The antecedents of the musical can be traced to the 19th-century in forms of entertainment blended the traditions of French ballet, acrobatics, and dramatic interludes. The content of many musicals is taken from famous books and the performers are dominated by white people. However, the musical Hamilton is a good example of a cultural object that updates and becomes more inclusive to contemporary audiences. Lin-Manuel Miranda has combined the black pop music to the traditional musical, used plenty of black actors, and expressed an idea of anti-slavery in the musical Hamilton. Compared with the previous theater culture which had a great negative stereotype of African Americans, the musical Hamilton has shown the inclusiveness in the aspect of both performing art and the content of it, which is a success of remixing the current idea of inclusiveness and equity.
Historically, musicals, as an art for the upper class, were impossible for black people to perform. Even today, the ethnicity breakdown of the performing artists is mostly white people. According to the statistics of Zippia, about 69.0% of the performing artists are white people, but only 7.5% of them are black people. This career is highly dominated by the white people. However, Hamilton has made a difference to it. Combining white figures with contemporary music and a cast consisting mostly black and brown actors helps to establish Hamilton’s America as a place where all are welcome to celebrate her history. Also, like Stanley stated that “These forces combined to create positive conceptions of black Americans and have produced a greatly heightened sensitivity to negative stereotypes.” Similarly, the musical Hamilton reminds us of the work done by black people along the founding history of America and strengthens the idea that all people’s voices can be heard in this nation.
In the musical Hamilton, the producer Lin-Manuel Miranda also added the elements of black pop culture into traditional performing art. There is a lot of rap music that serves as a part of the demonstration of the story of Alexander Hamilton. Also, the musical Hamilton used parody as a powerful tool to satirize the want of Britain to control America. Krasner addressed that “Bakhtin describes parody as the employment of another person’s speech, introducing ‘into that other speech an intention which is directly opposed to the original one. The second voice, having lodged in the other speech, clashes antagonistically with the original, host voice and forces it to serve directly opposite aims’.” The singing part of the British King is a good example of parody in the musical Hamilton, which is a great ironic figure in this musical, showing that the British Empire didn’t believe that the young America could gain independence and be liberated by Washington. This usage of elements of black pop culture is a novel creation added to the traditional musicals by Lin-Manuel Miranda. Typically, the traditional musicals are composed by songs and orchestras. Compared to them, the musical Hamilton has a more diverse form and is designed for more inclusive audiences. Not only the upper-class, a more broad variety of audiences could enjoy this musical.
The perspective of this musical, which is about the foundation of America, is unique. The main character, Hamilton, is a representative of people of color who contributes to the revolution of America. Like what is pointed out by Young, “Hamilton’s most important national influence is in providing the discernment of art to bridge the American divide over racism”. In the musical Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda has found a way to rewrite America’s foundational history to allow people of all different backgrounds to feel they belong to the nation no matter their race, ethnicity, or immigration status. While the musical keeps many elements of America’s origin story, it spreads ownership of that story beyond the exclusive property of whites. Hamilton allows people of color to see themselves in the country’s history. Especially, the identity of Hamilton has been mentioned a lot of times in the musical, which has strengthened this idea. In the song Alexander Hamilton, it is sung that
“how could a bastard, orphan/son of a whore and Scotsman/dropped in the middle of a forgotten spot in the Caribbean/by providence impoverished, in squalor/grow up to be a hero and a scholar?”
Being not a white people from Europe, Hamilton still played an important role in the foundation of America. This fact is convincing that the foundation of America not only attribute to the contribution of the white, but also people of color. As a result, the musical Hamilton has attached importance to the influence of the people of color, and has helped the audience to understand this fact.
Some people pointed out that the depiction of anti-slavery is insufficient in the musical Hamilton. Some part of the history of Abolition is not included in this musical, despite that it is definitely an important part of American history. For example, Monteiro believed that “despite the proliferation of black and brown bodies onstage, not a single enslaved or free person of color exists as a character in this play.” There’s no direct portrait of the Abolition or plot about people fighting with slavery in the musical Hamilton. In addition, Monteiro disputed that “The play can thus be seen as insidiously invested in trumpeting the deeds of wealthy white men, at the expense of everyone else, despite its multiracial casting…Sadly, that is where this revolutionary musical fails to push any envelopes: the history it tells is essentially the same whitewashed version of the founding era that has lost favor among many academic and public historians. Here there is only space for white heroes.” The non-negligible role of Washington in the Abolition is also not mentioned in the musical Hamilton. However, just like what Lin-Manuel Miranda commented, he just skipped some of the history in order to make this musical more interesting, which is completely reasonable for artistic purpose. Miranda also expressed the opposition of slavery in the part of satirizing Thomas Jefferson. As a result, there’s no point to doubt the racial standpoint by arguing that the musical Hamilton doesn’t attach importance to anti-slavery. The musical Hamilton has successfully pulled people’s attention to a hero of people of color in the foundation of America and played an important role in the education of the teenagers.
