Robert Bogdan establishes a historical analysis in his writing Freak Show: Presenting Human Oddities for Amusement and Profit. An argument presented is that the predominance and popularity of the freak show in the golden era, approximately 1870 to 1920, was only made possible through the use of theatrics and other unconventional techniques to fabricate ‘monsters’ that differed from the norm of society. The individual’s backstory, their attire, and the stage on which they stood contributed towards forming how they were perceived. The sympathy of the spectator was drawn by having the performer display their talent or having them accomplish a task that would otherwise be impossible for someone with their specific disability, whether mental or physical, to be able to complete. As a creation of cultural and historical conditioning, freakishness morphed to the changing ideologies and norms most notably at the turn of the century between the 19th and 20th century. …show more content…
Morals would over time become more ethical and well refined, and the performance would have to be refined. With that, the examination of past can become difficult if examined only from a modern day moral
Cullen, Frank, Florence Hackman, and Donald McNeilly. Vaudeville, Old & New: An Encyclopedia of Variety Performers in America. New York: Routledge, 2007. Print.
people today would have no morals, since there would be nothing to have based them
86). I like his definition of the word freak show, which is “an elaborate and calculated social construction that utilized performance and fabrication as well as deeply held cultural beliefs” (p. 86). The freak show was a place in which white people could come and recognize their difference and privilege and reaffirm their superiority over individuals who were different from them, who fall into the realm of the ‘other.’ It causes me to wonder that if some individuals saw this as a morally unjust thing, why was it such a popular phenomenon that had a great turn out? And it takes me back to what a friend said, that the only way things sell, is because there is a high demand for it. These freak shows were able to thrive in society, because some individuals needed to know and confirm that they were indeed higher than some other saps out there, whatever they had, they had it better than others. Yes these spectators were being duped into pay high prices to see people with highly exaggerated features, but they did not mind, because why they were there, was to have an opportunity to look at themselves and say Thank God, we are not like them and to reassert their dominance over the
In her 1997 article “Extraordinary Bodies: Figuring physical disability in American culture and literature” Rosemarie Garland Thomson explores the spectacle that was the 19th and 20th-century freak show. According to Thomson, the American freak show served as a “figure of otherness upon which spectators could displace anxieties and uncertainties about their own identities” (Thomson). The stars of the show were seen as freaks of culture, often crippled by medical deformities that left them on the periphery of society (Thomson). It was these spectacles that gave the American people one collective identity, helping distance themselves from the “anarchic body” that was being paraded. (Thomson). Although the traditional model of the freak show met its death in the 1950s, the Jim Rose Circus managed to successfully reinvent the spectacle for a 21st-century audience.
I agree with the popular saying that we reflect our past, because it is true our generation today is the way it is due to the past. Authors George Gascoigne, Thomas Lodge, and Richard Linche wrote poems that are a vivid example of this. In their poems And if I did, what then, Pluck the fruit and taste the pleasure, and The last so sweet, so balmy, so delicious all discuss issues that we face today even though they are in a different time period. These poems mainly debate the issue of being a rake, or a libertine, and the issue of sinning. In that time a libertine was considered an immoral person, someone who commits adultery or fornication, does bad things, someone who takes advantage
A circus is a magical place where it seems like nothing negative exists. Though accidents in the circus are rare, they happen. For example, in June of 2013, “ Aerialist Sara Gyyard Guillot, 31, fell 94 feet in Las Vegas and died before she got to the hospital” (providence.journal.com). Even more stories of death-defying acts ending in certain death have appeared over the years. Circuses can fill people with joy, but tragedy can strike at any moment. Just like Sara Guillot, the narrator’s mother in the story “The Leap” by Louise Erdrich, she thrived in the life of a circus performer. In the story, the reader walks through the misfortune of wind striking a circus performance, the narrator defines the astonishing achievement of her mother and how her mother handled her life even after the lightning struck. The narrator likewise demonstrates to the reader why she traveled back home to her mother using the literary element personification. In the story, “ The Leap” by Louise Erdrich, personification assists to
Angels in America is a play by Tony Kushner exploring themes of identity, power and stasis versus change in the setting of McCarthy era San Francisco. The play looks at homosexuality and homophobia, race, ethnicity and the AIDs crisis through exploring motifs of religion (especially Judaism and Mormonism), politics and law. This essay will explore how these themes could be examined and expressed through stage magic and circus arts in the context of a production inspired by Part One: Millennium Approaches of the two part play. A circus interpretation of Angels in America raises issues of casting skills and practical stunts performed live, demands consideration for set requirements and digital effects, music, and for style of process devising work. Kushner’s playwright’s notes for Angels in America describe “moments of magic”, referring to the appearance and disappearance of characters on stage, hallucination sequences and the dramatic conclusion of the play featuring an angel crashing through the ceiling of a small New York apartment. He states that “the moments of magic are to be fully realized, as bits of wonderful theatrical illusion – which means it’s okay if the wires show, and maybe it’s good that they do, but the magic should at the same time be thoroughly amazing” (Kushner, 1992, p11). It was this statement of aesthetic that inspired me to apply the themes of the play to creating circus and classic stage magic.
