Sideshows

A sideshow is an attraction, often attached to a fair or circus, featuring unusual acts and performers. It has historically combined live performance, spectacle, and the display of human difference.

Freak show: A show that exhibited people with unusual bodies or abilities as a public spectacle. Human exhibitions were among the most recognizable and controversial sideshow attractions.
P. T. Barnum: An American showman who built a career in museums, touring exhibitions, and the Barnum & Bailey Circus. Barnum helped popularize the commercial exhibition of unusual performers and curiosities.
Chang and Eng Bunker: Conjoined twins born in Siam who became internationally known performers and businessmen in the nineteenth century. Their touring exhibition helped make the phrase “Siamese twins” widely known.
Disability rights movement: A social and political movement seeking equal rights, access, and full participation for disabled people. Its challenges to segregation and objectification altered the terms on which bodily difference could be exhibited.
Freaks (1932 film): A 1932 Tod Browning film featuring performers associated with sideshows and circuses. Its cast and depiction of a sideshow community challenged and unsettled contemporary audiences.
Fire breathing: A performance skill in which a performer appears to exhale fire by spraying fuel across a flame. Fire breathing exemplifies the hazardous physical feats used to draw crowds.
American Museum (New York City): A New York City entertainment museum operated by P. T. Barnum from 1841 to 1865. Its eclectic exhibits and live entertainments anticipated features later associated with sideshows.
Tom Thumb: The stage name of Charles Stratton, a performer with dwarfism who toured with P. T. Barnum. His carefully crafted theatrical persona made him one of the era's most famous attractions.
Medical model of disability: A framework that treats disability primarily as an individual's medical condition or impairment. Sideshows often framed performers' bodies as medical curiosities rather than people with agency.
The Greatest Show on Earth: A 1952 Cecil B. DeMille film portraying life in a large American circus. Its circus spectacle helped sustain popular images of the tent show and its attractions.

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