Talk:Blackface

Sarah Silverman Show

http://sarahsilvermanonline.com/2007/10/17/sarah-silverman-blackface-episode/

I think this episode might be relevant to the pop culture aspect of it. If anyone wants to talk add it in —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.21.227.37 (talk) 04:54, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Jamie Kennedy and Dave Chappelle

Could Jamie Kennedy's big woman character be considered blackface?

What about Chappell's whiteface news anchor character?

Coffee5binky (talk) 04:23, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

shoop da whoop

isnt that blackface as well —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.188.101.60 (talk) 02:12, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

The Negro on the Stage, by Michael Hutton, Harpers Magazine #79, Jun-Dec 1889

Is this source useful here? The Negro on the Stage, by Michael Hutton, Harpers Magazine #79, Jun-Dec 1889 Jojalozzo 15:07, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

definition of "blackness" too broad, of "whiteness" too narrow

In his/her claim that the "Hee Haw" show, and the music and singing of Elvis Presley, Bob Wills, and Jimmie Rodgers are all rooted in "blackface" performance, the author seems to be assuming that all manifestations of "southern" white culture in popular media represent white misappropriation of African American culture. Southern white speech is, and was greatly more so in the days of Elvis Presley and Bob wills, a very rhythmic, "jivy" speech. I think that in modern America, as strong southern speech and behavior becomes less common among the white population, there is a growing tendency to consider most manifestations of southern culture as "black". I think that this is a harmful trend, as it draws too much separation between the races and creates a lot of general cultural confusion. Another thing I find irritating about the articles is this quote:

"Whites admire, envy and seek to emulate such supposed innate qualities of Blackness as inherent musicality, natural athleticism, the composure known as 'cool' and superior sexual endowment,"

I think that this statement does in fact ring true in many ways. However, I disagree with the idea that black people are the originators and sole legitimate proprietors of the concept of "being cool".

I feel that the author of this article has unresolved racial issues, and that the article should be greatly revised and edited, by someone in a less vindictive frame of mind. --Jimmy Spiz (talk) 05:56, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Please read the Wikipedia guidelines and policies (perhaps start with the five pillars) on editing articles, especially neutral point of view and original research. Note that editors are directed to base articles not on their own opinions and analysis but on the opinions and analysis of verifiable and reliable third parties (see WP:SOURCES). Quotes such as the ones you find troubling are actually useful content because they directly communicate the quoted author's ideas without being mediated by an editor's interpretation.

Readers and reviewers such as yourself play an important role in the project helping acheive its highest possible quality. It is important to remember to check an article's references to see what support it relies on and that all its claims and assertions are supported by reliable sources. However if a reliable source is used that a reader personally disagrees with that is not a fault of the editors or the article, it is just another facet of the article's topic. If a reader believes an article is lacking a point of view that is represented by a reliable source, it is helpful to point that out, but the project is not a discussion group and makes no space for readers who disagree with well sourced articles and cannot find supporting sources for their positions (i.e. original research).

I'm not claiming that this article is well sourced yet - most articles need improvement in that area - and I hope you can help us by locating some sources to round it out and offer alternative perspectives. Jojalozzo 13:27, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Blackface on All In The Family and SNL

The article should include references to the use of blackface by Carroll O'Connor on All In The Family in the 1970s and Fred Armisen on SNL currently (2008 to present - when he portrays U.S. President Barack Obama).

72.82.167.160 (talk) 14:40, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Also Daryl Hammond as Jessie Jackson and Billy Crystal as Sammy Davis Jr. Really SNL does a lot of racial bending, does Amy Pohler as Michael Jackson count?

99.190.87.131 (talk) 15:12, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

"International" backlash against Memín Pinguín?