The degree of transcendence attained by a particular performance depends largely on the relationship the audience has with the performer. Claude McKay’s Harlem dancer is initially framed through the gaze of a group of rambunctious youths, densely packed into a Harlem night-club. The young men accompanied by their prostitutes cheer and laugh, debasing the dance to a lewd exhibition. Where the seductive disrobement of the dancer would be thought to warrant a level of hypnotic control over the viewers, their capacity for the manipulation of her image indicates that the performance holds little to no significance. While “perfection” is attained by the sway of her half-clothed body, rather than a testame...
Monsters, mutants, oddities, weirdos, and freaks are terms associated with people with deformities. A person with a deformity was usually considered a monstrosity. In society, the focus of monstrosity has been commonly external and the internal aspects have become an accepted lifestyle if one’s external appearance is beautiful by society’s standards. If one is considered a monstrosity, their personality is usually portrayed as evil and wicked. In Tod Robbin’s 1923 book Spurs and Tod Browning’s 1932 film Freaks, the damaging effects of external and internal monstrosity are explored. The main male character, a midget, and the main female character, a“normal”sized beauty, in Freaks and Spurs experienced external and internal monstrosity throughout the plot, respectively. The origin of monstrosity appeared to have been a negative connotation in many different societies. There are many schools of theory that would help one understand the concept of monstrosity. However, psychological criticism seemed to coincide with the theme of monstrosity.
Slide, Anthony. The Encyclopedia of Vaudeville. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1994. Google Books. Web. 1 May 2014.
carrying strict moral guidelines, resonates in all ages and eras because of the ways in which they
Freak shows, also known as sideshows, were a form of entertainment as early as the 16th century, but did not become commonplace until the late 18th century and early 19th century. As places in England and the United States became more industrialized, the popularity of the display of human oddities and curiosities increased. As sideshows died down in the late 19th century due to ethical issues, many believed that they were a thing of the past. While people no longer go see freaks within the confined boundaries of the freak show, the discourse surrounding ‘freaks’ and ‘freak culture’ still exists. We still continue to have the same fascination with those with bodily differences. The structure of the freak show has carried on to the 21st century in the form of reality television and other forms of entertainment. The separation of normative and non-normative bodies, and the notion of
For example, some aspects of the behaviour of nobles at the court of Louis XIV were seen. as entirely normal then. Today they would be seen as seriously. deviant. The snare There will be two species of humans - those with genetic enhancements.
The thought of the circus sideshow acts seems like a hazy memory in the history of America. However, many television programs are recreating a modern version of P. T. Barnum’s freak shows. People today have the same curiosity or maybe even more curiosity than the people of the past to see these types of shows. The strangest part of today’s society is that there has never been a time when viewing the strange was so accessible. Therefore, my personal perspective is that freak shows still exist in the 21st century however they are less barbaric and in a different form than they once were in the past.
Stoddart, H., 2000. Rings of Desire: Circus history and representation. Manchester: Manchester University press .