Making Connections: Reflections
of History
Dr.
Marlene Gardner
Contents of the curriculum unit:
________________________________________________________________________
The concept of making connections is important in both
teaching and learning. Teaching
often consists of assisting students in finding connections and learning
involves making connections among various disciplines and life experiences.
The curriculum unit concentrates on an area of interest for mainstream
grade seven students, presents information about African-American literature
and history using inquiry strategies, and considers the concept of Southern
identity in examining sample stories from the oral tradition, with emphasis on
supernatural tales.
There is a paradoxical and interdependent aspect to culture and literature. Literature is part of the culture that forms it. To understand literature, historical background is necessary. This year, a new initiative which is organized as a block schedule, with ninety minute class periods focusing on an enrichment curriculum, allows for interesting and in-depth analysis of aspects of literature. In this case, enrichment involves an extension of the regular Communications curriculum: responding to literature. The curriculum unit supports the Pittsburgh Public Schools Communications Standards, and the focus is on the reading (Standard 2) and the writing (Standard 4) standards. Citizenship Standards (7 and 8) and the Arts and Humanities Standards (2 and 3) are also involved in the unit. Technology (Standard 9) and internet resources are used to enhance the depth and range of available information. Historical background and information on folklore and culture provides the background for connections students may make between African-American literature and history.
Black Southern writers have produced literature grounded in history and in culture. Although writers have responded to the Southern experience in different ways, history and collective experiences can be found in the oral black tradition (storytelling) and many traditional stories have been recorded. In addition, historical accounts are present in the literature called “slave narratives.” Black Southern literature tends to be autobiographical, dramatic, poetic, and connected to the stories slaves brought from Africa and told as part of an oral history (Killens and Ward 7.) The written word cannot escape oral antecedents as African-American authors focus on the lost homeland, or examine African culture and seek a connection to that culture.
History and Literature
African-American storytellers, along with the majority of
American blacks can trace their origin to an area of western Africa that was
controlled by three prosperous empires from around 300 BCE to late 1500 CE.
Ghana, Mali and Songhai thrived on trade and had efficient governments.
Many tribes were represented in these areas.
The slave trade, which brought Africans to the European colonies in the
Southern United States began in the early 1500s and continued for the next
three hundred years (World Book 1.)
While there is little doubt about the beginnings of African-American history and culture in the colonies, there is some dispute concerning literary beginnings, in general. For some experts, “literature” refers only to the written word, and literature began as early as 1608 with a promotional pamphlet by Captain John Smith long before statehood had come to the South (Wilson and Ferris 1.) Other works, like A Characterization of the Province of Maryland by George Alsop, an indentured servant, The History of the Present State of Virginia (1705) by Robert Beverley and The Sot Weed Factor (1708) by Ebenezer Cooke indicate the level of publishing in the early days. Early novels, by Arthur Blackamore, were Religion Triumverate and Lucky At Last. Poetry was not neglected, as Samuel Davies wrote and published Miscellaneous Poems in 1752 (Wilson and Ferris 1.) The formal written and published word was not a popular endeavor early on in the South, and if only written works are considered, literature was pretty dull.
In considering only published literary efforts, the Civil War, part of history for all Americans, produced a sub-set of literature. Such literature reflects the loss of a certain way of life for white southerners and it reflects a survival theme for slaves. Marse Chan: A Tale of Old Virginia (Thomas Page, 1884) and more modern novels by William Faulkner, Walker Percy and William Styron are part of the Civil War literary effort. Poetry such as Drum Taps by Walt Whitman and various poems by Henry Timrod reflected wartime, but contemporary diaries such as those published by Sara M. Dawson and Kate Stone told the details (Wilson and Ferris 1.) Most, like A Confederate Girl’s Diary by Mary B. Chestnut, published in 1913, were unknown until long after the war. Humor authors, authors of travelogues and “local color” authors also wrote during this historical time frame (Reed and Reed 2.) Military memoirs had a place among literary efforts, such as those published by Richard Taylor, John Singleton Moseby and James Longstreet. The romantic mode has long been prevalent in “Civil War” southern literature from Surry of Eagle’s Nest by John Esten Cooke (1866) to The Battle Ground by Ellen Glasgow (1902) to Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell (1936.) There are a few historical battlefield narratives, but Stephen Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage (1895) and The Civil War: A Narrative History by Shelby Foote (1958, 1963, 1974) are good representatives (Wilson and Ferris 3-4.) In spite of all of the energy and ink expended in Civil War literature, there has not actually been a major poem, novel or play derived from this “central crisis in the national existence,” according to some experts (Wilson and Ferris 2.) Yet, this part of our collective past continues to be an area of interest for historians and authors. African-American slaves and former slaves began to tell their stories during this same time period. While the written word seemed to reflect a white southern view, African-American literature was continuing to develop as stories, both from the homeland and the new land, were told and retold.
In
the South, African-American literature developed differently, and
African-American authors tend to reflect the antecedents of the oral tradition
and the condition of slavery. These
writers explore the meaning of Africa to the individual and to a collective
consciousness. In earlier literature, Africa was viewed as a remembered, lost
homeland, but, in more recent literature, a fascination with Africa has
progressed and turned into a “cultural reunion”(Olorounto 1.)
Southern writing is typified by a sense of history, a sense of place,
community, family, religion, race, “a love of storytelling,” and “the
Southern grotesque”(Reed and Reed 9.) Although
none of these characteristics is unique to the South, taken as a whole, they
do seem to describe the focus of southern literature. Southern writing, of course, also reflects the focus of the
African-American oral tradition, and African-American writing cannot escape
the overpowering element of history: slavery.
Through all early literary exploration, and through various genres and
literary forms, folk roots and the oral tradition are the ancestors of
published African-American writing.
Among
African-American authors, if only the formal and published literature is
considered, then “literature” began in 1746 with “Bars Fight” by Terry
Lucy (Bailey 1), a commemorative poem about the Deerfield Massacre (Harley
31.) Briton Hammond was the first
black prose writer with A Narrative of the Uncommon Sufferings and
Surprizing Deliverance of Briton Hammond, A Negro Man in 1760.
Historically, the American Revolution tended to reinforce ideas about
the importance of written communication, reading, writing and printing as
“technologies of power” (McHenry 2), but few literary efforts reflected
this time period. No songs or poems of battle survived. Although
African-American literature tends to be poetic regardless of form, some
southern African-American writers excelled in poetry as time went on.
Early forays into the publishing world were poetic reflections of the
history of the times and the expectations of the public, and African-American
authors wrote and continued to publish the poetry of their times.
After the early poem by Terry Lucy, Jupiter Hammond wrote An Evening Thought, his first volume of poetry, in 1761; his poem, “To Miss Phillis Wheatley” was published in 1778. Phillis Wheatley, who came to the United States as a slave in 1761, was the first African-American to publish a book (McHenry 1). Since poetry was considered to be the highest form of expression at that time, her work was considered to be unusual. The poems illustrated her humanity and called many to question whether slavery was justified. By the time her poetry was published, in 1773, some northern states, like Pennsylvania, had stifled slavery by taxing it heavily, but it flourished in the south. Poetic contributions to literature continued as slave poet George Moses Horton and abolitionist Frances Ellen Watkins Harper were prominent southern voices (Greene 1), reflecting an anti-slavery sentiment. After the Civil War, George McClellan and Joseph Cotter wrote poetry that followed the formal conventions of the times. A less formal work, Naked Genius was published by George Horton (Harley, 153.) In 1877, Albery Whitman published “Not A Man and Yet A Man,” reflecting the lingering effects of slavery (Harley 177.) Paul Lawrence Dunbar began publishing poetry in 1893 (Harley 191) and continued with Lyrics of a Lowly Life in 1899 (Bailey 2.) In 1911, George Johnson published The Heart of a Woman (Harley 221.) Poetry continued to reflect the effects of slavery, the times of the authors, and the oral traditions.
In the 1920s, the poetic form was celebrated. In fact, African-American authors “celebrated folk ways but created high art” (Olorounto 4.) Southern African-Americans, like Langston Hughes, The Weary Blues (Bailey, 2) and James Weldon Johnson, The Book of Negro Verse (1922), were dominant voices in the (northern) Harlem Renaissance. Claude McKay published “If We Must Die,” a sonnet in response to racial violence and unrest (McHenry 9) in a volume of poetry called Harlem Shadows, and Countee Cullen’s Color was published in 1925 (Harley 221.) The use of dialect was refined and the “southern black worldview” was embodied in the poetry (Greene 2.) Of course, dialect was a part of the oral tradition of storytelling. Authors like Jean Toomer and Anne Spencer used a lyrical, poetic style, and natural images of southern origins, autobiographical references and realism in the poetry found in novels (McHenry 8.) Alain Locke defined the Renaissance with The New Negro, a collection of poetry, essays and stories, but, by 1929, the age of African-American poetry was fading in spite of Southern Road, published by Sterling Brown in 1932 (Harley 239.)
