brownface
/ˈbɹaʊnˌfeɪs/
brownface noun: a style of theatrical makeup in which a white person colours the face brown in order to represent somebody of another race.
Noun
brownface (uncountable)
- A style of theatrical makeup in which a white person colours the face brown in order to represent somebody of another race.
- The problem isn’t so much Lancaster’s unconvincing brownface makeup — though it looks as if it had been applied by the same heavy laborers who blacktopped Laurence Olivier for “Othello” — as it is the extremely un-Leonardian softness of his presence.2007 September 2, Terrence Rafferty, “Elmore Leonard’s Men of Few Words, in a Few Words”, in New York Times
Origin of brownface
From brown + face, based on earlier blackface.
Questions about brownface
- What does brownface mean?
- Brownface means a style of theatrical makeup in which a white person colours the face brown in order to represent somebody of another race.
- What part of speech is brownface?
- Brownface is a noun.
- How do you pronounce brownface?
- Brownface is pronounced /ˈbɹaʊnˌfeɪs/.
Words near brownface in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: brownface (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “brownface.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/brownface. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.