{"id":14360,"date":"2009-10-17T10:26:07","date_gmt":"2009-10-17T15:26:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/?p=14360"},"modified":"2017-09-16T18:57:47","modified_gmt":"2017-09-16T23:57:47","slug":"french-vogue-and-contemporary-blackface","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2009\/10\/17\/french-vogue-and-contemporary-blackface\/","title":{"rendered":"French Vogue and \u201cContemporary Blackface\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Citizen Parables and Dmitriy T.M. alerted us to this month’s French Vogue<\/em>.\u00a0 According to Jezebel<\/a>, it features exactly zero black models.\u00a0 It does, however, contain several images of Dutch model Lara Stone painted so as to look black.<\/p>\n

The photos are being condemned as contemporary blackface.\u00a0 I’d like to open it up to discussion:<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 Is painting a white model so as to look black the same thing (in some important and significant way) as the derogatory minstrelsy with which blackface (with white mouths and red lips) is associated?\u00a0 Is the intent (dehumanization) the same?\u00a0 Is the effect the same?\u00a0\u00a0 Why or why not?\u00a0 If not, could it be that we are as inured to racism now as they were then?<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 Is the real (or part of the) problem the lack of actual black models?\u00a0 That is, if there were black models in the magazine, would we read these images differently?<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0 If we saw models of different races being painted various colors, would the white model painted black cease to be significant?\u00a0 Or, because of history, should this always (for the foreseeable future) be off limits?<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0 Is this “edgy” (and, therefore, fashion forward) exactly because it references historical blackface?\u00a0 In that case, should fashion play with such topics?\u00a0 Can people in the fashion industry do so responsibly?\u00a0 And, if so, what would that look like?<\/p>\n

More examples and discussion of contemporary “blackface” here<\/a>, here<\/a>, here<\/a>, here<\/a>, and here<\/a>.\u00a0 Also, Bugs Bunny<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n

Lisa Wade is a\u00a0professor of sociology at Occidental College<\/a>. You can follow her on\u00a0Twitter<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Facebook<\/a>.<\/p>\nLisa Wade, PhD<\/a> is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of <\/em>American Hookup<\/a>, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender<\/a>; and a forthcoming introductory text: <\/em>Terrible Magnificent Sociology<\/a>.\u00a0You can follow her on Twitter<\/a> and Instagram<\/a>.<\/em><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Citizen Parables and Dmitriy T.M. alerted us to this month’s French Vogue.\u00a0 According to Jezebel, it features exactly zero black models.\u00a0 It does, however, contain several images of Dutch model Lara Stone painted so as to look black. The photos are being condemned as contemporary blackface.\u00a0 I’d like to open it up to discussion: 1.\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[225,253,1776,283,285,1760,1757],"class_list":["post-14360","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-clothesfashion","tag-history","tag-nation-france","tag-prejudicediscrimination","tag-raceethnicity","tag-raceethnicity-blacksafricans","tag-raceethnicity-whiteseuropeans"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14360"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14360\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71140,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14360\/revisions\/71140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}