From
the Harlem Renaissance, where southerners defined northern conditions for
African-Americans, through the 1960s, when southern poets defined the winds of
change, many African-Americans wrote and published poetry.
Sterling Brown, Arna Bontemps, Margaret Walker and Melvin Tolson
continued to capture elements of black Folk culture in poetry (Greene 2.)
Robert Hayden published Heart Shape in the Dust in 1940 (Harley
247.) Gwendolyn Brooks published A
Street in Bronzeville in 1953 (Bailey 2) following Robert Hayden’s
historical poem “Middle Passage” in 1945 (McHenry 9 ) and Melvin
Tolson’s Rendezvous with America in 1944(Harley 255.)
In 1950, Gwendolyn Brooks wrote “Annie Allen.”
“For My People,” Margaret Walker’s poem from 1942, was reissued
in 1968. Nikki Giovanni published
Black Feeling, Black Talk in 1968, and 1973 brought Alice Walker’s Revolutionary
Petunias and Other Poems. In
1994, Rita Dove wrote an autobiographical poem about her grandparents, Thomas
and Beaulah (Bailey 4.) These
poetic samples from African-Americans who published their work reflect the
historic times, the loss of a homeland and the interest in history found in
most Southern authors. These
poems reflect the history of the author, and the poetic nature of
African-American writing, stemming from forms found in oral literature is just
one form of published writing; African-American literature has a dramatic
cast, as well.
Few
plays were written by African-American authors before the Harlem Renaissance,
but William Wells brown (1858) and Joseph Cotter (1903) wrote dramatic tracts
notable for their historic value. Various
musical comedies and minstrel shows of the times reflected popular culture and
couldn’t actually be called plays (Greene 2.) In 1919, Mary Burrell’s
play, They That Sit in Darkness, addressed conditions for
African-Americans and the issue of birth control (Harley 223.) As an outgrowth
of the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes, Hal Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston
and Arna Bontemps wrote shot plays in the social-realism mode (Greene 2) which
reflected growing concerns about life for African-Americans. Most playwrights
used music, folklore, religion and social history form the 1930s to the 1960s,
but the emphasis moved, as had many southerners, to urban and northern
settings (Greene 2.) Loraine
Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun (1959), with a title that references
an earlier poem, exemplifies this idea (McHenry 11) and the idea that the
African homeland has meaning (Olorounto 3.)
August Wilson, more recently, has continued to echo the historical
southern tradition (1987, 1990) (McHenry 13) with Fences, (Bailey 4)
although he, and his settings, are “northern.”
Since
drama is so much a part of other forms of African-American literature, authors
may retain the dramatic aspects and reject the formal confines of the play.
Historically, plays were not a prevalent literary form, but southern
African-American authors have certainly sought self-expression in other ways;
the oral traditions of the southern storyteller gave rise to the published
short story.
Southerners
were the first African-American short story writers in the United States.
Short fiction about the slave experience was predominant well past 1900
(Greene 2,) and slave narratives were a source of the stories found in
literature. Slave narratives were
a separate category of African-American writing; they were expository and
apart from the autobiographical short story. Such short stories reflected the
history of slavery and the conditions of life for African-Americans.
While
northern blacks were writing about racism (David Wilkes’ Appeal)
(McHenry 3) near the turn of the nineteenth century, Charles Waddell Chestnut
incorporated elements of “local color” and “regionality” to develop a
classification of short story called “plantation fiction” (Greene 3.) Of course, plantation stories were quite different from those
by white writers such as J.P. Kennedy’s Swallow Barn (Reed and Reed
5) because African-American writers showed the plantation system in a
realistic way. In addition,
newspapers were an area where free blacks were able to begin a literary
tradition. Anonymity was
the rule of the day, so many African-Americans used pen names, and black men
and women could submit a wide variety of writing for publication. For example,
Anglo African Magazine published “Two Offers” by Frances E. W.
Harper in 1861. Another magazine,
The Repository of Religion, Literature, Science and Art was started
under the auspices of the African Methodist Episcopalian Church (McHenry 5.)
Joel C. Harris (1880) published Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings
(Bailey 2.) These short stories
were direct adaptations of African tales from the oral tradition, but they
also featured the false image of the “happy slave” along with the wily
trickster (Brer Rabbit.) The
years between 1890 and 1910 were both the “woman’s era” and “a time
characterized by widespread lynching and segregation” (McHenry 4, 6.)
Aside from F. E. W. Harper’s “Shadows Uplifted,” Julia Cooper
wrote “A Voice from the South by a Black Woman of the South,” Judy Delaney
wrote “Struggles for Freedom” and Zora Neale Hurston continued the female
tradition with short stories published in the 1920s.
African-American
writers added features reflective of life in the south and features from the
oral tradition like the trickster and the double entendre to short stories as
they continued in the autobiographical mode.
Some authors, like Langston Hughes (Simple Series) and Richard Wright (
Uncle Tom’s Children, 1938) wrote short story cycles (Greene 2) with
different stories sharing a thematic unity.
As time went on, anthologies, like Bloodlines by Ernest Gaines
and Elbow Room by James McPherson (Harley 305,331) became
popular. In the short story, in
the early days and in modern times, Africa was a “point of reference from
which history could be accurately analyzed” (Olorounto 5) and short stories
carrying elements of the oral tradition formed the basis for much of what was
printed. Other writings by
African-Americans, of course, carried the same reflections of slavery, the
homeland and cultural ideas and novels often continued the same themes.
Between
the late 1800s and the 1970s, the novel became an important literary element
in southern African-American culture. In 1853, Williams Wells Brown, a
southern-born slave, wrote Clotel or The President’s Daughter,
a novel that reflected the problems of a mulatto family who happened to be
presidential. This was the
“birth of a literary tradition,” (Bing 1) but, when the novel was
published in the north, Thomas Jefferson had been replaced by an anonymous
senator (Harley 157.) Sutton
Griggs published Imperium and Imperio, the first “black power”
novel about an all black republic in Texas in 1899 (Harley 199.)
W.E.B. Dubois commanded a national audience in 1903, when he wrote The
Souls of Black Folks (Bing 4.) Such
novels are the standard representations of African-American cultural
consciousness (McHenry 7.) The
challenge to make an artistic contribution and define an identity became
important, and, although novels might reflect the times, many also reflected
the ancestral reaction to slavery. Charles
Waddell Chestnut was the first black author to consider the artistic
requirements of the novel form (Bing 1.)
Some southern novels, like The House Behind the Cedars (Chestnutt
1900), Cane (Toomer 1923,) The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man
(James W. Johnson, 1912) and even Invisible Man (Ralph Ellison 1952)
concerned migration and the problems of the southern black migrant who came to
the north, (Wilson and Ferris 3) but the sentiments of enslavement continued
to be reflected, as well.
The South was a literary wasteland before World War I (“ Tell About the South,” 2/14/02.) Although southern novels reflected historical events, the themes related to slavery remained constant. Prior to the mid 1970s, many novels were concerned with African-American identity like the early novels up through the Harlem Renaissance, but the viewpoint of the southern African-American was part of the evolution of the novel form (Greene 3.) Although 300,000 blacks were commissioned and fought in World War I along with 1400 officers, none of them wrote about the experience (Harley 217.) As time went on, novels like Nella Larson’s Quicksand written in 1928 (Harley 235) followed Toomer’s Cane. Both southern authors reflected the past and the idea of slavery. George Schuyler wrote Black No More and Arna Bontemps published God Sends Sunday, following Wallace Thurman’s The Blacker the Berry(1929) and Jessie Fauset’s There Is Confusion (1928) as the Great Depression began. The stock market crash in 1929 ended the patronage and the prosperity of the publishing industry, crucial to the support of African-American authors, but the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters became a union with a charter from the American Federation of Labor during the same year (Harley 234.) African-Americans did not stop writing novels, and “folk novels” like Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God and Ollie Miss by George Henderson reflected the economic times before World War II. Such novels were also the precursors of the socially aware novels of the 1940s (Greene 5.) The novels of the 1930s and the 1940s, like previous writings by black southerners, reflected the oral traditions of the storyteller and the autobiographical link to slavery and they were the basis for the social protest novels of the 1960s and the 1970s.
