Date of Award
5-2014
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
English
Committee Chair(s)
Phebe Jensen
Committee
Phebe Jensen
Committee
Evelyn Funda
Committee
Paul Crumbley
Abstract
Early scholars of blackface minstrelsy have often over-simplified and rebuked nineteenth-century American Negro minstrel shows for their racially barbed gibes at African Americans. Though it recognizes minstrelsy’s blatant racism against the newly freed slaves of the 1860s, this study agrees with many modern scholars in recognizing deeper cultural themes Negro minstrels highlighted onstage during the years surrounding the Civil War. The study focuses specifically on the rich literary contribution of two afterpieces (the final act of the minstrel show) burlesquing Shakespeare’s Othello: Desdemonum and Othello; A Burlesque. Using the racist jargon as a tool, this study examines how women and immigrants during the nineteenth century were able to identify and differentiate their identities with African Americans and find their place within American Society. Though women, African Americans, and the Irish were the three most hated and feared groups of the American White male, they also exemplified a unified power through their representation on the minstrel stage.
Recommended Citation
Hutchings, Kristen, "Blackface Shakespeare: Racial and Gender Anxiety on the American Stage" (2014). All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023. 423.
https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/gradreports/423
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