time, people needed entertainment and something to look forward to. Of course, music halls and minstrel shows were present but there was nothing that contained both of the features that these theaters had, and then came about vaudeville. Vaudeville highlighted many famous people’s careers and even helped started many of these stars’ careers. It grew as years progressed and became a loved entertainment for many years to come. Vaudevilles’ creation was the start of our current forms of entertainment and is the heart of the American entertainment industry in the 19th century.

“Cooning” was a TV show or Film usually they act like idiot behavior that misrepresents African American culture. I think idiot because that shows a deliberate act. Many people called “coons.” Yes, I saw some examples today’s culture some white people still discriminate black people. Some white people were enjoying it, and that seems to some people they insulted African- American behaves. African-American got angry. It was not fair at all that behavior. All are good examples.

Another popular character which has its origin in slavery is the African-American clown. It is easy to observe that man exults in his superiority over lower animals by teaching them to do tricks and to be entertained by those tricks. The jester, the clown, or the fool, as the inferior one who was responsible for making his superior laugh have been African-Americans. This has carried over in the present day as a defense mechanism for young African-American students in a classroom type situation. People do not take you seriously if you don't take yourself seriously. A sense of humor brings necessary balance to an organized life, but a life of humor blinds one to life.

The Antebellum Period was the time after the War of 1812 and just before the Civil War (Lapsansky-Werner). With the growing cotton plantation in the south, more slaves were needed and more slaves needed to escape ("Antebellum Period."). While the Antebellum Period brought the Second Great Awakening and Westward Expansion, it is also known for the uprising of abolition and anti versus pro slavery arguments ("Antebellum Period."). The antebellum period was overall a pivotal point in slavery and slave laws with laws like the fugitive slave act of 1851 and the Compromise of 1850 or rebellions like the Underground Railroad. Fredrick Douglass was also very influential in this time because he is a true example of a black abolitionist and his speech changed lives. Another important event in the Antebellum Period was the Abolitionist movement.

White minstrel actually used to visit plantations to study the way blacks interacted with each other. When performing, these white Minstrels would take coal and color their faces black. Their performances consisted of skits that including music and dance routines , which imitated blacks. Initially minstrelsies weren’t brought about with the pure intent of poking fun at Blacks. But after the Civil War things changed. Whites stopped visiting the plantation for new material. They began to use the same negative material over and over again. This is what gave birth to many of the Stereotypes that African Americans are victim to, even today. James Bland was one of the African Americans who gained popularity by performing and composing in the black face. After being a part of white minstrelsies, Bland eventually had the opportunity to play in an all black Minstrel called Haverly's European Minstrel Show. After the performers departed from that group, Bland decided to stay in Europe While living in Europe Bland was allowed to perform in shows without having to put on the “black face”. He became extremely popular. Eventually he returned to the U.S. where he couldn’t fit in because American Music had taken a turn since the time that he left. Another group of people that also tried to sing (what I’ll call) “acceptable” music are The

In the beginning of this essay, Hurston describes the superiority dynamic between herself and White Northerners passing through her hometown. Specifically, Hurston reflects that the passing white travelers only valued her as a source of amusement: “They liked to hear me speak pieces and sing and wanted to see me dance the parse-me-la.” (Hurston 42). Almost as if Hurston was a common servant; the passing white people would pay to see an innocent black girl dance and sing just as a king demands a show from his jester. Furthermore, Hurston’s youthful naivety in the racial hierarchy of Jim Crow America made her exploitation all the more grotesque. Hurston includes this reflection in her essay to show how black people were degraded by white society even as young children. Which creates the impression that the social hierarchy of races was thoroughly integrated into the lives of African Americans. Essentially, it was part of an African Americans social identity to be inferior due to their complexion.

In order to fully ascertain the gravity of negative archetypes, it is important to explore a common one. Donald Bogle is a film historian and lecturer at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University. Bogle has authored a book entitled Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks, in which he outlines a few of cinemas most infamous black architypes. The one most salient this this essay is that of brutal black buck. Bogle divides the brutal black buck into two subcategories: “black bucks” and “black brutes.”

Different archetypes have been used to represent black people through television, live performances, and film. These stereotypes consisted of “Coon”, “Mulatto”, “Mammy”, and “Tom” (site—Johnson). Prior to films and television, African American’s were depicted by white actors wearing “blackface” in which white people entertained audiences through plots that portrayed African Americans in stereotypical ways that had prevailed since the time of slavery. “Coon” for instance, was created as a from of comedy and amusement for white individuals, as this image allowed for comic relief through idiocy. “Coons” had, in essence, a low level of intelligence with minimal common sense. Their dull-wittedness advocated the view that African American people were unintelligent beings who were incompetent and unable to formulate intelligible thoughts. This further reinforced the idea that African American people were in need of instruction and guidance from white individuals—just as they did during slavery—in order for African Americans to sustain and remain alive, or else they would be damaged by their own incapabilities. Similar to the “Coon”, Mammy was also a common character who was portrayed as an obese and grumpy woman who also provided comic relief to white folks. Mammy’s creation was

The movie 'Ethnic Notions' describes different ways in which African-Americans were presented during the 19th and 20th centuries. It traces and presents the evolution of the rooted stereotypes which have created prejudice towards African-Americans. This documentary movie is narrated to take the spectator back to the antebellum roots of African-American stereotypical names such as boy, girl, auntie, uncle, Sprinkling Sambo, Mammy Yams, the Salt and Pepper Shakers, etc. It does so by presenting us with multiple dehumanized characters and cartons portraying African-Americans as carefree Sambos, faithful Mammies, savage Brutes, and wide-eyed Pickaninnies. These representations of African-Americans roll