World War II changed the South forever. Blacks and whites have borrowed ideas from each other, consciously and subconsciously, for no southern author can ever escape the “other southerner,” (“Tell About the South,” 2/21/02) regardless of the author’s viewpoint. World War II finally and officially ended the economic depression left over from the Civil War, and participation in the United States Army had encouraged both racial equality and “social justice authors” (“Tell About the South,” 2/21/02.) For many novelists, and for ordinary people in society as well, change was not fundamental; many authors wrote about personal identity, cultural identity and African themes.
The
literary reflections of the changes in society was contained in descriptive
novels like those of Richard Wright (Native Son) and William Attaway (Blood
on the Forge, 1941.) In fact,
Native Son (1938) set the pattern for later self-definition novels in the
1970s which reflected the historical facts of the Civil Rights struggle.
Although Richard Wright was probably the most well known author, the 1940s
ended with a “flurry of Southern writers” (“Tell About the South,”
2/21/02.)
As
the country continued to recover from World War II, William Thomas wrote a
fictional autobiography, The Seeking (Andrews, 4.) The increasing tendency towards autobiography and the
inclusion of cultural values continued as African-American novelists evolved
through the 1950s. Willard Motley
wrote Knock on Any Door and Chester Hines wrote If He Hollers,Let
Him Go; Anne Petry’s The Street preceded Ralph Ellison’s
Invisible Man (1952.) Ellison
found his inspiration in “jazz and blues as well as in folklore” (McHenry
10) and from his own inner voice (“Tell About the South,” 2/21/02.)
He brought cultural values into his portrait of African-Americans in
the United States as his narrator migrates from the south to the north.
In 1953, James Baldwin published Go Tell It On the Mountain (Bing
1.) Baldwin was interested in the
paradox of African-Americans as part of life in the United States and the
“failed promises of American democracy” (McHenry 10.)
In 1959, Paule Marshall wrote Brown Girl, Brown Stones,
continuing the trend of identity themes and echoing the autobiographical
trend. The changing times altered
the literature, but literature continued to reflect the pain of slavery as it
had become part of our history. Authors
continued to focus on realism as they portrayed the conditions of life in the
United States.
In
the 1960s, “Black is beautiful” was a common saying and LeRoi Jones became
Amiri Basraka (Olorounto 6) after writing Preface to a Twenty Volume
Suicide Note (Bailey 3.) The
Black Arts movement sought to communicate with the masses.
Sonia Sanchez, who also retold some traditional tales, and Larry Neal
welcomed a lack of mainstream acceptance, (McHenry 11,12) but The
Autobiography of Malcolm X with Alex Haley was also popular (Andrews, 4.)
Reflecting the times, The Angry Ones by John Williams was
published. Other notable
African-American authors were John O. Killen, Margaret Walker Alexander and
Robert Dean Pharr. In 1962, James Meredith integrated Ole’ Miss and Ernest
Gaines returned to Baton Rouge to write (“Tell About the South,” 2/28/02.)
William M. Kelley published A Different Drummer (Harley 285,) a
novel about leaving society, and Jubilee, by Margaret Walker, was
published in 1966 (Harley 297.) In
the same year, Ishmael Reed published Free Lance Pallbearers (Harley
301.) In 1968, Eldridge Cleaver published Soul on Ice (Bing
1.) The era of the 1960s is best
typified by Julius Lester, who published two books in 1968:
Look Out Whitey! Black Power’s Gon Get Your Mamma and To Be
A Slave. The turbulent times relating to the ongoing struggle for Civil
Rights represented a new future, and the south “looked more like the rest of
the country” (“Tell About the South,” 2/21/02.)
The historical climate was reflected in the literature, but authors
continued to focus on the themes found in the older oral tradition.
The
social unrest of the decade found its way into literature, but
African-American novelists continued to turn back to the slavery issue.
In the 1950s and the 1960s, Africa “represented what Greece and Rome
represented to white Europeans and Americans; (Olorounto 6) it was the origin
of culture and history. African-American
authors continued in the autobiographical vein and distanced themselves from
European influences. Both the
descendents of slaves and the descendents of slave owners were writing in the
South. As the sixties ended and
the seventies began, the Viet Nam war had created hawks and doves among
American novelists, but African-American novelists reflected a different
perspective.
In
the 1970s, a new generation of writers revealed different parts of the
African-American experience (“Tell About the South,” 2/28/02.) In 1970,
Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye (Harley 311) represented one kind of
female experience with echoes back to slavery.
Fictional autobiography was represented by H. Rap Brown’s Die,
Nigger, Die and The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (1971) by
Ernest Gaines; although these novels represented different looks at the
African experience, both were influenced by slave narratives (Andrews 4.)
In 1976, Alex Haley wrote Roots (Bing 2 and Harley 329.)
This work took the autobiographical trend even further and brought
national attention to the issue of slavery for African-Americans.
In 1976, the presidency of a southerner, Jimmy Carter, marked a trend
towards a national homogeneity (“Tell About the South,”2/28/02,) but
southern African-American novelists continued to write tales based in the past
like Oxherding Tale by Charles Johnson and Song of Solomon by
Toni Morrison (1977)(McHenry 12.) In
1977, Eldridge Cleaver published Soul on Fire, and, the following year
Ishmael Reed published Mumbo Jumbo (McHenry 15.)
By 1979, the history, in the form of slavery, was still present. Barbara C. Ribaud wrote Sally Hemmings, (Harley 333)
another version of “the president’s daughter.”
The
focus on slavery and the return to old stories continued through the decade of
the eighties. Sherley A. Williams
wrote Dessa Rose,(Andrews 4) and Rita dove published The Yellow
House on the Corner. Female
African-American novelists revealed their concepts concerning the
African-American experience. The Women of Brewster Place by Gloria
Naylor (1980) and The Salt Eaters by Toni Cade Bambera represent a
search for moral wisdom with African roots, (Olorounto 6) and Tar Baby
written in 1981 by Toni Morrison, carried the slave narrative influence
(Andrews 5.) The autobiographical
theme continued as well, in novels like Marked By Fire by Joyce Thomas
and Ntozake Shange’s Sassafras, Cypress and Indigo (McHenry 14,) and
John Williams wrote The Man Who Cried I Am.
In 1984, Linda Brown wrote Rainbow Roun My Shoulder (Harley
343.) By 1987, Toni Morrison continued the return to African ideas with Beloved
and Mamma Day written by Gloria Naylor in 1988 traveled into the past
to forge some African connections (McHenry 13.)
In the 1970s and the 1980s, the literary trend was to return to African
ideas to find answers (Olorounto 6.) Since
many authors also traveled to Africa, the autobiographical aspect of their
writing was strong, as was the idea of a cultural reunion with things African.
In the nineties and up to the present, authors have continued to return
to the idea of slavery, as represented by neo-slave narratives like Charles
Johnson’s Middle Passage (Andrews 6.)
Waiting to Exhale by Terry McMillan, written in 1992, (Harley
361) is representative of the autobiographical trend.
Toni Morrison and others continued to write in ways that reflected the
oral tradition and the historical fact of slavery, as well. Today, the
African-American writer is part of a “literary aviary where artists may be
in the same place, but they are singing a slightly different song” (“Tell
About the South,” 2/28/02.) This is seen in Eddy L. Harris work, The
South of Haunted Dreams and in Ralph Ellison’s posthumous publication
(1999), Juneteenth (Harley 362.)
The southern viewpoint is found in the African-American novel (Greene
4) but it is an African-American viewpoint; it is autobiographical, with
historical references from slave narratives through realistic fiction to true
autobiographies. The stories embedded in the oral tradition were part of the
culture of early African-American people and they were to be found as a
historical backdrop for written literature as well. The new southern writers
are the heirs of the great writers of the past (“Tell About the South,”
2/28/02.)
If
only the written word is considered as literature, it would seen that southern
African-American literature has evolved from a sparse body of writings focused
on black life in the south and on historical events to a more distinct and
sophisticated literature (Greene 1.) Southern
writers are “exiles but embedded in their community” (Reed and Reed 6.)
Of course, the written literature is, for the most part, the product of
the older spoken word. Other influences such as religious orientation, music,
common aphorisms and folktales had a major effect on writing (Greene 4.)
Plot structure, language, imagery and symbolism, and characterization
which appeared in novels and other works were all affected by the “other
literature,” the stories found in the oral tradition and the folklore which
traveled from Africa and which arrived under conditions of slavery.
Folklore, Slave Narratives and Stories from the Oral
Tradition
Folklore came to the United States as part of the
cultural connections of various and varied settlers.