This section about "(Blackface in) México" is really American-centric. On the one hand, back in 2005 there were protests in the USA against the release of postage stamps portraying Memín Penguín, but those protests by the White House and by African-American communities are not an "international" backlash. And on the other hand, some "racially sensitive" and "controversial" images are so for the Americans, but not for the Mexicans, for the Latin-Americans or for others. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.156.147.145 (talk) 08:40, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

United Kingdom

This both predates the current mentions and is considerably more relevant: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Black_and_White_Minstrel_Show Thorsson64 (talk) 22:56, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Blackface role in forming sterotypes in introduction

Edits in the introduction concerning the role of blackface in the proliferation of stereotypes were reverted as POV and unsourced. There is no need for sources in the introduction if the statements are covered in the rest of the article (see Blackface#"Displaying Blackness" and the shaping of racist archetypes). I also do not understand how it is biased to connect blackface with racial issues since there is a no lack of sources to support it. Therefore I replaced the edits. Jojalozzo 17:56, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Zwarte Piet / The Netherlands

I believe that this article should stress a bit more the fact that modern days The Netherlands still holds its anual Sinterklaas fest with an army of blackface Zwarte Pieten (Black Petes). The Dutch society is unfamiliar with where their childhood favorite of Zwarte Piet comes from. Let alone why they understand how it is actually racist. This is mainly due a lack of being educated and properly informed on how blackface connects to racism. This article should not be AngloSaxon centric- as it's The Netherlands which plays a very active role in keeping the blackface alive and therefor active development this racist character. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.4.130.106 (talk) 22:42, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

File:Hotmikado.jpg Nominated for speedy Deletion

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Zwarte Piet / The Netherlands and Belgium (Flanders)

I believe the part about Zwarte Piet should be completely removed from this page. Zwarte Piet is not a product of the minstrel shows. It's not perceived as racist by the Dutch public only by foreign visitors.

I would also really like to see this line removed. Zwarte Piet inherited many of the classic darky icons, contemporaneous with the spread of darky iconography.[95] 95 does link to anything anymore. But you can still find the illustrations. I can't see how those illustrations prove Zwarte Piet inherited any of the classic icons of the darky characters.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.215.146.10 (talk) 03:33, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Your proposal merits consideration but I reverted your edits while we see what the consensus is.

• Most importantly, please provide some sources that support your position. We can't make these changes in the article without them.
• It is illogical to conclude that the inability of the Dutch to see harm in the tradition means there is none. If we have sources that discuss this Dutch perspective we could include it but it does not seem to me to be a reasonable basis for removing the content.
• I am not convinced that the Dutch culture has rid itself of racism to the extent that Zwarte Piet reflects no elements of "darky iconography". We definitely need sources to support any statement about the lack of racism in the culture and this tradition.
• There is a valid question as to the connection of this tradition to theatrical blackface as practiced in North America and Europe and a broader question of whether this article's topic extends to all cases of skin-darkening makeup. Jojalozzo 04:50, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

This article seems useful: Black Peters (Temple Hauptfleisch, Shulamith Lev-Aladgem, Jacqueline Martin, Willmar Sauter, and Henri Schoenmakers, ed., Amsterdam and New York: International Federation for Theatre Research, 2007, p. 293, accessed 16 Aug 2010). The parent article starting on page 291 is referenced on the Sinterklaas page. Jojalozzo 05:52, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

It seems that the Dutch are sensitive to this issue but that is not a reason to modify the contents of the page. We depend on reliable sources that connect Zwarte Piet to blackface. I think most of the explanation and justification is unnecessary since the role of the character is explained in the Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet articles. I propose that here we should focus on the blackface aspects of the character and the controversy that surrounds that. Jojalozzo 15:43, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

There is a large body of literature on this topic but mostly in Dutch. Here is one in English: Black Pete: Analyzing a Racialized Dutch Tradition Through the History of Western Creations of Stereotypes of Black Peoples by Izalina Tavares (Humanity in Action NL):

A new form of consciousness has to be learned: one which leads from the premise that being against prejudice doesn't automatically mean we are free from it—as a society or as individuals. That awareness is the first step not the last. That denial of existing racism is a form of racism in and of itself. When someone says Sinterklaas is not racist, answer, "what is racism," not "yes it is." When someone says they should be free to say whatever they want, tell them that you also should be free to point out the prejudice inherent in what they say. And furthermore, if they believed in what say they believe in, they would be not resistant but open to the comment because that is how growth and change takes place. When someone says Sinterklaas is an old Dutch tradition, ask them if they then believe that other cultures of people who have come to the Netherlands should hold on to all of their traditions regardless of anything else. This will expose the hypocrisy that often rests in their answer. And when they say again, (as they often will) "but it's our tradition," tell them: "so is racism."

