NATIVE AMERICANS AS SHOWN ON THE STAGE, 1753-1916 (INDIANS).
Item
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Title
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NATIVE AMERICANS AS SHOWN ON THE STAGE, 1753-1916 (INDIANS).
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Identifier
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AAI8423069
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identifier
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8423069
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Creator
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JONES, EUGENE H.
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Contributor
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Vera M. Roberts
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Date
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1984
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Theater
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Abstract
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Between 1753 and 1916, approximately two hundred theatre pieces featuring Native American characters were presented to American audiences and readers. Varying widely in form, style and representations of Indian life and character, these plays reflect the shifting positive and negative attitudes of white Americans toward Indians. They illustrate that these changing views were the result of social, political, and technological changes in American life, and a masking of the white man's fear of Indians as obstacles to his settling of the New World.;In the 18th Century, a false picture of Indians grew out of artificial theatrical conventions and of playwrights idealizing them as Noble Savages, or, in musical farces and pantomimes, as fancifully imagined exotics.;As the 19th Century began, the new form called melodrama continued to feature the Noble Savage, as well as the Pathetic Dusky Lady, a new character stereotype, who was often involved with a white lover. Legendary heroines as well as the historical Pocahontas were repeatedly dramatized.;Displacement of tribes caused by the Indian Removal Bill of 1830 may account for increasing focus on Indians in the second quarter of the century. Dozens of Indian plays appeared, many of them stressing the current notion that the Indians were a dying race.;Immigration and Westward expansion caused new antagonism toward Indians, which in the theatre brought on the deep-dyed redskin villain and the displaced drunken parasite. Before the Civil War, burlesques of the Indian plays' melodramatic excesses effectively stemmed the flood of such pieces.;The 1870s saw a revival of anti-Indian feeling in melodrama villains, probably as a result of public sentiment favoring the Plains Wars and the government's Indian reservation policy. But in the last quarter of the century, a rising tide of pro-Indian interest and the influence of Realism and the local color movement inspired playwrights to portray Indians as realistic, believable human beings.;Although the traditional stereotypes persisted in plays, operas, and vaudeville sketches about Indians, the most extreme racist versions passed on to the films, and the 20th-century theatre began to dramatize more humane and clear-sighted views of Native American.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
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Program
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Theatre