In the south, folklore came from geography and history, (Cohen 1) as
well as from tall tales of hunters and riverboat men, brags, songs and
sayings, and the stories of slaves. In the south, “the living word and the
performance, the marrow of folklore, were likewise the marrow of southern
culture” (Wilson and Ferris 1.) Folk
studies, like Zora Neal Hurston’s Mules
and Men, show that collections of stories from the black south, along with
the true stories of the slave narratives are the underpinnings of southern
African-American Literature, for “art transforms folklore” (“Tell About
the South,” 2/28/02.)
The combination of racial composition, the sectional difference of geography and “historical developments” (Cohen 1) distinguishes the South from the rest of the United States. Africans brought their culture and their history, and the elements of folklore continued in the oral traditions of slaves. Although slave owners tried to annihilate African traditions, “the arch-survivor, Brer Rabbit,” was born in Africa (Cohen 1.) Folklore appeared in the written word, where it was often used by white authors like John Lawson, Edgar Allen Poe, William Gilmore Simms, Mark Twain and William Faulkner as a literary focus or technique, (Cohen 3) and it was the substance of the Southern oral tradition in the stories which were told, not written. The notion that “folk roots are sub-literary or wanting in aesthetic integrity is absurd” (Killens and Ward 7.) Folklore found a way into the true stories of the slaves as well, since it was a part of African experience.
“…if you don’t remember where you came from, or how
you got from there to here, you have a very hard time moving on (Simon,
163.)” African traditions
appear in the segment of literature called slave narratives.
The slave narratives proved that black people could command language
and effectively express themselves (McHenry, 5.) Along with Frederick
Douglass’ narrative, known for its association of literacy to freedom
(McHenry, 5,) Moses Roper’s A Narrative of the Adventures and Escape of
Moses Roper from American Slavery in 1837 and Olaudah Equiano’s The
Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano or Gustave Vassa
(1789) are typical of the genre (Olourounto 3) and these works indicate a
longing for the African homeland.
Slave narratives were written and published as history continued to move on. In 1770, A Narrative of the Most Remarkable Particulars in the Life of James Albet Gronniosaw, An African Prince as Related by Himself was published; in the same year, Crispus Attucks was the first African-American to die in the Boston Massacre. By 1798, when A Narrative of Venture, A Native of Africa but Resident Above Sixty Years in the United States was published, anti-slavery orations were common, Kentucky had entered the union as a slave state (1792) and the first minstrels had appeared in New Orleans (Harley 61-65.) In 1810, when The Blind American Slave or Memoirs of Boguereau Brindio was published, about 19% of the U. S. population was African-American. By the time Willow published his narrative in 1815, the Underground Railroad had been established by Quaker Levi Coffin (Harley 79.) In 1824, William Grimes published The Life of William Grimes, Liberia had been established as a black colony, and Dartmouth College opened admissions to African-Americans; in 1825, A Narrative of Some Remarkable Incidents in the Life of Solomon Bailey was published and The History of Mary Prince was the first narrative by a black woman. The harsh aspects of slavery and rebellion continued to be revealed in The Confessions of Nat Turner in 1831 (Andrews 4 and Harley 95.) Through the 1830s, slave narratives continued to support the abolitionist cause. By the 1840s and the 1850s, slave narratives began to reveal the struggles of African-Americans who had migrated to the north as “fugitives from the south (Andrews 1.)” Sojourner Truth (Isabella Hurley) published her narrative in 1850, (Harley 125) and slave narratives continued to reveal one of the causes of the coming Civil War.
Although more than one hundred narratives exist,
including some written in Arabic, some historians doubted their authenticity,
(Reed and Reed 2) but narratives like Harriet Jacobs’ Incidents in the
Life of a Slave Girl (1861)
revealed the pain of slavery (McHenry 5.) Slave narratives continued to be
written as the Civil War changed the economy of the South.
“As historical documents, slave narratives chronicle the evolution of white supremacy in the south” and give voice to first generation African-Americans (Andrews 2.) The narratives are a major part of the literary legacy. The pattern of the narrative: the narrator portrays slavery in all of its extremes of physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual deprivation. A personal crisis precipitates escape. The narrator often stresses faith and a commitment to liberty and human dignity. Finally, after an arduous quest, the slave attains the free states or “north” and may rename himself or herself (Andrews 2-3.) During antebellum times, writers like William Wells Brown stressed African-American survival; authors often wrote with a “keen sense of regional identity” (Andrews 4.) The influences of the slave narratives were found in works by white authors of the times and included Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852) and Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (1884.) More modern novels, like William Styron’s Confessions of Nat Turner in 1967 and Toni Morrison’s Beloved in 1987 also show the influences of the slave narratives. A later book, included as a narrative, Up from Slavery by Booker T. Washington (1903), emphasized interracial cooperation and black progress, and was taken more seriously as an “American success story,” (Andrews 4) but African-American authors began to strive to revise the stereotypes of plantation fiction, minstrel shows and vaudeville acts (McHenry 6) as they turned to the slave narratives for inspiration.
The slave narrative was a product of an author who was both southern and black (Greene 4.) Although some narratives were the result of collaboration with a white abolitionist, (McHenry 4) slave narratives had an influence, along with the stories from the oral tradition, on every aspect of written literature. Slave narratives, themselves, “embody a considerable amount of folklore” (Killens and Ward 7.) The autobiographical narrative, which outnumbered novels written by African-Americans until the Depression Era, is the most extensive and influential tradition in African-American literature (Andrews 9.) The popularity of the genre wasn’t limited to the United States, (McHenry 4) and other countries read slave narratives to learn about conditions of slavery. The slave narrative, and the remnants of the narratives found in published literature, is a vital literary legacy, since such works tell the brutal tale of slavery. Narratives, along with the stories from the oral tradition, reflect the history of the times as slaves struggled to recall and to relate to a lost homeland as they survived in a new country. Narratives were, however, only one kind of southern African-American story; southern literature began as the well-told tale.
“Literature began with the oral tradition, evolved from the blending of oral and written traditions and continues to grow as self conscious artists adopt or modify their literary heritage to serve contemporary needs” (Killens and Ward 7.) African-American stories in the “vernacular tradition” are traceable to Esu, an African god, who was a messenger of the Supreme Being, a trickster, and an intermediary between humanity and destiny (Herskovits 253.) In addition, African-American people carried with them, along with music and all other aspects of culture, “their myths and their forms of performance,” (Olorounto 2) along with the well-told tale. The key operatives in southern African-American storytelling are cooperation and response; stories taught people how to respond to the environment with its physical, intellectual and spiritual challenges and to use the “gift of memory” to achieve community (Robinson 215.) In the United States, repetition changed the African stories, and created adaptations, but repetition was also “signifying a black difference,” (Gates 3) which had arrived along with the slaves. For hundred of years, professional storytellers had performed in Western African countries. Because such cultures did not often have written history, griots had to remember and retell “up to seven generations worth of oral history.” They also acted as a spokesperson and editorialized on current events. Their audiences were expected to participate (“call and response”) (Ridge 13.) The griot informed people of their roles in society and was well respected; this role continues today so that those of African descent can understand a lost African past (Kouyate 180 and Asante 492.) In the United States, in the South, an older person within the family or the group, took on the role of the griot to tell the tales to the young.
Authors who wrote and published stories were indebted to the oral stories for “structure, theme and vision” (Olorounto 2.) For example, the small animals of Africa’s trickster stories, like spider, tortoise and hare, were replaced by others, notably Brer Rabbit, and larger predators like lions and elephants became bears, mountain lions and foxes. Rhythmic patterns from the African oral tradition appeared in retold tales and in writing: who said what, when they said it, how they said it, to whom it was said and the response (Robinson 213.) This pattern is carried into modern stories, as well, and many authors continue to go back to Africa, metaphorically and physically, for inspiration. It is in the tradition of vernacular stories that much of African-American literature is found. Africa was near, in the minds of many slaves. Slaves related their own experience, but folk life gave birth to stories that contained African motifs: legends, myths, praise songs and proverbs. The motifs include “motion imagery, the home of the spirit, the trickster, the sacredness of motherhood (and family), game playing and verbal competition, and supernatural beings” (Olorounto 6.) Although stories may contain more than one motif, these southern stories can be, and have been, categorized by those who have retold them or collected them; southern African-American stories reflect the historical fact of slavery and the memories of a lost homeland.
