ABSTRACT
Until the 1980s, it was rare to see a white man semi-naked in popular fictions. The art gallery, sports and pornography offered socially sanctio ned or cordo ned-off images, but the cinema, the major visual narrative form of the twenti eth century, only did so in particular cases. This was not so with non -white male bodies. In the Western, the plant ation drama and the jungle adventure film, the non -white body is routinely on display. Dance numbers with body-baring chorus boys (up to and includi ng Madonna's videos) most often used non -white (including 'Latin' ) dancers. Paul Robeson , the first major African-American acting star (as opposed to featured player), appeared to rso-naked or more for large sections in nearly all his films, on a scale unimaginable with white male stars. The latt er might be glimpsed for a brief sho t washing or coming out of a swimming pool or the sea (at which point they instantly put on a robe ), but a star like Rudolph Valentino (in any case Latin and often cast as a non-white ) or a film like Picnic (1955) stand out as exceptions, I together with two genres: the boxing fil m (not really discussed here) and the adventure film in a colonial setting with a star possessed of a champion or built body.
