Heroines of Norwegian silent cinema: Nordic femininity and conventions of cinematic whiteness

Abstract

Framed within studies of whiteness in film, this article investigates the positioning and performance of the female lead in Norwegian silent cinema. Richard Dyer’s arguments on the importance of staging, not least lighting, of the Hollywood heroine to convey ethereal and moral aspects of ‘superior’ whiteness, are central to the analysis. The question is how the heroines are positioned as white: aesthetically, narratively and intersectionally in regard to class, gender and ethnicity. Complex or unstable class and ethnicity performances in the 1910s give way to a more indisputably white heroine in the late 1920s. In conclusion, the analysis supports the claim that whiteness encompasses most of the heroines, if not always according to the conventions of lighting.