Black Stereotypes as Reflected in Popular Culture, 1880-1920

Abstract

THE MINSTREL SHOW WAS AMERICA'S FIRST NATIONAL, POPULAR ENTERtainment form, and from it came two of the classic stereotyped characters of blacks.' One was Zip Coon and the other was Jim Crow. Zip Coon was a preposterous, citified dandy. In the minstrel shows he was easily recognized in his bright, loud, exaggerated clothes: swallow-tail coat with wide lapels, gaudy shirts, striped pants, spats, and top hat. He was a highstepping strutter with a mismatched vocabulary. He put on airs, acted elegant, but was betrayed by his pompous speech filled with malapropisms. Jim Crow represented the slow-thinking, slow-moving country and plantation darkey. He wore tatters and rags and a battered hat. He spent his time sleepin', fishin', huntin' 'possums, or shufflin' along slower than molasses in January, except when stealing chickens or dancing on the levee. Of course, these minstrel characters did not exhaust the stereotypes. Equally common was the image of the Negro as servant and maid. There was Old Uncle Tom or Uncle Remus, Aunt Jemima or Mandy the maid, Preacher Brown and Deacon Jones, Rastus and Sambo, and the ol' mammy. All these stereotypes were part of the popular culture of America at the turn of the twentieth century. They were so familiar that few people had any notion that they degraded black Americans. Most people thought the caricatures were simply funny. They laughed with good humor, but their sense of humor revealed a pervasive lack of sensitivity. The images