The history of blackface and minstrelsy from the 1830s to the present. The hosts examine how minstrelsy was the most popular form of American entertainment for decades and how its racial caricatures shaped American culture in ways that persist today.
Highlights
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Minstrelsy was America's first mass entertainment — and it was built on racial mockery
Before movies, radio, or television, minstrel shows were the dominant form of American popular entertainment. The first mass culture industry was built on dehumanizing Black Americans.
Cultural representations shape perceptions for generations after the representations end
Minstrelsy ended over a century ago, but its racial caricatures — exaggerated features, lazy stereotypes, comic buffoonery — persist in subtle forms throughout American media and culture.