Stories in the oral tradition can be divided into some basic categories. One group is folktales, which tend to answer questions, and moral tales, which provide instruction. Folktales often include stories in which animals talk and have other very human characteristics and moral tales occasionally masquerade as fairy tales. Included in this group are retold myths and other stories with direct connections to the African homeland. This kind of story was popularized by Joel Chandler Harris in 1881 (Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings,) but these stories were told long before they were written. These tales reflect a human interest in animals and why they act as they do, as do folktales from other cultures. As time passed, stories took on new meanings, became important as a means of imparting wisdom, and revealed the possibility that the trickster rabbit, representing the slave, could triumph. The stories also came to include the use of disguises by the trickster, and, in some tales the trickster is tricked (Houston 99 and Kouyte 180.) Slaves told and retold these stories as a means of connecting with a lost homeland and relating to current conditions; the stories reflect history and the world-view of the storyteller.
Another category of story seems to be more directly related to slavery. These stories emphasize “survival among an enslaved people and foster a sense of pride and undoubted heroism” (Robinson 212.) These stories are in the tradition of the slave narrative and reflect one person’s life experiences, or they may take the form of a historical narrative. At times, stories tied to the experience of slavery are closely connected to folktales, fables and myths, and they have been retold and collected in the same way.
Similarly, stories concerning the family or “family and friends” may overlap into other categories. In these stories, “implied wisdom is learned and transmitted by the enslaved to their descendants” (Goss and Barnes 2.) Family lore may be impersonal, in that it could have happened to other families and it reflects a wider, older, emotional experience rather than the “emotion and wisdom on one individual” (Morgan 298.) Stories of family life are also often stories of slavery or of the lost homeland.
Even stories that might fall into the category of humor, tall tale or anecdote reflect the history of Africa and of slavery. Humorous folktales were shared among black captives from the beginning (Coleman 431.) Such stories, while carrying information about history, also provided a means of coping with frustrations and the terrible effects of various slavery induced situations. Some humorous tales are modifications of the animal tales with Brer Rabbit-like main character, often a slave or share cropper named John. These stories feature the same caricature and exaggeration found in modern comedy routines, but they served the purpose of providing another way to react to the conditions in which African-Americans found themselves.
The performance element is seen in another form of the oral story, for stories are frequently told as rhymes, rhythm tales or ballads, the antecedents of today’s rap music. Black captives were frequently forbidden to use the instruments and music of their homeland, and songs, games and dances evolved from the ordinary, everyday life of their times (Goss and Barnes 487.) Information was often an integral part of the message when slaves sang to warn other slaves about the plantation patrol rider or about traveling by the Underground Railroad. Sometimes the message was of thanks or love, and sometimes the rhyme told a story that reflected the condition of slavery. For example, “Hambone” speaks of a time when the best parts of the slaughtered hogs were reserved for whites and the discarded ham bone was circulated to season the cooking of one family after another (Asante 490.) Folk poetry was the earliest poetry heard in homes and churches detailing “culture, arts, crafts, secrets, ceremonies, and rites of passage,” (Asante 491) and poetry was recited and rhymes and songs were sung long before they were written down. The poetic tradition, constant for more than three hundred years in the South, consists of rhyming, moralizing and telling a story, (Asante 492) or imparting information. The rhymes of black captives provided information or told the story of captivity, often disguised as a straightforward poem or game.
Finally, stories in the oral tradition may be categorized as supernatural tales. The “creature remembered from the homeland” came ashore with the African slaves (Garcia-Barrio 357.) In African-American tales, the Hairy Man of Georgia, the guije from the Caribbean and the Tunda all have the tendency to carry off children, and many slaves in the Unites States lost children just as suddenly. Other tales feature creatures which affect adults, but many supernatural tales arose from historic events in which African-Americans took part. Stories of avenging ghosts or returning spirits were often told as closure for an actual event (Garcia-Barrio 358.) Ghosts, haunted places and people, and witches are found in the most interesting of southern stories, and, like other African-American tales, they reflect the condition of slavery, the history of the time or the idea of the remembered African homeland.
Texts and the Textbook
Several
texts and stories have been selected for use with this curriculum unit.
Other stories from these or other texts could be substituted to adapt
the curriculum unit for other grade levels or another area of emphasis.
From Amy Cohen’s Sea to Shining Sea, the following stories were selected to represent folktales, moral tales and myths: “Brer Possum’s Dilemma” retold by Jackie Torrance (pp. 249-251), “The Cat’s Purr,” retold by Ashley Bryce (pp. 260-261,) and “The Split Dog,” retold by Richard Chase (pp. 230-231.) Slavery tales are “The People Could Fly” by Virginia Hamilton (pp. 144-146) and “How the Slaves Helped Each Other” retold by William Faulkner (pp. 130-131.) Stories of Family and Friends are “The Talking Mule” by Z. N. Hurston (pp. 224-225), and three traditional tales: “Hush Little Baby (pp. 98-99),” “Long John (pp. 136-137,)” and “Follow the Drinking Gourd (p. 140.)” Humorous stories include Steve Sanfield’s retelling of “High John, the Carpenter,” (pp. 134-135,) “Brer Rabbit in Mr. Man’s Garden,” retold by Julius Lester (pp. 212-219,) and Harold Courlander’s retelling of “Sharing the Crops (pp. 219-221.) Rhymes and rhythms are represented in two traditional works: “Juba This and Juba That” and “Hambone (pp. 42-43.)” The supernatural story is “The Peculiar Such Thing” retold by Virginia Hamilton (pp. 338-339.)
Great American Folklore, edited by Kemp Battle, is where the
following selections were found. In the folklore, fable and myth category,
“The Tale of the Dog with Upside Down Legs,” retold by M. A. Jagendorgf
(p. 160 f.), “The Tar Baby,” retold by J. Harris (p. 346 f.) and “Mr.
Rabbit and Mr. Fox,” retold by J. Harris (p. 348 f.) are representative.
Slavery/history stories include “The Fight (p. 110 f.),” “The
Hatfield McCoy Feud: How It Started (p. 141),” and “When We Isn’t We (p.
182.)” “Family” stories are
“Nail Soup,” retold by Leonard Roberts (p. 14 f.,) and “Bundle of
Troubles,” retold by Frank Dobie (p. 286 f.)
Two traditional tales reflect the humorous category:
“The Travelers Homecoming (p. 42 f.)” and “Sheer Crops (p. 352
f.)” Rhyming stories are “The Rebel,” a traditional song (p.
126,) and “John Henry,” retold by Frank Shay.
Supernatural stories include “Old Ferro,” retold by Frank Burnes
(p. 304 f.) and “The Seven Year Light on Bone Hill,” a traditional story
(p. 325 f.)
One
Hundred and One African-American Read-Aloud Stories, edited by Susan
Kantor, is the source for the following stories.
Myths, fables and folklore, in this book, include rabbit stories and
Brer Rabbit stories. Traditional
tales in this category are: “Why
the Rabbit Has a Short Tail and Long Ears (p. 200 f.),” “Who Ate the
Butter? (p. 196 f.),” “Anancy Gets What He Deserves (p. 20 f.),” and
“Nine Wild Dogs and One Lion (p. 27 f.)”
Excerpts from stories about slavery and history are:
Booker T. Washington’s “Up From Slavery (pp. 334 f.),” “The
Slave Dancer,” by Paula Fox (p. 359 f.) and “My Name is Not Angelica,”
by Scott O’Dell (p. 344.) The
Family and Friends category includes several traditional stories:
“Who Shall Marry the Chief’s Daughter? (p. 136,)” “Three Sons
of a Chief (p. 136,)” “Baboon Skins (pp. 60-67,)” and “Two Ways to
Count to Ten (pp. 78-84.)” Several
stories represent the humorous category:
“The Champion Liar (p. 243 f.,)” “Pumpkins, Potatoes and Corn (p.
247 f.,)” “Salt the Pudding (p. 248,)” and “Lucky Shot (p. 253 f.)”
Rhyming stories and rhythm selections include the traditional:
“Hambone,” “ Kum Ba Ya,” “ Take This Hammer,” and “Over
My Head (pp. 409-4l4).” Supernatural stories include “The Magic Bones (p.
104)” and “ The Three Little Eggs,” retold by Terry Berger (p. 96.)
Virginia Hamilton’s The People Could Fly
contains numerous stories in each category.
These have been selected to represent fables, folktales and myths:
“Tappin, the Land Turtle (p. 20 f.,)” “Bruh Alligator and Bruh
Deer (p. 26 f.,)” “Bruh Lizard and Bruh Rabbit (p. 31 f.,)” and “Bruh
Alligator Meets Trouble (p. 35 f.)” History
and slavery are found in “Carrying the Running Aways (p. 141 f.),” “How
Nehemiah Got Free (p. 147 f.,)” “ The Riddle Tale of Freedom (p. 156
f.,)” “The Most Useful Slave (p. 160,)” and, of course, the title story
(p. 166.) Two selections
represent the Family and Friends category:
“A Wolf and Little Daughter (p. 60 f.)” and “Manuel Had a Riddle
(pp. 60-75.)” Humorous stories
include: “Papa John’s Tall
Tale (p. 76 f.,)” “The Beautiful Girl of the Moon Tower (p. 53 f.,)” “
The Two Johns (p. 89 f.,)” and “Wiley, His Mamma and the Hairy Man (p.
