Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Race
- The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Race
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Note on Shakespeare Editions
- Chapter 1 Did the Concept of Race Exist for Shakespeare and His Contemporaries?
- Chapter 2 The Materials of Race
- Chapter 3 Barbarian Moors
- Chapter 4 Racist Humor and Shakespearean Comedy
- Chapter 5 Race in Shakespeare’s Histories
- Chapter 6 Race in Shakespeare’s Tragedies
- Chapter 7 Experimental Othello
- Chapter 8 Flesh and Blood
- Chapter 9 Was Sexuality Racialized for Shakespeare?
- Chapter 10 The Tempest and Early Modern Conceptions of Race
- Chapter 11 Shakespeare, Race, and Globalization
- Chapter 12 How to Think Like Ira Aldridge
- Chapter 13 What Is the History of Actors of Color Performing in Shakespeare in the UK?
- Chapter 14 Actresses of Color and Shakespearean Performance
- Chapter 15 Othello
- Chapter 16 Are Shakespeare’s Plays Racially Progressive?
- Chapter 17 How Have Post-Colonial Approaches Enriched Shakespeare’s Works?
- Chapter 18 Is It Possible to Read Shakespeare through Critical White Studies?
- Further Reading
- Index
Chapter 10 - The Tempest and Early Modern Conceptions of Race
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 February 2021
- The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Race
- The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Race
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Note on Shakespeare Editions
- Chapter 1 Did the Concept of Race Exist for Shakespeare and His Contemporaries?
- Chapter 2 The Materials of Race
- Chapter 3 Barbarian Moors
- Chapter 4 Racist Humor and Shakespearean Comedy
- Chapter 5 Race in Shakespeare’s Histories
- Chapter 6 Race in Shakespeare’s Tragedies
- Chapter 7 Experimental Othello
- Chapter 8 Flesh and Blood
- Chapter 9 Was Sexuality Racialized for Shakespeare?
- Chapter 10 The Tempest and Early Modern Conceptions of Race
- Chapter 11 Shakespeare, Race, and Globalization
- Chapter 12 How to Think Like Ira Aldridge
- Chapter 13 What Is the History of Actors of Color Performing in Shakespeare in the UK?
- Chapter 14 Actresses of Color and Shakespearean Performance
- Chapter 15 Othello
- Chapter 16 Are Shakespeare’s Plays Racially Progressive?
- Chapter 17 How Have Post-Colonial Approaches Enriched Shakespeare’s Works?
- Chapter 18 Is It Possible to Read Shakespeare through Critical White Studies?
- Further Reading
- Index
Summary
The Tempest reflects early modern European trends in racial perceptions, especially in the play’s foregrounding of Caliban, who embodies many of the era’s cultural prejudices. Although Caliban was born on a remote island and is its sole human inhabitant when Prospero and Miranda arrive, his sexual assault on Miranda and their contempt for Caliban as savage, pagan, monstrous, and perhaps cannibalistic provokes Prospero to enslave him. This chapter contextualizes those demeaning categories in light of Caliban’s African and perhaps American roots. Among the developments that profoundly shaped England’s (and presumably Shakespeare’s) attitudes toward “Blackamoores” were the increasingly numerous Africans arriving as offshoots of the international slave trade. Concurrently, Spain’s and Portugal’s settlements in Central and South America and their exploitation, often enslavement, of the natives strongly influenced English policies toward racial “others” at home and in England’s colonies, as did Iberian America’s extensive importation of African slaves.
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- The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Race , pp. 139 - 157Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2021
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