Blackface and Whitewashing

Begin by having students view the Blackface and Whitewashing slideshow, Blackface and Whitewashing slideshow.

If you are presenting the slideshow for the whole class, follow this sequence:

Project slides one and two.  Tell students that “Blackface” was a popular genre of comedy that involved White actors who wore makeup to play heavily stereotyped Black characters. Though it was most popular in the 19th century, it remained common until the 1950s: the first movie with sound, “The Jazz Singer,” was about a blackface performer. The Jazz Singer reflects the era’s racial biases and set a precedent for Hollywood’s portrayal of Black characters.

Advance to slide three and tell students that in today’s media, literal blackface mostly only occurs in period pieces – as in this episode of the ‘60s-set drama Mad Men, where blackface was used to highlight the cultural attitudes and racial insensitivity of the 1960s – or as satire, as in 2008’s Tropic Thunder where Robert Downey Junior played a White actor in Black makeup. In Tropic Thunder, blackface was used to point out how often White actors play roles of people from different racial backgrounds, ignoring the real stories of those communities.

Project slide four and explain that the term blackface is more often used to refer to White or other majority-culture actors playing characters from historically under-represented group. For example, David Carradine, a White actor, played half-Chinese character Kwang Chai Kane in the TV series Kung Fu – the only TV series in the 1960s to have an Asian lead character.

Project slide five and tell students that Espera Oscar de Corti, better known as “Iron Eyes” Cody, was a White actor who made a career out of playing Indigenous characters. His best known role was as the “Crying Indian” who appeared in the extremely influential anti-littering public service announcement Keep America Beautiful. Many (if not most) Indigenous characters in film and on TV were played by White actors until the 1960s, though Cody was unusual in that he actually claimed to be Indigenous in real life.

Pause and ask students:

Point out that in these cases it was not just the fact that the characters were being played by White actors that was a problem, but that these characters were usually extremely stereotyped as well. Remind students of the idea that media have social and political implications, discussed in the video in the lesson’s Introduction. Point out that the Asian population of the United States grew substantially following the 1965 Immigration Act, and that many Indigenous people became politicized in the 1960s and 1970s as part of groups such as the American Indian Movement. Ask:

Advance to slide six and tell students that while cross-casting isn’t as prevalent as it once was, it does still happen. A recent study by the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative looked at films produced between 2007 and 2022 and determined that 1 in 5 indigenous characters were played by non-indigenous actors. Tell students that Johnny Depp’s portrayal of Tonto, a Comanche character, in the 2013 film The Lone Ranger sparked criticism because Depp is not a recognized Indigenous actor, raising questions about authenticity in Indigenous representation. Explain that Rooney Mara, who plays Tiger Lily in the 2015 film Pan, is another example of a non-Indigenous actress playing an Indigenous character. While Pan director Joe Wright defended the choice at the time by saying she was a powerful role model for young girls, the decision sparked wide-spread criticism for whitewashing a role that could have been an opportunity for an Indigenous actor.

Move to slide seven and tell students that while this kind of blackface doesn’t often happen in live-action film and TV now, it is still fairly common in animation and video games. Diane (a Vietnamese-American) on Bojack Horseman, Cleveland (a Black American) on Family Guy, and Apu (an Indian immigrant) on The Simpsons – some of the most high-profile non-White characters on animated television – were all voiced by White actors. (Note that as a result of viewer pressure. both Family Guy and The Simpsons made a commitment in 2020 to no longer have White actors voice non-White characters.)

Advance to slide eight and explain that unlike cross-racial casting, casting non-disabled actors remains not only accepted but often celebrated: Riz Ahmed, a hearing actor, received an Academy Award nomination for playing a Deaf character in 2019’s The Sound of Metal.

Move to slide nine and tell students that similarly, there is little expectation that actors be of the same religion as the characters they play – even when that religion is central to the character and the story, as it is for the Mormon detective played by Andrew Garfield in Under the Banner of Heaven or the Israeli prime minister Golda Meir played by Helen Mirren.

Advance to slide ten and explain that “whitewashing” means making racialized characters White – or in some cases changing any character from a member of an under-represented to a majority group – when adapting a TV show or movie from another medium – is still common. Recent examples include the movies Ghost in the Shell, The Last Airbender and Doctor Strange. It’s often justified in economic terms, with producers saying they need to cast a recognizable star.

Advance to slide eleven and tell students that a particularly common version of this is “straightwashing,” in which 2SLGBTQ characters are portrayed as heterosexual in big-budget adaptations. This most frequently happens with characters who are bisexual in the original material, such as the comic characters Deadpool and Harley Quinn.

Move to slide twelve and point out that the same issues have occurred in digital media, as well. Gradient’s AI Face was heavily criticized for allowing users to wear “digital blackface,” but is still available as of 2022. Digital tools can also encourage whitewashing: one app launched in 2022 offers “accent translation” that makes speakers sound more “neutral” (in other words, White.)