Neo-slave narratives are an African American genre that is concerned with the continued affairs of slavery, physical and psychological, on both slaves and the enslavers. They examine questions of labor, violence, denial, unequal relations of dependence, and the need to build better futures together with former oppressors (Gates Jr. and McKay). There are three types of neo-slave narratives. The third person historical novel of slavery, the first person narration of the life story of a slave, and the recounting of the traumatic legacy of slavery on later generations. While nineteenth century slave narratives primarily served to educate white audiences about slavery, inciting and engaging their opposition to it, the audience for neo-slave narratives include contemporary black readers who must come to terms with their own personal, ancestral histories of slavery (Vint). Octavian Butler is a well-known author of neo-slave narratives. Her popular novel Kindred is concerned with describing the struggle of a young black woman who is trying to escape the past both literally and figuratively and to gain a higher degree of agency, or the ability to make life choices, in the process. Butler chooses the body as her primary troupe for narrating the multi-faceted struggle of the protagonist to increase her agency (Vint). Kindred relates Dana’s struggle for freedom and self-determination primarily by way of her body. It constructs the time jumps, which forcibly move Dana as explicitly corporeal events. It presents the apprehensive and over-determined relationship between Dana and Rufus, her white ancestor, in terms of a struggle for control over her body; and it clearly marks the brutal legacy of slavery, imprinted on a character from the presen... ... middle of paper ... ... way of helping ex-slaves and their ancestors cope with their lives of slavery, discrimination, and oppression in an effort to build a better future for themselves and future generations (Vint). Works Cited Bast, Florian. “”NO.“ The Narrative Theorizing of Embodied Agency in Octavia Butler’s Kindred.” Extrapolation 53 (2012): 151-181. ProQuest. Web. 25 Feb. 2014. Gates, Jr., Henry Louis, and Jennifer Burton. Call and Response: Key Debates in African American Studies. 1st ed. New York: W.W. Norton and Company Inc., 2011. Print. Gates Jr., Henry Louis, and Nellie Y. McKay. The Norton Anthology of African American Literature. 2nd ed. New York: W.W. Norton and Company , Inc. , 2004. Print. Vint, Sherryl. “”Only By Experience“: Embodiment and the Limitations of Realism in Neo-Slave Narratives.” Science Fiction Studies 34.2 (2007): 241-261. JSTOR. Web. 25 Feb. 2014.
The book Kindred is about a women named Dana, a present day African American women. She ends up traveling from California, where she lives with her husband Kevin, who is Caucasian, back to the antebellum South. Dana only goes back in time when Rufus needs her help and each time she is there she seems to stay longer. Rufus is a white slave owner son. Slavery had previously existed throughout history, in many times and most places. What does it mean to be a slave or an enslaved person? To be a slave is to be owned by another person. Slavery to me seems like the imagery of hell. I imagine hell being something you cannot escape. A place where your soul burns internally. You might beg, cry, or even pray but nothing will help the predicament you
In conclusion, readers identify with the human form and use it as a vehicle for defamiliarization to show the mechanical functions they serve themselves and others. The characters in “Bloodchild” behave as part of a process and show a lack of respect for their human qualities. As they desensitize their bodies, they allow the Tlic to engage with them in an unbalanced power relationship. Then, the Tlic interact with them in a sheltering way and inhibit their thought process. Through this interaction chain, Butler effectively conveys that the way humans treat themselves will dictate how others treat them. As the afterword said, “Bloodchild” is not about slavery; it’s about the relationships humans take on because they allow themselves to be
Trilling, Lionel. "Review of Black Boy." Richard Wright: Critical Perspectives Past and Present. Eds. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and K. A. Appiah. New York : Amistad, 1993.
To understand the desperation of wanting to obtain freedom at any cost, it is necessary to take a look into what the conditions and lives were like of slaves. It is no secret that African-American slaves received cruel and inhumane treatment. Although she wrote of the horrific afflictions experienced by slaves, Linda Brent said, “No pen can give adequate description of the all-pervading corruption produced by slavery." The life of a slave was never a satisfactory one, but it all depended on the plantation that one lived on and the mast...
