Topic: Race in the Masque of Blacknesse. A Critical Race Theory
Abstract
The Mascque of blacknesse explains Queen Anne and her ladies’ blackface presentation with a sycophants’ verbal comment that blacks were disgusting and unattractive. This assumption is thwarted by Niger’s daughter’s efforts that brought about the beauty of racial identities and demonstrate how the blackface gives beauty in terms of magnificence and innovation. Johnson represents the emblem of blackness as an indelible difference that can be adopted, integrated as a unification tool rather than a tool for discrimination; African culture should stand out conspicuously, that is, African identity should not be negated. The concept of race in the Mascque of Blacknesse represents the dichotomy in the British racial and cultural attitudes that took cognizance of human diversity but pursued an indifferent in light of more approaches compatible with global expansion and Europe’s universal market competition. Johnson designs a cross-cultural dialogue where African characters are molded conversant proportionate with the 17th century European standards to impede the imminent absorption of their identity by the British in its burgeoning effort for international markets. This paper will establish the understanding for Africans from England’s prism, Johnson Travel narratives, the power relations between the races, and how race descriptions participate in the Mascque of Blacknesse in the 17th Century.
Works cited
-http://www.luminarium.org/editions/maskblack.htm
Glenn A. Odom, “Jacobean Politics of Interpretation in Jonson’s Masque of Blackness,” Studies in English Literature 51.2 (2011): 370.
Imtiaz Habib, Black Lives in the English Archives, 1500–1677: Imprints of the Invisible (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2008