Stereotypes Of African Americans In Literature

The depiction of African Americans in literature, television, films and the theatre have followed the same archetypes for more than a century and a half. On ABC’s hit show Scandal, Kerry Washington plays the role of Olivia Pope, a strong headed, independent African American woman in a love triangle with two white men, one of whom is the married President of the United States. In the film realm, Tyler Perry acts out the role of Mabel “Madea” Simmons, a comical and sassy older woman who is often aggressive, violent, rambunctious, and outrageous in her behavior. She is a caregiver but also a criminal and is known to provide life lessons to her troubled family members and friends. These characters embody many of the same crippling stereotypes of
African Americans developed in the late 19th century, which served as entertainment for white Americans through minstrel shows and vaudeville. They constituted the thoughts and opinions of society during and following slavery moving through reconstruction and were used to understand the behaviors and nature of their black neighbors and workers. Employing what they saw in popular culture, whites justified the unrighteous treatment of African Americans. For many years, these representations degraded Black Americans and although attempts have been made to shine a positive light on the race, they still lurk in popular culture today because they have been deeply embedded in American culture.
The image of African Americans has been delusive since slavery.
Dates and Barlow (1990, p.5) state, “Black media stereotypes are not the natural, much less harmless, products of an idealized popular culture; rather they are commonly socially constructed images that are selective, partial, one-dimensional and distorted in their portrayal African Americans.” During the 20th century negroes were categorized as servants or maids, old Uncle Toms, Uncle Remus’, Aunt Jemimas, and Mammy the Maids to name a few. They appeared on rice boxes, baking mixes, soap powders and various other trademarks. They became advertisements and were very familiar to American citizens. But where did these images of African-Americans come from? African Americans were always viewed as inferior and it was the white man’s burden to civilize the barbaric and brutish creatures through a systematic approach. The slaves were viewed as nothing more than property, bought and sold and deprived of their rights. Despite their plight, many slave owners thought that their slaves were happy and from this evolved one of the very first stereotypes of African-American men,
Sambo.
The caricature of Sambo can be described as a fat wide-eyed grinning man. He is simple minded and docile, a typical black man. He flourished during slavery. Sambo was essentially a “happy slave.” He is often identified as a jolly overgrown child who enjoys serving his master but Sambo much like other slaves is naturally lazy, so he relies on his master for direction. Slave owners used this stereotype to defend the nature of slavery. “The stereotype suggested that black slaves were content with their lot and that the infantile race benefited from their bondage to paternalistic white masters.” (Nuruddin, 298). Sambo was beloved by whites because he was harmless and funny. This stereotype was relayed through interaction, music, folk sayings, literature, children’s stories and games (Goings, 1994). In 1898, A children’s book called The Story of Little Black Sambo by Helen Bannerman acquainted the stereotype Sambo with the American public. In the story, a little boy named Sambo, son of Black Mumbo and Black Jumbo, escapes a group of hungry tigers by giving them all of his clothing. Today this book can be bought online at Target.com for $16.99. In 1957, Sam Battistone started an American restaurant chain called Sambo’s. Sambo was the first and most detrimental of many portrayals of the black man because it seemed so harmless and has been perpetuated by the media. Johnny Brown with his role of superintendent Nathan Bookman on the sitcom Good Times, and Cole from the sitcom Martin are two examples of how the Sambo stereotype lives on today.
The next two stereotypes of African American men arose from the political questioning of the institution of slavery.
When race relations became particularly bad, comic relief became the answer with the Negro as the butt of the joke. The minstrel show first appeared in the early 1840’s and soon became the most popular form of entertainment in American until the 1890’s. Many historians accredit T.D “Big Daddy” Rice, a struggling white actor from New York City, with the creation of blackface minstrelsy. However, Rice wasn’t the first man to perform in blackface; he made it popular. In 1828, a crippled man dancing on the street inspired him. At the time laws prohibited African-Americans from dancing because it was said to be “crossing your feet against the Lord.” In order to circumvent this, slaves created a shuffling dance where their feet never left the ground. Rice wrote a song called “Jump Jim Crow,” in which he says, “Weel about and turn about and do jis so, Eb'ry time I weel about I jump Jim Crow.” Rice painted his face with burnt bottle corks mixed with grease paint and shoe polish to attain a black shine and exaggerated red or white lips. He wore a wooly wig and imitated black music and dance, including the Jim Crow dance. He spoke in an “authentic plantation” dialect. His act became a big hit in the South. Minstrel performances originally began as small parts of shows, sometimes as an opening act. Many theatres did not allow these performances because they were
distasteful, but after the economic panic of 1837, upscale theatres began to produce them as a means of cheap entertainment. As the abolitionist movement took flight, the popularity of minstrel shows multiplied. The Northerners were curious about slave life in the south so they looked to the minstrel shows. Northern white actors began to perform “The Jim Crow” and at its height, there were at least 30 full-time blackface minstrel shows performing across the nation before and following the Civil War. The minstrel shows sought to show the Northerners that slaves were happy within the confines of slavery and Jim Crow became the image of the black man in the Northern and Western World (Engle, 1978).
The Jim Crow stereotype is a slow moving and thinking plantation darkey. He wears tattered clothing and a worn 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” (Lemons, 1977). His northern counterpart is Zipcoon, a comical and ridiculous citified dandy who wears bright, loud and exaggerated clothing. He wears swallow-tailcoats with wide lapels, gaudy shirts, striped pants, spats, and top hats. He imitates whites in his speech, but used his vocabulary incorrectly. “He put on airs, acted elegant, but was betrayed by his pompous speech filled with malapropisms” (Lemons, 1977). These two characters dominated the stage in minstrel shows. They represented African-Americans as “shuffling and drawling, cracking and dancing, wisecracking and high stepping” fools evolved over time (Engle, 1978).