Stereotypes In The Minstrel Shows

In the 19th century, the minstrel show became the most prominent form of entertainment in America. Minstrelsy evolved from many different theatrical traditions such as the traveling circus, musical halls, and medicine shows (Taylor and Austen 4). As minstrelsy began to grow in popularity, so did the number of actors willing to paint their faces a different skin tone. Both Caucasian and African American actors portrayed African Americans and eventually, African Americans turned the tables by performing as Caucasian citizens. This information raises the question: “How did audiences in the nineteenth and twentieth century accept the performance of different ethnicities in the minstrel shows?”

In 1832, just as the American anti-slavery era was going underway, Thomas Dartmouth “Daddy” Rice walked onstage in New York City’s Bowery Theatre to perform his song and dance routine. This routine consisted of Rice wearing blackface and well-worn clothes all the while portraying a character based on Jim Crow (Nowatzki 1). Thomas Dartmouth

The majority of scholarly articles (INCLUDE ONE HERE) about minstrelsy written between the early 1960s to the late 1980s argued that stereotyping was an example of the majority culture’s desire to maintain political, social, and economic control. It was said that this occurred by transferring false theories of racial inferiority into a comic form of theatre in order to discredit African Americans (Bean, Hatch, and McNamara 182). Even with negative responses to this form of theatre, there were still audience members in every show. Some debaters have tried to say that the only people in the audience were Caucasian people. However, evidence shows that African American people attended as well (Taylor and Austen