Black Americana Man Weighing Baby In Kitchen Real Photo Postcard
"A Bran New Coon In Town," copyrighted in 1898 by Knaffl & Bro. of Knoxville, Tennessee, exemplifies the widespread anti-Black racism prevalent in the United States during the Jim Crow era. The postcard's title employs a deeply offensive racial slur, "coon," while the image itself, depicting African Americans in a staged domestic scene, aligns with the grotesque caricatures popularized by minstrelsy.
These "coon cards" were a potent form of propaganda, widely distributed and instrumental in normalizing harmful stereotypes across American society. They reinforced racist portrayals of Black individuals as ignorant, buffoonish, and childlike, thereby justifying racial segregation, violence, and the systemic oppression inherent in the Jim Crow South. This visual culture played a critical role in perpetuating a dehumanizing narrative that endured for decades.
These "coon cards" were a potent form of propaganda, widely distributed and instrumental in normalizing harmful stereotypes across American society. They reinforced racist portrayals of Black individuals as ignorant, buffoonish, and childlike, thereby justifying racial segregation, violence, and the systemic oppression inherent in the Jim Crow South. This visual culture played a critical role in perpetuating a dehumanizing narrative that endured for decades.
