Saul Flores

El Diablo on the streets of Portobelo, Panama.

This Panamanian Carnival tradition manages to make blackface ‘playful’ and ’emancipatory’

February 20, 2015Music

In Portobelo, Panama, a local spin on the Carnival holiday celebrates Africans who escaped from Spanish slavery. But while it features “Diablos” with whips and kids wearing blackface, an American academic who works with locals says it’s a powerful, celebratory metaphor.

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