Imagine that it is the late nineteenth to early twentieth century in the American South. Imagine a work environment where the only reward for hard labor and back breaking tasks is not being beaten that day. Imagine barely getting enough to meet even one’s most basic needs, and that the only way out of this cruel cycle is by death or an almost impossible escape. This is the world in which Marriah Hines lives. Luckily for her, she only witnesses such atrocities; she never has to endure them as most slaves did during her lifetime and for hundreds of years before her. How is this possible? The compassion of one man, her master, saves her from the worst aspects of slavery. Her master is not the stereotypically cruel slave owner that dominates
insights into what the narratives can tell about slavery as well as what they omit,
This book is also one of the first non-fiction books that I’ve had to write a reaction about. I thought it was going to be difficult to write about a non-fiction book, especially this one, as most non-fiction books are more stories and character development and not cut-and-dry fact. Although this was a non-fiction account, the personal accounts Bales used (such as that of Ronald in Mato Grasso [Bales 127]) did have characters with personal stories, which made it much easier to both relate to the book as a reader and write about the book as a student. These small stories also gave me, as a student, more substance to write about then just numbers and statistics. Overall, Bales did an astounding job mixing those two separate entities, the statistics and the personal, to forge a lasting account of a fairly unknown problem in today’s world. Bales is desperately trying to enlighten the world about slavery, and with this novel, he is well on his way.
James, Johson Weldon. Comp. Henry Louis. Gates and Nellie Y. McKay. The Norton Anthology of African American Literature. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2004. 832. Print.
Octavia Butler’s novel Kindred is categorized as science fiction because of the existence of time travel. However, the novel does not center on the schematics of this type of journey. Instead, the novel deals with the relationships forged between a Los Angeles woman from the 20th century, and slaves from the 19th century. Therefore, the mechanism of time travel allows the author a sort of freedom when writing this "slavery narrative" apart from her counterparts. Butler is able to judge the slavery from the point of view of a truly "free" black woman, as opposed to an enslaved one describing memories.
Rose, Arnold. “The Negro in America”. New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, Incorporated, 1964. Print
In the novel, the author proposes that the African American female slave’s need to overcome three obstacles was what unavoidably separated her from the rest of society; she was black, female, and a slave, in a white male dominating society. The novel “locates black women at the intersection of racial and sexual ideologies and politics (12).” White begins by illustrating the Europeans’ two major stereotypes o...
When one thinks of slavery, they may consider chains holding captives, beaten into submission, and forced to work indefinitely for no money. The other thing that often comes to mind? Stereotypical African slaves, shipped to America in the seventeenth century. The kind of slavery that was outlawed by the 18th amendment, nearly a century and a half ago. As author of Modern Slavery: The Secret World of 27 Million People, Kevin Bales, states, the stereotypes surrounding slavery often confuse and blur the reality of slavery. Although slavery surely consists of physical chains, beatings, and forced labor, there is much more depth to the issue, making slavery much more complex today than ever before.
For most American’s especially African Americans, the abolition of slavery in 1865 was a significant point in history, but for African Americans, although slavery was abolished it gave root for a new form of slavery that showed to be equally as terrorizing for blacks. In the novel Slavery by Another Name, by Douglas Blackmon he examines the reconstruction era, which provided a form of coerced labor in a convict leasing system, where many African Americans were convicted on triumphed up charges for decades.
In her novel, Kindred, author Octavia Butler addresses the challenges of interracial relationships. She touches on both consenting and non-consenting relationships. While Dana and Kevin are in a consenting relationship, their experiences and difficulties are similar to that of Rufus and Alice. Conversely, there are also many aspects of the two relationships that are very different.
Table of Contents Page 1. A BRIEF CONVERSATION WITH OCTAVIA E. BUTLER Page 2 - 4. Biography Page 5 - 9. Synopsis Page 9 - 14. Analysis of Criticism Page 14 – 15.