Jojalozzo 16:03, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but the problem is that any semblance between a blackface minstrel and zwarte piet is completely coincidental, and Zwarte piet never was a racist caricature of a black person.

Historically zwarte piet was depicted, not as a slave from central Africa, but as a morisco, a Christianized Arab living in Spain of Moroccan descent. His depiction in this way in no way was done with the same intent as the caricatural depiction of a blackface.

Also most of the caricaturist elements that have sneaked into his depiction under American influences have been eliminated in the last few decades, because the Dutch do not want zwarte piet to be associated with the "darky iconography" from the US.

In this case racist intentions are simply in the eye of the beholder Mahjongg (talk) 16:16, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps it would be useful to explain why a boy with a dark complexion was chosen to be st nicholas servant for his new book about sinterklaas by a schoolteacher in 1845. Traditionally before 1845 the servant was more or less a bogeyman, often depicted as a black devil. The schoolteacher wanted something less menacing to replace that tradition, while keeping some of the aspects. It's quite impossible to know his reasoning. but it is reasonable to suppose that is was something like this:

St Nicholas was a Bishop, who each year came from Spain to the Netherlands, that at least was the part of the legend that was kept unchanged. What needed change was to loose the bogeyman, so he needed to invent another "servant" of a Spanish Bishop, and it happened to be a fact that Spanish Bishops (and many Spanish royalties) in reality often had such servants, in the form of page boys. Spanish page boys at the period normally were boys from influential moriscan families. So the teacher simply decided to keep things factual, and that in his story the new servant should be a (morisco) page boy, in full page boy costume. The servant was simply called "piet", a very normal Dutch first name for a boy. To keep with the legend the boy also got the nickname "zwarte" (black), in accordance with the previous incarnations of st nicholas helpers, and so "Zwarte Piet" was invented, as far as can be determined without any racist intentions. Mahjongg (talk) 17:13, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Our purpose here is to decide how to present the Zwarte Piet tradition based on sources. From the sources we have already, even if Piet's Schenkman roots weren't racist (though I haven't seen reliable sources either way on that), racist/darky baggage was added to Piet's character over time. We depend on reliable sources. Anything else we view as original research and POV pushing. Jojalozzo 18:05, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

These sources exist, but you must remember that such "decisions" to remove "coon elements" (such as not using large golden earrings anymore, and toning down the clown sized lipstick) were not taken by popular vote, but simply happened spontaneously as a result of changing perspectives. So almost no written material exists that "documents" why this happened. Material that exist now was written in hindsight. I will try to find some more sources. Mahjongg (talk) 18:37, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I found one article (in Dutch) from a reliable source that mentions that in the past some elements of zwarte piet that had racist overtones were already removed, in this case the large golden earrings are mentioned. Obviously because there was never a "ruling" about it you can still find the odd piet that has earrings, but the custom is slowly disappearing. The reference, in Dutch. [1]

No, discussion sites are definitely not reliable:

"... self-published media—whether books, newsletters, personal websites, open wikis, blogs, personal pages on social networking sites, Internet forum postings, or tweets—are largely not acceptable." -WP:SPS [my emphasis]

I believe your are working here in good faith and the best intentions but your participation is edging towards tenditious and edit warring. Since BRD is not your style, please discuss any edits here before proceeding to be sure what you are changing has proper sources and the support of other editors (seek consensus). Editors with a personal POV need to be particularly careful about their contributions or they risk being banned from the topic. Jojalozzo 02:12, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

I suggest you find good secondary sources that summarize or identify cultural shifts. To be reliable these would be the work of credentialed historians or anthropologists, not our everyday bloggers or pundits. Ideally the sources would be peer-reviewed or independently published. Articles in notable mainstream magazines may also be good sources - especially if Internet accessible.

