Imagine being separated from everyone that you love. Everyone that shares a culture or blood with you. This is one way that kinship was manipulated during slavery by slave owners. The importance of family is a theme commonly explored and discussed today in many different contexts, but it was used as a weapon in order to break the African and African-American community. Fortunately, what broke them was also able to heal them. In many novels and poems by African and African-American authors, the importance of kinship and how it was used to break and heal slaves is discussed, such as in Beloved by Toni Morrison and Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe.
During slavery slave owners pulled families apart without remorse. They viewed them as animals and believed they did not deserve to have normal rights given to humans, such as getting married or being able to stay with their own family. In Barracoon by Zora Neale Hurston, the reader is exposed to what it was like to be dragged from home unwillingly through the perspective of Cudjo Lewis. As he recalls being dragged from his tribe he remembers “beg[ing] de men to let [him] go findee [his] folks” (Hurston 47). These men were not white, but other Africans who’s tribe had gotten rich off of slavery. The slave trade had caused men of the same culture to turn on each other for profit breaking the trust that was built between the various tribes of Africa. After talking about being snatched away from home, Cudjo expresses “I so sad for my home…” (Hurston 47). Years later and he is still in immense pain from never being able to be with his kin. On top of that as he was being dragged away he had to witness the dead bodies of his tribe. Furthermore, once they got to America he was dragged away from the people he traveled with. As they were pulled away from each other Cudjo described the grief as “… so heavy look lak we cain stand it” (Hurston 57). This grief is what broke many slaves as they had no one to rely on and anyone they knew was either dead or left in Africa.
Another novel that shows how family was used to break slaves is Beloved by Toni Morrison. During the time within the novel slaves were able to buy their own and their families freedom. Halle, Sethe’s husband, was able to buy his mother’s freedom, but “Schoolteacher in there told [him] to quit it. Said the reason for doing it don’t hold. [He] should do the extra but here at Sweet Home” (Morrison 231). This means that Halle will not be able to buy the freedom for the rest of his family because he will not be getting paid for the work he does at Sweet Home. He understands that Schoolteacher has done this purposely, so that he will always have slaves working under him doing what he wants. It does something to Halle to know that there is nothing he can do to free his family from enslavement. We also see the grief of a mother within the novel. After attempting to run away and getting raped by Schoolteacher’s nephew, Sethe goes to extreme measures to make sure that her children will not grow up being enslaved, which is seen in the four horsemen’s description, “Inside, two boys bled in the sawdust and dirt at the feet of a nigg** woman holding a blood-soaked child to her chest with one hand and an infant by the heels in the other” (Morrison 175). She kills all, but one, of her children in order to save them from a miserable life. This extreme action displays how the love for one’s family can cause slaves to go to extreme lengths. In this case she felt that it was better for her children to die rather than have to live a life of being oppressed and treated like animals. While modern day Africans and African-Americans may see this as too radical to Sethe this was the only way for her children to be safe and protected from watching the family be destroyed.
While the slave owners pulled families apart from each other and caused grief and pain, family also assisted in healing the pain that was left over. In Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, the importance of kinship is discussed during Okonkwo’s going away feast when one of the oldest members stated “We come together because it is good for kinsmen to do so” (167). However, within the same breathe he states, “But I fear for the younger people because you do not understand how strong is the bond of kinship” (Achebe 167). These statements allow the reader to see that being a family and the bond with family that you have does something; it strengthens people more than first realized. If you have no one, if you are not loyal to anyone, than it can break something within you or, as the younger generation soon learned, it can leave you vulnerable to your enemies.
Barracoon and “Of The Passing of the First Born” by W.E.B DuBois both show how children can help heal a family and connect them to their past. In Barracoon, Cudjo brings up how his wife and him “[gave] our chillun two names. One name because we not furgit our home…” (Hurtson 72). They made sure that their children will have a connection to their ancestors, which assisted in developing pride for who they were and where they came from. “Of The Passing of the First Born” also explores how a child can bring joy into the family. The narrator expresses how when he first saw his child he did not love it, but his love for his wife eventually motivates him to love his son. The child gives the parents, especially the mother, motivation and joy, which can be seen when the narrator states, “her [the wife] own life builded and moulded itself upon the child…” (DuBois Line 37-38). The birth of the child brings the family together and allows them to “… [dream] and [love] and [plan] by fall and winter” (DuBois 46). While the end of the poem is tragic and causes grief, the beginning shows how a child helped distract the couple from the terrible things within their life, such as being looked down on by whites. Having a child and watching him become strong allows them to develop pride, which assists in the healing process by allowing them to see that they are more than they are constantly being told they are. It shows that they are parents, people, humans who can make a life and raise that life up to be someone great in the world. It also reminds them of their ancestors and the connection they still have to them as they recount stories and continue traditions of the past, all of which heal the soul and reminds them of their humanity.
The poem, “For My People” by Margaret Walker, also discusses this connection to ancestors and the commonality of a people. Within her work, Walker explores the strength of a people and the new world that will come out of a healed community. In the beginning of the poem she mentions, “For my people everywhere singing their slave songs repeatedly” and “For my people lending their strength to the years” (Walker Lines 1-2; Line 6). The first discusses the connection African-Americans have to their ancestors through song and the second discusses the strength they have throughout all their pain. She also, in stanza 4, discusses how the children “went to school to learn/to know the reasons why and the answers to and the/people who and the places where and the days when…” and “For the boys and girls who grew in spite of these things to/be man and woman”, which explore how the students needed to know what happened to their ancestors and in spite of all that happened to them and the circumstances they live in now, they were able to grow and prosper (Walker Lines 17-19; Lines 23-24). By learning about their common history it can bring a people together and, if taken a step further, can heal them from all the pain their ancestors experienced and the future pain they may experience. She concludes the poem by mentioning the new world the African-American community was trying to create, which will accept people of all backgrounds and also have a generation full of courage and bravery. In order to achieve this they would need to accept what happened in the past, come together as a people, face the world, and demand the respect they deserve. Walker expresses this within her poem when she states, “Let a beauty full of/healing and a strength of final clenching be the pulsingin our spirits and our blood” (Lines 53-55). This poem, especially the aforementioned quote, communicates the importance of healing, not only as an individual, but as a people, in order to create a better world.
While family can be used as a weapon to break the spirits of Africans and African-Americans, it can also be used as a remedy to heal the souls of the community. By coming together and supporting one another a feeling of security and safety can wash over people allowing them to begin the process of healing. By having children and being reminded that they are human, it allows them to look both towards the past for advice and future with hope and courage. Family motivates a community to appreciate the culture and background they come from, learn from the pain of their ancestors, protect one another, and build a world where they are healed and striving for equity.
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