User:Isabelle Feng

Contemporary Canadian Blackfaces

A poser of Uncle Tom's Cabin during the 1850s

This user completed the
introductory tutorial series
on 27 March 2023.

Contemporary Canadian Blackface is a form of performance carried out by white actors within Canada under the assumption of what the black race really is in the defence of racist humour.   

Early 19th Century Blackface

Before transmitting to Canada, the culture of ”blackface” as originated within America since the 19th century, which since then took place within the “minstrel shows" in which had included the racist performance of the black by having a white actor painting themselves in black and fetishistically engage in 'blackness' as how they imagine them to be.  This included examples such as touring of Uncle Tom's Cabin, in which later on entered the stage of Western Canada during the 1960s in provinces such as Ontario and Montreal.

Black Face In Contemporary Canada 19th-21st Century

With the decline of blackfaces in America during the 1950s as the Civil rights movement begun, the blackface culture still remained within Contemporary Canada under the justification of 'just harmless fun' under the phrase of "embodied racism" for the white subjected society's pleasure. Contemporary Canadian blackface has often included stereotypical traits of anti-black racism such as fried chicken, afro or dreadlock wigs, basketball jerseys, monkeys, marijuana, and in one instance, a Klan costume and a noose.     The painting of face black incidents since the year of 2009 when it took place as in remembering the film Cool runnings, from the CBC News reporting in 2013 about the Winnipeg nightclub incident , in which establishes the firm ground of present racial discrimination.  

blackface performed by Bert Williams in 1916.