With the war and influx of American GIs and Britain, not to mention their colonies, I stand by my statement for Britain as well.
What helps in the case of the UK is a larger percentage of their population lives in cities than the US too. Just by the math living in urban areas you’re just going to see more people and more people from outside your community will be come in.
True. A decade or two earlier might have been different: All the historical examples in this thread had my mind locked in to the thirties, not the fifties!
The Black and White Minstrel Show is a British light entertainment show on BBC prime-time television that ran from 1958 to 1978. The weekly variety show presented traditional American minstrel and country songs, as well as show tunes and music hall numbers, lavish costuming and often with cast members in blackface.
I mean let’s be real minstrel shows are explicitly a western concept. Go down another comment and I addressed the UK as well, but really that’s going to apply anywhere Americans were during WW2 as well.
arrow74@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
I can promise you that the vast majority of white Americans had seen a black person in the 1950s.
f314@lemmy.world 1 day ago
This is a British book, though
arrow74@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
With the war and influx of American GIs and Britain, not to mention their colonies, I stand by my statement for Britain as well.
What helps in the case of the UK is a larger percentage of their population lives in cities than the US too. Just by the math living in urban areas you’re just going to see more people and more people from outside your community will be come in.
f314@lemmy.world 1 day ago
True. A decade or two earlier might have been different: All the historical examples in this thread had my mind locked in to the thirties, not the fifties!
FishFace@piefed.social 1 day ago
I don’t think minstrel shows with black face were common in Britain?
It’s more likely that white British people took it as “much darker than the skin we’re assuming for people” which is enough to make the simile work.
undeadotter@sopuli.xyz 1 day ago
You’d be wrong on that I’m afraid:
Atomic@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
I know it’s difficult to grasp the idea that the world is larger than just the US. But you’ll juat have to try.
arrow74@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
I mean let’s be real minstrel shows are explicitly a western concept. Go down another comment and I addressed the UK as well, but really that’s going to apply anywhere Americans were during WW2 as well.
Atomic@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
The whole idea of minstrel shows was to mock africans. Seeing a white guy in blackface is not equivalent to seeing a black person.
zjti8eit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 22 hours ago
lies, lies! foreign countries are just made up for the movies