Full Disclaimer: I don't see myself as a expert on this kind of topic. I usually try to stay away from conversational topics like this, because I'm not that good at bringing information on how to go about with them. If there are any facts in this part that I got wrong or you felt I didn't go over them well enough, just let me know because believe me I'll be talking about this topic a lot more later on, but I would also advice that you check out a website call they also go over the topic way better than me and they also give out information on famous African American actors during silent film era.
So with that, enjoy this chapter.
Okay, so we're at the point where we're going into a bit of a sensitive topic. Now I wasn't sure how I was going to deal with this topic and I had many other stereotypes I wanted to talk about, but I'll talk about some of the other stereotypes later. Also just for the record there are many stereotypes outside of the big one that I'll be covering. Stereotypes have been around since art started. Stereotypes are usually one way people would use to make a character by giving that character or a group one specific trait. For example it could something like police loving donuts or girls playing with dolls. Throughout the early years of film these stereotypes were sometimes simple traits that'd been done to death like the tough guy or the guy that looks though but is weak or the girls that look pretty and are always the love interest for the main character. We've seen these tropes all the time in the media and sometimes we still see them today in some cases. Stereotypes doesn't always have a negative effect on people, sometimes it can have a good effect on a certain group of people, but there's the stereotypes that really goes too far when it comes to characterizing a group of people.
The one stereotypes most people are familiar with especially when it comes to early media are stereotypes about African Americans, also known has blackface.
According to a website known as , the person that popularize the Blackface makeup was a white New Yorker name Thomas D. Rice. Rice was the one that made a popular blackface character known as Jim Crow in 1832 when he performed a song known as Jump Jim Crow. The song and the performance was so popular that more white actors started performing in what was known as minstrel shows.
Minstrel shows and blackface were usually a way for whites to characterize African Americans, based on what they believe an African American is like as a race, this became what was like a rule for African Americans that they have to have these types of characters, most of them were depicted as poor and stupid or rude and loud or even that they had to be at least a loyal servant to their white masters. The first film that feature Blackface was Uncle Tom's Cabin released in 1903 by Edwin Porter based on a novel by the same name. The plot of the film I guess is that some white woman is trying to save her daughter from someone and Tom's master protects him from I guess another white master. I kind of don't understand the plot of this film that well, but that's what I'm gathering from this film.
Now keep in mind that whites weren't the only ones in blackface. In fact if an actual African American wanted to perform then they also had to put blackface on or at least act like a certain stereotype that was required for them at the time, but that's not to say that every single film that feature an African American had a stereotype, as the years go by we'll start to see directors and actors trying their best to push pass the stereotypes and try to actually bring out some sort of character with them and there are actual African American actors and directors that will and have become famous during the pre-civil rights era.