90.)” That last story
could also be included, with the following tales, in the supernatural
category: “John and the
Devil’s Daughter (p. 107 f.,)” “Little Eight John (p. 121 f.,)”
“Jack and the Devil (p. 126 f.,)” and “Better Wait Til Martin Comes (p.
133 f.)”
Some
stories have been selected from Zora
Neale Hurston’s Mules and
Men. The following tales
represent myths, folktales and moral tales:
“How the Possum Lost the Hair Off His Tale (p. 103,)” “ How the
Gator Got His Mouth (p. 104,)” “The Goat That Flagged a Train (p. 112,)”
and “ How the Cat Got Nine Lives (p. 121.)”
Slavery and history are the category for the following stories:
“How the Negroes Got Their Freedom (p. 82,)” “ Massa and the Bear
(p. 72,)” and “John, the First Colored Man in Massa’s House (p. 79
f.)” Family stories
include: “The Son Who Went to
College (p. 125,)” “All These Are Mine (p. 169,)” “ Man and the
Catfish (p. 95,)” and “How to Write a Letter (p. 40.)”
Humorous tales and anecdotes are represented by these stories:
“ The Quickest Trick (p. 39,)” “How the Brother Was Called to
Preach (p. 21,)” and “ The Workingest Pill You Ever Seen (p. 46.)”
Songs and rhythm tales are found in the following:
“Sal, Sal (p. 35,)” “Ah’m Gointa Loose Dis Right Hand Shackle
from ‘Round My Leg (p. 154,)” “John Henry (p. 56 f.,)” and “Mule on
De Mount (p. 269.)” In the
supernatural category, the following stories have been selected:
“High Walker and Bloody Bones (p. 173,)” “How the Devil Coined a
Word (p. 160,)” “ How Jack-O-Lanterns Came to Be (p. 163,)” and “God
and the Devil in the Cemetery (p. 87.)”
Additional
stories were selected from Talk That Talk, edited by Linda Goss and
Marian Barnes: this text also contains modern stories in the oral tradition.
Folklore, myths and fables are represented by the following stories:
“Brer Rabbit and the Briar Patch,” retold by Annie Reed (p. 30 f.,)
“Why Anansi Hides in Corners,” told by Jeremiah Nabawi (p. 35 f.,) “The
Ant Story,” by Constance Garcia-Barrio (p. 47 f.,) “Don’t Play With Your
Supper,” by Kwasi Asare (p. 46 f.,) and “A Bush Got Ears,” by Naomi
Clarke. Stories which reflect
slavery and history are: “The
Ibo Landing Story,” by Frankie and Doug Quimby (p. 139 f.,) “Looking Back
On My Texas Heritage,” by Adele L. Simmons (p. 161 f.,) “ How We Got
Over,” by Jackie and Rosa Maddox (p. 117 f.,) “A Pioneer’s Story of Long
Creek,” by Naomi Clarke (p. 141 f.,) and “The Violence of Desperate Men”
by Martin L. King (p. 145 f.) In
the Family and Friends category, the following tales have been selected:
“Annie, the Bully,” by L. Randall (p. 225 f.,) “Death of a
Boy,” by C. Ochebe (p. 230 f.,) “Sikhambe-Nge-Nyonga,” by A. C. Jordan
(p. 236 f.,) “River and the Foolish One,” by Kwasi Asare (p. 246 f.,) and
“Aunt Zerletha,” by Ruby Dee (p. 278 f.)
Humorous selections are: “Jack
and De Devil,” by W. Horton (p. 365 f.,) “A Laugh That Mean Freedom,” by
M. Brown (p. 367 f.,) “Si Mary Bigfoot,” by E. W. Jacobs (p. 403 f.,) “
Umu Madu in the Good Old Days,” by T. Obinkaram Echewa (p. 405 f.,) and “
February,” by Dick Gregory (p. 224 f.)
The following items were selected to represent the rhyme and rhythm
category: “John Henry,” by
Huddie Ledbetter (p. 447 f.,) “The Legend of Dolemite,” retold by N. Nduma
(p. 451 f.,) “African-American History Rap,” by S. J. Holley (p. 473 f.,)
“ “Signifyin’ Monkey” by Oscar Brown, Jr. (p. 456 f.,) and “The
Ballad of Joe Meek,” by Sterling Brown (p. 467 f.) Supernatural tales are:
“The Two Sons,” by A. McGill (p. 311 f.,) “The White Dog,” by
W. Gigettes (p. 320 f.,) “Barney McKay,” by Jackie Hunter as told to
Marian Barnes (p. 325 f.,) “The Devil’s Dulcimer,” by J. Harrington (p.
348 f.,) and “Daddy and the
Plat-Eye Ghost,” by Eleanora Tate (p. 326 f.)
Jump
Up and Say, edited by Linda and Clay Goss is an anthology that gets its
name from the proper response after the preacher has asked, “Can I get a
witness?” This text also
contains some modern stories that follow the older traditions.
Folktales, myths and moral tales are represented by the following
selections: “The Young Lion,”
by Tejumola F. Ologboni (pp. 28-32,) “ How the Leopard Got His Claws,” by
Chinua Acheba and John Iroaganachi (pp. 36-42,) “Nzambi and the Earth
Connection,” by David Anderson (Sankofa) (pp. 50-52,) “Brer Rabbit and the
Peanut Shells,” by Maxine LeGale (p. 173 f.,) and “ Brer Rabbit Builds a
Home,” by Jackie Torrance. History
and the slavery theme are found in the following tales:
“Feet in the Water, Song in the Heart,” by David Anderson (Sankofa)
(p. 82 f.,) “Sojourner Truth Speaks,” by Alice McGill (p. 89 f.,) “Get
On Board and Tell Your Story, “ by Gloria Davin Goode (p. 87 f.,) and “The
Ballad of the Underground Railroad,” by Charles L. Blockson.
Family and Friends tales are as follows: “The Tree of Love,” by Linda Goss (p. 97 f.,)
“Grandma,” by Charlotte B. Alston (p. 110 f.,) “ The Crumb Catchers,”
by J. Bishop (p. 118 f.,) and “Bubba,” by Sonia Sanchez (p. 123 f.)
Humorous tales are: “Why
Women Always Take Advantage of Men,” by Zora N. Hurston (p. 177,)
“Funeral,” by Mary Carter Smith (p. 180 f.,) “Uglyrella,” by J. Pena
(p. 183 f.,) and “ Riley’s Riddle,” by Mary T. Burroughs (p. 171 f.)
Rhymes which tell tales are represented by:
“We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn Brooks (p. 137,) “ My Friend
Bennie,” by Rex Ellis (p. 141 f.,) “Frog Went A Cruizin’,”by Morton
Brooks (p. 157 f.,) and “Strawberry, Strawberry,” by H. B. Insignares (p.
159 f.) Supernatural stories are:
“The Talking Skull,” a traditional tale, (p. 232,) “Ol’ Ben,”
by Rex Ellis (p. 231,) “Ligahoo,” by Lyn Joseph (pp. 238-241,) and
“Removing the Veil,” by Caroline I. Frink Reed (pp. 242-243.)
Finally,
stories were selected from African Folktales by Roger D. Abrahams.
Although these are not stories from African-American literature, they
provide a look at the origins of some of the other stories.
Selections which are in the folklore, myth and moral tale category are: “Why Monkeys Live in Trees (p. 158 f.,)” “ Saving the
Rain (p. 180 f.,)” “The Trickster’s Encounter (p. 185 f.,)” and “ Is
It Right That He Bite Me?(p. 140 f.)” Family and Friends tales include:
“He Starved His Own (p. 134 f.,)” “The Cloth of Pembe Mirui (p.
364 f.,)” “ The Smart Man and the Fool (p. 136 f.,)” and “ An Eye for
an Eye(p. 113.)” Humorous
stories are represented in the following tales: “One Trick Deserves Another (p. 193 f.,)” “ The Trapper
Trapped (p. 203 f.,)” “The Clever Wakasanke (p. 183 f.,) and “Two
Friends From Their Childhood (p. 227 f.)
