Tag: black art

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A New Perspective on Progress

In class this week, I was constantly questioning the cakewalk and whether one should view it as a tool of resistance. I seemed to be very fixed on the idea that it could not have been the tool that Brooks claimed it was, as it both seemed to be offensive and did not seem to be successful or recognized in the moment that it was performed. After much reflection, I have realized that I was approaching it from too harsh a guideline. In today’s society, we are pushed to strive for the best and to not be content until we have reached the place that we hope to end up. This is the mindset that I was applying to the cakewalk. I was demanding that it would adhere to a standard that would be impossible for it to have during the time it was made—it would have never been allowed to go on. In doing this, I lost sight of the importance of baby steps in controversial issues, such as racial struggles. 

Paving the way for progress is important, even if one is forced to do so in a transitional way. This is what Williams and Walker are doing with In Dahomey and its controversial inclusions, such as the cakewalk and black actors in blackface. They are getting their foot in the door, flipping the script normally used against blacks, and helping to set a foundation for the racial change to come. Representation is the first step to good representation. The reviews that we read may have played down the cultural and political significance of the cakewalk and the reclamation by the blacks, but history has not. Williams and Walker were exploiting the cakewalk and playing up other negative stereotypes for their gain and to the advantage of the black theater community. The very fact that we study this play so many years later supports the importance and overall impact that Williams and Walker had in paving the way for blacks on stage and in the American culture. Change starts with one person or group of people and their reclamation makes it possible for the larger reclamation.

This situation reminds me a lot of the way that I, and many others, view the n-word. The n-word is a word that I think is inherently derogatory and rooted in hate. There are blacks, however, who see the reclamation of it as empowering and a form of resistance that is used in both art and everyday speech. While it may appear to be problematic, there is some correct thinking within it. Their opinion of it is what really matters, as it contributes to their individual liberation. The n-word was used to define the blacks of the past, but now they are using it to represent themselves and attempting to redefine its very meaning. They are using the word in their own context and with their own agency. This action will perhaps also be a gateway for cultural change, or at the very least, a conversation starter.

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Using Spectacle to Hold Open the Door: In Dahomey

We’ve talked about spectacle a number of times in this class. We asked whether Gulliver was a spectacle in Lilliput and the country of the Houyhnhnms, which seems likely in both instances in the way he is seen as almost a tourist attraction. For instance, he writes in Lilliput that “as the news of my arrival spread throughout the kingdom, it brought prodigious numbers of rich, idle, and curious people to see me (Swift, 15).” Additionally, we wondered whether Douglass was a spectacle in Ireland, arriving at a more inconclusive answer.

However, in In Dahomey, the question of spectacle is never in doubt. As Daphne Brooks writes about the play, “The press trumpeted the arrival of African-American performers in a musical of their own making and encouraged the public to attend the production, if only to observe the odd miracle of African-American theater (Brooks, 207).” As this quote shows, the all-black cast was a spectacle regardless of the content of the play. On one hand, this intentional spectacle gave African-Americans an important viewership that at the very least opened the door for black actors to become more prominent in theatre. Yet it also put limitations on what these women and men could achieve through this play. The all-black cast made this play a work of “black art,” which was thus undeniably political. All art made by a marginalized person is automatically political and can longer solely entertain. Thus, if the writers of In Dahomey attempted to present obvious critiques of the color line, racial discrimination, and the Jim Crow South, they would lose the precious viewership achieved by this spectacle (at least in the United States). As a result, the play portrays the racist stereotypes of African-Americans in theatre.

Brooks argues that, through Mose and Me Sing, the play mocks individualism in the black community (specifically through emigration) by exposing the greed and xenophobia that undermines such an attitude (Brooks, 246). In a way, this critique, though not explicit in the text, makes perfect sense. The writers of In Dahomey reject individualism themselves. Though they could have pursued a more overt and aggressive critique of the color line, they instead utilize their spectacle to place a foot in the door so that others, like those writers in the Harlem Renaissance, could present a more overt case. Reversing the rhetoric we have seen in the past, though the subversive critiques of society in In Dahomey show that the writers were ready to attack racial injustice, the finished product of the play shows a recognition that the world “was not yet ready.” Yet, when it became ready, In Dahomey ensured that black artists would have an entryway into the conversation.