RuPaul's Drag Race Reflection

Latrice Royale and Dida Ritz Lip-Sync

            Strings and Bui’s article offers critical context for one of my favorite shows. The authors highlight the racialized constructs that dark-skinned contestants on RuPaul’s Drag Race are expected to uphold in order to succeed in the competition. This construct appears as what is considered a “protocol” of racial “realness,” or “authenticity.” At the same time, the objective of the show is meant to play with the fluidity of gender roles as drag queens. The light-skinned queens are encouraged to step outside the confines of gender and race, while the dark-skinned queens succeed only if they do so with gender while simultaneously personifying the “naturalized” racial stereotypes to which they have been pigeonholed by the judges. The third season seems to have set the height of this standard for the show, which is why I think it would be interesting to apply the same analyses to later seasons of RuPaul’s Drag Race.

Similar situations have arisen throughout the seasons. The “clique” notion of Heathers vs Boogers in Season 3 seems to have resurfaced in Season 5 with “Ro-Laska-Tox,” the clique named for three light-skinned queens, Roxxy Andrews, Alaska Thunderfvck, and Detox Icunt, at least until Michelle Visage, one of the judges, heavily chided them for forming the group (possibly due to the criticisms the show received from the third season).

An instance where a dark-skinned queen was encouraged to fulfill racialized roles is in the case of Latrice Royale from Season 4. She was regularly applauded for playing the role of a stereotyped black Southern Baptist woman, with hands lifted in the air, clapping, and singing “Jesus is a Biscuit/ Let him sop you up,” as if in church. In the “Frock the Vote” episode, the contestants were asked to create a character as presidential candidates and stand at podiums, answering questions in the style of a political debate. Chad Michaels, a 40-year-old white queen plays Chad “the Lady Pimp” Michaels, a funky, 70s-inspired character who was “one of the first transgender dancers on the Soul Train.” Latrice Royale plays a more somber, no-nonsense candidate. While the judges loved Michaels’ “joke character” as a “fully-realized human being,” Latrice was critiqued that “she didn’t have a character” and ended up on the bottom, at which she had to lip-sync in order to stay in the competition. The lip-sync was performed to the song “I’ve Got to Use My Imagination” by Gladys Knight. Latrice’s performance echoed the high energy dancing one might see in a black Southern Baptist church, while Dida Ritz, the other drag performer, danced like a pop “superstar… performing to an arena.” One of the on-looking queens even commented that “Latrice was taking me to church!” She stayed in the competition while Dida Ritz was asked to go home.

Reflection on Goldberg: The First Decade of the New Century

Performance art in the first decade of the twenty-first century saw an increase in popularity. Goldberg explains that post September 11, 2001 a, “multiculturalism that had marked academic and curatorial research since the 1980s, broadening the scope of the Western European canon in art history and criticism, increased exponentially” (p 226). I’m curious how the attack on the World Trade Center had an effect on curation in museums, galleries, etc? For artists, especially performance artists, whose practice often transposes an inherent political agency, would that mean an added responsibility? 
I find the conversation involving the necessity to archive performance art and how it changed the dynamic of the museum to be rather interesting. As Goldberg explains, “for the first time archivists, registrars and conservators…had to confront the complexities of displaying, collecting, preserving and explaining materials that had so profoundly shaped artistic developments in the final decades of the twentieth century, yet which, paradoxically, was ephemeral and almost invisible” (p227). I wonder if the ephemerality of performance adds to its agency? Does a performance lose its potency when the moment passes? Or can it retain it’s power through documentation? Is there something lost through this documentation process? It seems these questions elicit greater responsibility from those archivists, curators, directors, etc. 

RuPaul's Drag Race

            Strings’ article on RuPaul’s Drag Race discussed the topics of race and authenticity as it related to the perceived idea that the Heathers were, not only allowed, but encouraged to take risks by performing stereotypical acts that represented races other than their own, while the Boogers were strongly discouraged to take the same actions. The idea that gender was mutable was generally established, yet the idea that race was mutable was only believed by the Heathers. Strings’ article clearly brought forth the racial inequalities in the show and gave multiple examples that proved the blatant racism and mistreatment of the individuals that were labeled the Boogers. Multiple layers of negative connotation surrounded the terms “Heathers” and “Boogers.” The racial inequalities bled through the paper as Strings discussed specific examples in the television show. For example, RuPaul discouraged Yara from performing as Amy Whitehouse because Winehouse was not Puerto Rican, yet continuously awarded Manila’s performances as characters that were not Filipino. It surprised me that this was the case and throughout the article, I continued to question why the white/Asian characters were encouraged to perform as characters from different races, while the black/brown characters were discouraged. On page 825, Strings discussed the idea that that the black/brown individuals on the show inhabited “bodies historically deemed inherently non-fungible or inassimilable to whiteness.” In other words, the black/brown bodies were marked with race, while the white/Asian bodies could be perceived as racially ambiguous.

The idea of an inherent racial authenticity that was ultimately based on stereotypical examples of specific races, played a significant role in determining whether the characters were utilizing their ability to perform stereotypical versions of specific races. The Boogers were forced to remain true to their own perceived racial authenticity, while the Heathers were allowed to transcend theirs. Even in an example of three contestants who were all Latina. Yara and Alexis were forced to be Boogers and continuously perform Latina characters, while Carmen was “racially-unmarked” because of her light skin and lack of a Spanish accent.

Overall, the article was very convincing of the obvious racial undertones of the show and produced questions as to how this show is somewhat reflective of American society. It appears that the character’s levels of perceived “whiteness” or racial ambiguity were the determining factor in being allowed to temporarily disown one’s own race and adopted that of another. Racial superiority was apparent throughout the reading; the white/Asian race was obviously treated as superior to the black/brown. What confuses me the most about the show is that it’s hosted and presumably controlled by a black drag queen, yet the black/brown characters appear to be more harshly judged. Why would RuPaul, as a black queer, perpetuate the idea of black/brown races as inferior to white/Asian races and legitimize the idea that race is such a fixed aspect of black/brown individuals that they cannot even attempt to perform as individuals of other races, yet the white/Asian characters could? Is he perhaps simple a product of his culture or is he simply acting as a realistic judge of these performances?