Rhymes and rhythms appear in these stories:
“The Tiger Slights the Tortoise (p. 142 f.)” “ The Disobedient
Sisters (p. 145 f.,)” “All the Little Animals (p. 165 f.,)” and
“Treachery Repaid (p. 119.) Tales
of the supernatural include the following tales:
“Never Ask Me About My Family (p. 336 f.,)” “Their Eyes Came Out
(p. 133 f.,)” “The Leopard Woman (p. 150 f.,)” and “The Orphan with
the Cloak of Skins (p. 309 f.)”
The
stories of the south, in the African-American oral tradition, are interesting,
and many categories tend to overlap. For
the curriculum unit, a specific text will be used
to interest seventh grade students in the ways literature can connect
to history and to life. Writers
construct history, and African-American authors reflect the oral tradition;
these ideas are also related to the theme of southern identity.
Identity often appears as a literary theme, is of cultural importance
and is often of special importance to middle school children.
A thematic focus and some literary exploration can only help students
make meaningful connections in exploring literature and history.
The
text used for literary exploration is The Dark-Thirty: Southern Tales of
the Supernatural by Patricia McKissack.
The title refers to the half hour between daylight and dark when scary
stories have the most power. As
in most areas of literature, the stories also reflect other concepts.
In this case, although the stories might all have “fear” as a
connective, other elements of the southern experience are present.
For example, some stories deal with slavery, and one story is about the
Ku Klux Klan. One of the stories
relates to the unionization of African-American porters (1927-1939) because it
is the kind of “train” story these men told to each other.
One story reflects the place of the southern midwife as a wise woman
and another story relates directly to the history of Civil Rights.
Healers, or “root doctors” have a place in one story in the
collection. One tale relates to
the real human reaction of wanting to disappear or “fly away,” in keeping
with many similar stories in the oral tradition.
Finally, there are two stories that relate to the folktale motif of
charms and a “monster.” This text, with multiple connections to history and to the
idea of the Southern story, is suitable for middle school students.
For older students, Raw Head, Bloody Bones: African-American Tales
of the Supernatural, selected by Mary E. Lyons, could be used.
Lesson Plans, Objectives, Strategies and Classroom
Activities
The curriculum unit is organized in the following way:
two ninety-minute classes will be spent in the computer lab and the
library. The computer lab contains twenty-eight computers and the library has
eight computers; technical assistance is available from the technology teacher
in the lab and the librarian in the library.
One or both rooms may be used, depending on availability.
The remaining eight to ten days are spent in the regular classroom,
with students grouped at eight tables; each group consists of three or four
students. The following
materials, aside from the selected texts, are used in the computer lab, the
library and the classroom: pencils,
pens and paper, markers, chart paper, the selected texts and the textbook,
maps of the United States and of the South. The Inquiring School Model
(Calfee) and the Directed Reading Model (Hamilton and Sauer) are used for all
lessons. (Please see the
Appendix for detailed lesson plans.)
Content Standards: Communications 2 and 4, Technology 9, Citizenship 7 and 8, and Arts and Humanities 2 and 3.
International Baccalaureate Middle Years Program focus (areas of interaction): approaches to learning and homo faber (man, the maker).
Objective: The student will examine and discuss the idea of Southern identity and will be able to categorize selected stories from the African-American oral tradition as belonging to specific categories; students will be able to explain and define the attributes of the stories as presented by the instructor and as measured by an oral presentation by the group.
Strategies and activities:
The introduction contains an explanation of connections found in literature and culture.
Content Standards: Communications 2 and 4, Citizenship 7 and 8 and Arts and Humanities 2 and 3.
International Baccalaureate Middle Years Program focus (areas of interaction): approaches to learning and homo faber (man, the maker).
Objective: The student will examine supernatural stories and relate the story to an event in African-American history as measured by class discussion and the successful completion of a student-selected activity.
Strategies and activities:
Each story in the text The Dark-Thirty, by
Patricia McKissack is read, examined and discussed, using inquiry strategies.
As a further focus for the literature, a time line will be devised
which places each story among historical events.
Students will relate each story to the southern elements of the oral
tradition and to African-American history or to a specific event.
Because the curriculum unit, focused on responding to literature, has
an enrichment focus, suggested activities rather than traditional homework are
provided. For example, activities
include topics for further research. Writing
assignments relating to the theme of southern identity and what makes a
southern story, and to the specific stories are suggested.
Discussions also include the generation of graphic organizers.
Students will extend the study of supernatural stories to include
others from their own experience. Informal
assessment occurs through an examination of the activities selected by
individual students, and work products are displayed.
Connections are important to teachers and to students; we are members of a community of learners. The use of the anthology for the curriculum unit facilitates an examination of one type of African-American tale from the south, and it allows for connections to other stories and to African-American history. Average middle school students are able to understand the stories and to relate to the idea of a Southern identity. Communications Standards are implicit in the process of reading and responding and academic rigor and accountable talk are furthered by the discussions and cooperative learning activities associated with understanding the stories. Exploring cultural connections between history and literature can only lead to increased understanding.
Greater understanding provides for more rigorous
examination of themes and concepts for students. Finally, an enlarged view of literature and historical
connections can only lead to a greater truth:
we are all connected.
Works Cited
Andrews, William L. “An Introduction to the Slave
Narratives” in Documenting the American
South, 1998, updated February 11, 2002. Available
http://docsouth.unc.edu
February 15, 2002.
Asante, Molefi Koto, “Folk Poetry in the Storytelling
Tradition” in Linda Goss and Marian Barnes (eds.) Talk That Talk.
New York: Simon and
Schuster, 1989, 491- 493.
Bailey, Roger B. “A Brief Chronology of
African-American Literature” in SAC Litweb, 2000.
Available http://www.accd.edu/sac/english/laframlit.htm,
February 20, 2002.
Baker, Houston A. “Animal
Tales and Lore” in Linda Goss and Marian Barnes (eds.)
Talk That Talk. New
York: Simon and Schuster, 1989,
99-102.
Battle, Kemp. Great American Folklore:
Legends, Tales Ballads and Superstitions from
All Across America. New
York: Doubleday and Co., 1986.
Bing, Carter. “Literature”
in The Drum Links, 2002. Available
http://drum.ncat.edu
Cohen, Amy. From
Sea to Shining Sea: A Treasury of
American Folklore and Folk Songs.
New York: Scholastic,
1993.
Cohen, Hennig. “Folklore”
in Documenting the American South, 1998, updated
February 11, 2002. Available
http://docsouth.unc.edu, February 15,
2002.
“From Africa to America” in The American Journey,
2002. Available
http://www2worldbook.com
February 17, 2002.
Garcia-Barrio, Constance. “Creatures That Haunt
America,” in Linda Goss and Marian
Barnes (eds.) Talk That Talk. New
York: Simon and Schuster, 1989,
357- 359.
Gates, Henry L. (ed.)
Black Literature and Literacy Theory. New York: Methuen, Inc.
1984.
Goss, Linda and Marian Barnes (eds.) Talk That Talk.
New York: Simon and
Schuster, 1989.
Goss, Linda and Clay Goss (eds.) Jump Up and Say:
A Collection of Black Storytelling.
New York: Simon and
Schuster, 1995.
Greene, J. Lee. “Black
Literature” in Documenting the American South, 1998, updated
February 11, 2002. Available
http://docsouth.unc.edu, February 15,
2002.
Hamilton, Rebecca and S. Sauer. “The Directed Reading
Model,” workshop sponsored by
Pittsburgh Public Schools Teaching, Learning and Assessment Division, February
2, 2002 at South Hills Middle School.
Hamilton, Virginia.
The People Could Fly. New
York: Alfred Knopf, 1993.
Harley, Sharon. The
Timetables of African-American History.
New York: Simon and
Schuster, 1995.
Herskovits, Melville J.
The Myth of the Negro Past.
Boston: Beacon Press,
1958.
Hurston, Zora Neale.
Mules and Men. New
York: Harper Collins Perennial
Classics, 1990.
Kantor, Susan. One
Hundred and One African-American Read-Aloud Stories.
New York:
Black Dog and Leventhal Publishers, 1998.
Killens, John O. and Jerry M. Ward.
Black Southern Voices. New
York: Meredian
Group/Penguin Books, 1992.
Kouyate, D’Jimo. “The
Role of the Griot” in Linda Goss and Marian Barnes (eds.)
Talk That Talk. New
York: Simon and Schuster,
l989,179-181.
McHenry, Elizabeth.
“African American Literature” in Literature, 1998.
Available http://www.africana.com,
February 20, 2002.
McKissack, Patricia.
The Dark-Thirty: Southern
Tales of the Supernatural. New
York: Scholastic, 1993.