As I said before there are problems with the sources mostly being in Dutch. Because this is a controversial subject I think we will need English translations of critical sections even if they are produced by Wikipedians (see WP:NOENG).

I hope you are also willing to help find sources that identify racist elements in Piet's portrayal so we can present the topic with all views well represented. Jojalozzo 02:31, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

You are still mistaken on the nature of www.joop.nl its NOT any of these "... self-published media—whether books, newsletters, personal websites, open wikis, blogs, personal pages on social networking sites, Internet forum postings, or tweets" Its a journalistic news site, one of the major ones of such in the Netherlands. Journalists write pieces on current events, then the site offers possibilities to discuss the item. The link is not quoting a user comment, but points to a piece written by a journalist! In fact www.joop.nl is very much like www.slate.com which is also used as a reliable source in this article.

Furthermore joop.nl is owned by the Dutch broadcasting organization VARA.

Obviously as this is a uniquely Dutch topic, very little stuff written about it will not be in Dutch. Its unfair to limit to material not written in Dutch, as WP:NOENG points out. You can use a translation engine to read it. I will translate the relevant sentence and put it in the footnote.

I am trying to "identify racist elements in Piet's portrayal", that is exactly what the link is about! Showing that by their behavior the Dutch more or less admit that some racial stereotyping can be read into the appearance of zwarte piet, and that they are already working to remove these. I'm putting the comment and its reliable source back, it makes the article more balanced, not less. Mahjongg (talk) 15:22, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

Please stop adding material to the article without getting agreement here first. News articles are reliable but reader discussion on a news site is not reliable. Please ask at the reliable sources noticeboard before posting anything more from such sites. We need reliable sources in English or accompanied by English translation not anonymous statements by web site readers in Dutch.

Also, this article is more concerned with Piet's history as a darky icon, not so much his current status. Issues with current status belong more in the Zwarte Piet page not so much here. Jojalozzo 18:42, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

Again, this has nothing to do with the fact that readers can react to this opinion piece, if you really dismiss this reliable source, than by exactly the same logic you should remove this link too: Slate.com: The racist Christmas tradition Dutch people have begun fighting about. http://www.slate.com/articles/life/holidays/2011/12/zwarte_piet_holland_s_favorite_racist_christmas_tradition_.single.html which is exactly the same kind of site as joop.nl. I could have removed this link based on the same reasoning as you did, but I knew to do so would go against the spirit of wikipedia. Mahjongg (talk) 22:35, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

I understand that you now have switched focus from the unreliable discussion that took place at the joop.nl page ("discussion site mentioning the trend to no longer use big golden earrings when dressing up as Zwarte piet" as you initially presented it) to the more reliable opinion piece itself. Perhaps this is simply a language issue but I understood you to be previously be proposing the discussion comments as your source. Since you are no longer doing that let's allow it to stay as long as we want the content it is sourcing.

Please do not load this article up with justifications and explanations of how the Dutch are now not racist. This article is mostly about the past and there's no need to defend anything. Let's just present the information from reliable sources without explaining how good everything is now. Piet's main page might be a better place for your point of view if you feel you must but in my opinion this article is now quite cluttered with denials and justifications. Jojalozzo 02:57, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

It was never my intention to use the discussion as a reference, just the opinion piece itself, the sentence I was referring to was from the opinion piece, not from any of the comments. Perhaps the wording of the edit summary of my original post was a bit unfortunate. I'm not trying to defend any racist characteristics of piet, simply pointing out why he has this looks. Its now impossible to determine why Schenkman (the writer of the schoolbook that defined the current looks of zwarte piet) had any racist feelings when he made up piet, but its clear that some elements of his looks can be explained that way, and I wanted to point out that the Dutch generally are aware of it, and try to tone down these elements, without scrapping piet altogether. Mahjongg (talk) 13:42, 21 December 2011 (UTC)