Blackface Quotes

• Just reading that - just reading that a person can be black and still perform in blackface, making fun of black people for a living, and at the same time be a genius and be an incredible entertainer and at the same time be extremely conflicted and feel like - just feel terrible for doing that, essentially, which is what Bert Williams felt, from what I gather, from what I read - all of that just made - was so incredible to me.

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  Cecile McLorin Salvant

  Fun   Reading   People  

  "Jazz Singer Cécile McLorin Salvant Doesn't Want To Sound 'Clean And Pretty'". "Fresh Air" with Terry Gross, www.npr.org. January 1, 2016.

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• I have a huge issue with blackface.

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  Rachel Dolezal

  Issues   Blackface   Huge  

  "As Rachel Dolezal Breaks Silence, a Roundtable Discussion on Race, Appropriation and Identity". www.democracynow.org. June 17, 2015.

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• I thought Black Friday was when everyone puts on blackface and steals children from Wal-Mart.

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  Stephen Colbert

  Friday   Children   Black  

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• Like, Australians definitely don't walk around dressed up in blackface going "Ha-ha."

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  Chris Lilley

  Walks   Blackface   Dressed Up  

  "Chris Lilley on Angry Boys, the Blackface Taboo, and Laughing at His Own Jokes". Interview with Jean Bentley, www.vulture.com. December 28, 2011.

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• Speak out, educate, do not be intimidated by the apologists, and do not let extreme racism be mainstreamed. Hopefully there will come a time when we don't need to tell our kids that Halloween is no excuse for hate, and that blackface has no place in a civilized society.

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  Christine Pelosi

  Leadership   Halloween   Hate  

  "Halloween Is No Excuse for Hate: Blackface Has No Place" by Christine Pelosi, www.huffingtonpost.com. October 27, 2013.

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• [Zwarte Piet] is unfortunate, and just like the early American blackface films, if it offends a segment of the population, it shouldn't be shown again.

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  Roger Ross Williams

  Population   Film   Unfortunate  

  Source: www.hollywoodchicago.com

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• I was not interested in doing the plot of Oedipus in blackface. I did wonder, what would these people have been like if they hadn't been in that situation?... One could look at Oedipus, or at my character Augustus, as a cynical schemer who did everything because he was hungry for power. But that's just too easy. I'm more interested in how humans can embody conflicting goals and emotions.

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  Rita Dove

  Character   Oedipus   People  

  "The darker face of the earth". American Theatre, November 1, 1996.

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• I think when black performers performed in blackface, they were kind of taking back slave songs, but it was still a little bit iffy because they were performing, a lot of times, for white audiences who found it hilarious.

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  Cecile McLorin Salvant

  Song   Thinking   White  

  Source: www.npr.org

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• I think it is very ironic that most people think that the banjo is a southern white instrument. It came from Africa and even for the first years that white people played banjo they would put on blackface.

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  Bela Fleck

  Thinking   Years   White  

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• A white face goes with a white mind. Occasionally a black face goes with a white mind. Very seldom a white face will have a black mind.

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  Nikki Giovanni

  White   Black   Mind  

  1971 Conversation with James Baldwin, London, 4 Nov. Collected in A Dialogue (1973).

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