Blackface = white men using makeup and costume to dress up as a caricature of black men for public performance.
Drag = men using makeup and costume to dress up as a caricature of women for public performance.
Blackface is racist. So why isn't drag seen as sexist/misogynist?
Some perspectives on this question:
Josephine Bartosch in The Critic
Kelly Kleiman in the Chicago-Kent Law Review (admit it, you read it all the time)
Meghan Murphy at Feminist Current
Frustratingly, most of the articles I found giving the opposite perspective are behind paywalls. This one is a brief summary.
The difference is intention. Blackface doesn't have to be racist, for example there's the Cornish Morris Dancers and the Zwarte Piet character in the Netherlands. But with all things we have been infected by American culture where the Minstrel shows were a direct mockery of the poor blacks under Jim Crow laws. That was intentionally racist.
ReplyDeleteThink of the difference between Spike Milligan playing an offensive stereotype of an Irish/Pakistani in Curry and Chips in the 60s and Christopher Lee playing Muhammad Ali Jinnah in the movie Jinnah. One was inviting the audience to laugh at the character, one was inviting the audience to admire the character. One racist, one obviously not.
Drag isn't mockery of women and if it was it wouldn't be socially accepted by women. You need another dog-whistle.
Ah the old Lucy Powell manoeuvre. And it was all going so well.
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