Smith, Ian. "The cliché of race." Throughlines. www.throughlines.org/suite-content/the-cliche-of-race. [Date accessed].

The cliché of race

A necessary moral objective and pedagogic requirement that begins by making race visible in Shakespeare’s texts.

Download the transcript
Ian Smith
University of Southern California

How is the cliché of race developed in the early modern literary canon? The emphasis on skin and its emergence to prominence represents an important shift in the history of racial ideology that, in the premodern era, had relied on religion, geography, and language. Complaints about the injustice and unoriginality of this topsy-turvy, upside-down racial cliché have been set aside since its maintenance and durability are, in fact, the cultural goal. By asking students to interrogate the role of the cliché, they are given the opportunity to understand how race is understood as a form of cliché itself.

Further learning

Essay

Racialized skin in Shakespeare

The necessity of excavating and exposing the forms of whiteness that both drive the cliché of race and offer students opportunities for more sharply defined social critique and self-interrogation.

Ian Smith
Reading list

Reading race in Shakespeare

Suggested readings from Ian Smith for an in-depth understanding of the "cliché of race."

Ian Smith

Recommended

RaceB4Race Highlight

Shakespeare and the War on Terror

Ambereen Dadabhoy investigates the long history of the logics of the War on Terror and how these structure narratives about Muslims across the centuries.

Ambereen Dadabhoy
Video

Shakespeare and the art of bookmaking

Suzanne Coley offers her creative insights on interpreting Shakespeare’s sonnets through the art of bookmaking.

Suzanne Coley
Reading list

Teaching racialized genders

Early modern Turk plays, travel narratives, medical writings, and drama are rich sources of this history of racialization. This reading list compiled by Abdulhamit Arvas offers useful excerpts and critical analysis to include in your syllabus.

Abdulhamit Arvas