ABSTRACT
In many cases, though, establishing direct ties between racialized artifacts and colonial contexts is fraught with complications, as evidence is scant or inconclusive. Form, function, and materiality of font and altarpiece thus play a key role in articulating the racial codes they promote. In contrast, the highly customized baptismal font reveals subtle changes to its iconography, as reflected in a repositioning of the most important ethnic prop, the turban placed at Deacon's Phillip's feet, which encodes the cultural and religious roots the Ethiopian severs by receiving the sacrament. Recent histories of emotions have studied how pre-bureaucratic societies relied on dramatic, ritualized displays of emotion to consolidate existing power structures. Subservience, dissent, forgiveness, and gratitude were expressed using a vocabulary of ritualized displays which made emotions visible, recognizable, and recordable. The Blackfaced flagellators offer a prime example of performed emotion as most of their poses seem staged and self-aware rather than impulsive.