In a word, the musical Hamilton is a good example of a cultural object that successfully remixed with modern performing art to make the traditional form of performing art, musical, more inclusive to the diverse audience nowadays, expressing racial equity to the public and especially to the teenagers. First of all, Lin-Manuel Miranda employs a cast of mainly people of color to show the diversity of this show, which has changed the situation of white-dominated careers of theater artists. Miranda also blended the traditional performing art with black pop music, adding parody and rap to express the idea in the musical. In the perspective of narrative, the musical Hamilton has a main character from people of color and demonstrates the significant role played by them in the foundation of America. Although some people argue that Miranda didn’t add the content of Abolition or express the opposition of slavery. However, I believe that Miranda just made some adjustments to the real history for the artistic reason and he actually addressed the disagreement of slavery in the musical Hamilton. The musical Hamilton not only began an era of more inclusive musicals, but also had great significance in educating teenagers the important role of people of color in American history, which can help them to set up a worldview of equity and inclusiveness.
Annotated Bibliography
Lemons, J. Stanley. “Black Stereotypes as Reflected in Popular Culture, 1880-1920.” American Quarterly, vol. 29, no. 1, 1977, pp. 102–16. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/2712263. Accessed 16 Nov. 2022.
In the journal of Stanley, he discussed the stereotypes in the popular culture in the US. The first black character, James Crow, in the musical has reflected the malicious impression on the African Americans. Later, the black characters, who were occurring in the comics, acted as entertainment for the white people. Then, the depiction of black people even transformed from a human to an ugly and animal-like feature. After the rebellion of the black people in the song “All Coons”, Stanley also analyzed the illusion of the songs about life in the south, which was actually full of oppression of black people. Although after the rebellion and the renovation, the situation has changed a lot, we should still be sensitive to the negative stereotypes.
I want to use this journal by Stanley to help illustrate the black stereotype before, especially in performing art. The musical I want to analyze, Hamilton, made good changes to this situation and successfully combined black culture with traditional musical instead. This is a good example of a cultural object that makes a good suit to modern society and transforms into a better version. By referring to the journal of Stanley, I could have insights of how the performing art was hundred years ago. Also, this will provide a strong comparison of the use of black music and actors in Hamilton to address my viewpoint that this musical is a successful renewed cultural object.
Krasner, David. “Parody and Double Consciousness in the Language of Early Black Musical Theatre.” African American Review, vol. 29, no. 2, 1995, pp. 317–23. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3042310. Accessed 16 Nov. 2022.
In this journal by Krasner, he analyzed the initial black art and how it has transformed along the time. From the first “coon song”, black musical theatre is a powerful rebellion against the stereotype that white people consider them as uncivilized or not a proper human. In the black performing art, parody and irony are really important features, which are also disliked by the white people at that time. Over the time, black artists have built their own cultural art and utilize parody as a tool to express their ideas in their artworks against the previous de-humanizing effects of racism.
This journal of Krasner also provides analysis of the history of black performing art. To be more specific, parody is an important feature of black performing art. In the musical Hamilton, Lin-Mannual Miranda has added rap and black pop music in it, as well as the strong parody and irony by the black actors. I would like to relate Hamilton to the journal of Krasner to analyze the usage of black performing art and parody to show how Miranda has successfully combined the black performing art with traditional musicals to make an innovation of the cultural object.
Hamilton: An American Musical – Its National Influence as Art, William H. Young, https://www.nas.org/blogs/article/hamilton_an_american_musical_its_national_influence_as_art
This article by William H. Young mainly discusses the significance of the musical Hamilton in the history of the American theater and also the education of the teenagers. He pointed out that instead of demonstrating the work done by white people during the foundation of America, the musical Hamilton has the main character as a people of color, and attaches importance to the effort of them, which has positive influence on the education for teenagers of inclusiveness and anti-discrimination. Additionally, Young refuted the point that the musical Hamilton skipped the part of slavery and agreed that Lin-Manuel Miranda had made wise adjustment for the historical content to put them on the stage.
I think the article by Young is really helpful if I cite it to my essay because I personally agree the point that Lin-Miranda Manuel hasn’t skipped the part of slavery. Actually, he has addressed the opposition of slavery in the second part of the musical about Thomas Jefferson. Also, I think the part about the perspective of the musical Hamilton is related to my point that letting a main character be people of color in a musical portraying the foundation of America. Young suggested that this musical is beneficial to the education of equity to the teenagers, which I totally agree and I believe that this is a successful cultural object that becomes suitable to a more diverse and broad audience.
“Color-Blind Casting”: Thomas Jefferson and the Erasure of the Black Past in Hamilton，by Lyra D. Monteiro, UC Press Blog, “Color-Blind Casting”: Thomas Jefferson and the Erasure of the Black Past in Hamilton – UC Press Blog
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