Race

Race

1. Blackness

   • Old churches often depicted the devil as black
   • Seen as the "other"
   • "Or else the devil will make a grandsire out of you"

2. Othello

   • Othello and Desdemona are dichtomous
   • Looked down upon due to race
     • Witches, animals etc.
   • Incongrous with the white people surrounding him
   • Puts Othello on the outside
   • Often referred to with animal imagery
     • eg: "barbary horse"

3. White's are afraid of the "other"

   • Mixing of races is seen as contamination
   • "extravagant and wheeling stranger"
     • Othello is the stranger, the idea of black being outside the norm

4. Sterotypes

   • Barbaric
   • Heathen
   • Uncivilised

5. Iago's descriptions of Othello

   • "Old black ram tupping your white ewe"
   • "Barbary horse"
   • "the devil"
   • "the moor"