Before the 1830s, when blackface minstrelsy begins formally, African Americans, people whom we today would call African Americans, have been involved in local entertainment. They are the fiddlers at ...

To fully appreciate its legacy, we must look beyond the jingly chorus and confront the uncomfortable context of its creation and initial reception. Originally titled “One Horse Open Sleigh,” the song ...

“There have been two ways to look at things like minstrelsy. One way is to say: ‘Let’s forget it and look forward,’ and the other way is to say: ‘We will never forget,’” Louis Chude-Sokei said at the ...

Minstrelsy should be vociferously condemned but its centrality in American culture cannot be denied. “Jim Crow,” the name associated with the laws and practices of racial segregation, comes from a ...