Performative voices of scholars of color present the balcony, opera performances, and opera glasses as signifiers of the origins and entrenchment of racism in the United States. A View From the Balcony: Opera Through Womanist Eyes by Jean Derricotte-Murphy, metaphorically seats readers in theater and societal balconies while glimpsing into and correcting the harmful historical, philosophical, and religious underpinnings of American systemic racism.