Word.ws English Dictionary

yellowface

yellowface noun: a style of theatrical makeup in which a white actor yellows their face in order to portray an East Asian.

Noun

yellowface (uncountable)

  1. A style of theatrical makeup in which a white actor yellows their face in order to portray an East Asian.

Origin of yellowface

From yellow + face, based on earlier blackface.

Words formed from yellowface

Questions about yellowface

What does yellowface mean?
Yellowface means a style of theatrical makeup in which a white actor yellows their face in order to portray an East Asian.
What part of speech is yellowface?
Yellowface is a noun.

Words near yellowface in the dictionary

  1. yellowen
  2. yellower
  3. yellowest
  4. yelloweye
  5. yelloweyes
  6. yellowface
  7. yellowfacing
  8. yellowfin
  9. yellowfin sole
  10. yellowfin soles
  11. yellowfin tuna

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: yellowface (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: “yellowface.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/yellowface. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.