Whitaker, Cord J. "Blackness as metaphor." Throughlines. www.throughlines.org/suite-content/blackness-as-metaphor. [Date accessed].

Blackness as metaphor

The metaphor of Blackness deployed in medieval epics was a rhetorical tool that aided early racial formation.

Download the transcript
Cord J. Whitaker
Wellesley College

Many medieval epics regale their audiences with the phenomenon of skin color change, often in the context of religious conversion. The metaphor of Blackness at play in these epics offers a way to understand how phenotypic traits were used as markers of good or evil in the literature and culture of medieval Europe. The long history of racial construction has its roots in how Blackness is leveraged as a metaphor over hundreds of years.

Further learning

Video

Where were the Black people in the Middle Ages?

Records and texts from the period offer insight into a rich and cosmopolitan medieval Europe, where there were not only Black people, but they held positions of power and prestige.

Cord J. Whitaker

Recommended

Video

What is the "curse" of Ham?

The curse of Ham myth is rooted in some of the nascent formations of race and racism. This story—its revisions and retellings—continues to shape a set of beliefs about the inferiority of Black people, which persists in our world today.

Chouki El Hamel
Video

Race-making and the preservation of power

The history of racial and religious caste in Spain echoes through contemporary far-right political parties

Mayte Green-Mercado
Syllabus

Race in the European Middle Ages

This course explores the changing patterns, meanings, and uses of racializing discourses in medieval Europe from the 10th through 15th centuries.

Geraldine Heng

Selected annotated bibliography