Staging the Other: Blackface, Stereotypes, and the Cultural Politics of Representation in Theatre and Cinema

This article examines the origins of blackface in European theatrical traditions, examining its ideological foundations and historical expressions from antiquity to the present. It examines how European performance cultures have historically mobilised blackness as a performative and racialised construct, going beyond the often American-centric interpretation of blackface. The study aims to reveal how the visual and embodied motifs of blackface have been used in popular entertainment, judicial spectacles, and religious rituals to articulate changing but enduring forms of racial othering. The approach emphasises the ways in which these activities influenced the creation of cultural identities, the aesthetics of exoticism, and larger systems of colonial authority. The paper argues that blackface in Europe is a unique and deeply ingrained cultural matrix that necessitates critical historical analysis rather than being a derivation of American minstrelsy. Building on this analysis, the article shows how racial stereotypes in early American film are reinforced on the silver screen. This study provides an understanding of how performance has historically shaped perceptions of race and identity.