Abstract
This essay analyses theatre's return to Kingston, Jamaica in the years following the Emancipation of the slave population in 1834. From town council discussions about theatrical infrastructure to journalistic warnings about idle women, theatre provided an opportunity for Kingston's white settler population to affirm and stabilise gender, racial, and social hierarchies during a period of radical transformation. The essay begins with a brief overview of theatre in Kingston before Emancipation. It then offers a lengthier analysis of the intense affects that swirled around the construction of a new theatre, reading communal debates about the theatre's social function as evidence of deeper concerns about Jamaica's position within the British Empire. The second half of the essay turns from theatre building to theatre artists, paying attention to the specific challenges that greeted the first Anglo-American companies to visit post-Emancipation Jamaica.
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