Morgan, Kathryn L. “Caddy
Buffers: Legends of a Middle
Class Black Family in Philadelphia”
in Linda Goss and Marian Barnes (eds.) Talk That Talk.
New York:
Simon and Schuster, l989, 295-298.
Olorounto, Samuel B. “Studying African-American
Literature in Its Global Context,”
1992, VCCAJournal. Available
http://www.br.cc.va.us, February
12,2002.
Reed, John and Dale Reed. “Grit Lit:
Writers and Literature” in Anything
Southern, 2001. Available http://anythingsouthern.com,
February 17, 2002.
Ridge, Kari K. “Hip
Hop History” in Read Magazine, 51, 13, 2/22/02, pp. 13-15.
Robinson, Beverly. “Historical Arenas of the
African-American Storytelling,” in Linda
Goss and Marian Barnes (eds.) Talk That Talk. New York: Simon and Schuster,
1989, 211-216.
Simon, Ada DeBlanc.
“Looking Back on My Texas Heritage” in Linda Goss and
Marian Barnes (eds.) Talk That Talk.
New York: Simon and
Schuster, l989, 161-163.
“Tell About the South:
Voices in Black and White,” Public Broadcasting System
WQED, Pittsburgh, February 7, 14, 21 and 28, 2002, A James Agee Film
Project, National Endowment for the
Humanities, 1999.
Wilson, Charles and William Ferris.
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Documenting the American South, l998, updated February 11, 2002. Available http://docsouth.unc.edu,
February 15, 2002.
Armstrong, William H. Sounder. New York: Scholastic, 1969,117 pages. The nineteenth century South is the historical setting for this novel about the faith of a sharecropper’s son as he makes a hard journey to manhood. The boy (and the dog named Sounder) wait for the return of a father.
Blair, Walter. Tall-Tale
America. New York:
Coward-McCann, Inc., 1944, 262 pages. Familiar
stories, like “John Henry and the Machine in West Virginia, pp. 203 f.,
appear in this volume along with historical references and songs.
Bridges, Ruby and Margo Lundell (ed.) Through My Eyes.
New York: Scholastic,
1999, 64 pages.
The selection is an easy to read history of the live and times of Ruby
Bridges, who became the first black child in an all-white school in
September of 1960. It includes
photographs, interviews and expository text.
Collier, James Lincoln and Christopher Collier.
Jump Ship to Freedom. New
York: Dell/Bantam/Doubleday, 1981, 198
pages. Slaves, Daniel Arabus and
his mother live in Captain
Ivers’house in Connecticut. Soldiers’
notes, meant to buy their freedom, are
taken by Mrs. Ivers and Daniel steals them back. He finds himself on a
ship bound for the West Indies, and his plan is to jump ship in New York,
where he is caught up in history. These
authors have written other books, like War Comes to Willy Freeman.
Curtis, Christopher Paul.
Bud, Not Buddy. New
York: Scholastic, 1999, 243
pages. The novel is
historical fiction, set in the 1930s during the Great Depression.
Bud Caldwell is a foster child
who finds himself in situations particular to the hard times
when he runs away from the Amos Family.
He visits “Hooverville” and travels by
train; he makes rules for living along the way and meets a series of
interesting characters.
Eventually, he becomes a musician and learns about his real father.
Curtis, Christopher Paul.
The Watsons Go to Birmingham, 1963. New York: Scholastic,1995,
210 pages. The trip of the
“Weird Watsons” to Birmingham to visit
Grandma is told through the eyes of ten-year old Kenny. The family is at an
oddly wrong place, church, when four little girls are killed by a bomb.
The book contains an epilogue
with a concise history of the Civil Rights Movement and it is
readable and enjoyable.
Davidson, Margaret.
Frederick Douglass Fights For Freedom.
New York: Scholastic, 1968,
79 pages. This short biography tells the story of Frederick Douglass by
asking the essential questions:
Why was he so famous? Why
did people respect him so much?
The book is easy to read and is suitable for upper elementary or middle
school students.
Ehrlich, Amy (ed.) When I Was Your Age:
Original Stories About Growing Up. Cambridge:
Candlewick Press, 2001, 160 pages. Famous authors present stories from
their childhood experiences that were significant to them as adults. The text varies in
complexity, but is interesting for students and for adults. Other volumes are planned.
Fox, Paula. The
Slave Dancer. New York:
Dell Publishing (Bantam/Doubleday), 1973,
127 pages. This historical
novel for young people tells the story of Jessie Bollivar
who is kidnapped from New Orleans and forced to play fife music so
slaves can “dance” to keep their
muscles strong in the hold of the ship. The
story is one of suspense and survival;
readers will want to know what happens to Jessie and the
slaves.
Giovanni, Nikki. Spin
A Soft Black Song. New York:
Scholastic, 1971, 57 pages. The
poetry in the book is biographical, and some is dedicated to specific people.
Most Students will enjoy the
poems.
Greene, Bette. Philip
Hall Likes Me I Reckon Maybe. New
York: Scholastic, 1974, 135
pages. Beth Lambert, who
lives in Pocahontas Arkansas, shares her rural life
with readers: the Church
picnic, the 4H competition, the cure for turkey thieves, and
The Pretty Penny (girl power) Club.
Her feelings and reactions are described in this
realistic novel; she stands up for herself and overcomes every
adversity except her allergies.
This novel is interesting for younger middle school students.
Grimes, Nikki. Hopscotch
Love. New York:
Scholastic, 1999, 40 pages. The
poetry is all about love and the
family. It is suitable for all
ages but the illustrations give this book
a child-centered focus.
Guy, Rosa. The
Friends. New York:
Dell Publishing (Bantam/Doubleday), 1973, 185
pages. The novel, for young people, is about friendship,
self-perception and self-knowledge. It
tells the story of Phillisia Cathy, a student from the West Indies, and
Edith Jordan, a social outcast; the book would interest older middle
school students. The main
character, Edith Jordan, also appears in other books by the same author.
Hamilton, Virginia.
Anthony Burns: The
Defeat and Triumph of a Fugitive Slave.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf,
1988, 193 pages. This expository
text tells the story of Anthony Burns,
a Virginia slave, who escaped to Boston in 1854.
His struggle for freedom caused
riots in the streets, and a trial was held.
The extensive index in this book
is helpful in understanding the Fugitive Slave Act.
Hamilton, Virginia.
The House of Dies Drear. New
York: Simon and Schuster, 1968,
278 pages. The historical
novel would appeal to older middle school students.
It tells the story of an
Underground Railroad Station House where Dies Drear and the
two slaves he was hiding were murdered.
The novel has a high level of suspense as
the story of a black family caught in a dangerous situation is told.
Hamilton, Virginia.
Zeely. New York:
MacMillan Co., 1967, 97 pages. In
this short novel, Zeely, who may be a
ghost, imparts wisdom and historical facts to Elizabeth
(Geeder) and her brother, John (Toeboy,) as they visit their Uncle’s rural
Farm. Younger middle school students would be interested in this book.
Haskins, James. Black
Eagles: African Americans in
Aviation. New York:
Scholastic, 1995, 196
pages. The text is expository.
It provides biographies of African-Americans from the pioneer stage of
aviation through the space age. Other similar Books by
the same author are: Get On
Board: The Story of the
Underground Rail Road and One
More River to Cross.
Haskins, James. The
Dream and the Struggle: Separate
But Not Equal. New York:
Scholastic, 1998, 184 pages. The
text is straight-forward history and it explains
the doctrine of “separate but equal” and the historical events
involved. It is similar
to other books by the same author, but in concentrates on the times
rather than the people.
Hudson, Wade, and Cheryl Hudson (eds.)
How Sweet the Sound. New
York:Scholastic, 1995, 48 pages. The
words to songs of the south are presented with
excellent art work by Floyd Cooper.
Similar works are cited in the “Recommended
reading” list and the key elements of African-American music are also
listed. The
book is meant to provide a “glimpse at the history of Blacks in
America through their
music.”
Hudson, Wade (ed.) Pass It On.
New York: Scholastic,
1993, 32 pages. The over-size
book is beautifully illustrated by Floyd Cooper.
A variety of poets are represented.
Most of the poetry would be suitable for memorization or a choral
reading, but all of it is enjoyable.
Hughes, Langston. Selected
Poems. New York:
Random House/Vintage Books, 1987,
297 pages. Details on the
Mississippi-born poet’s life are presented along with
the poetry. Most middle
school students would enjoy this text.
Jackson, Florence. Blacks
In America: 1954-1979.
New York: Franklin Watts,
Inc., 1980, 89 pages.
The expository text is suitable for younger middle school students.
The book presents historical events, illustrated by photography, and
the Civil Rights struggle is discussed
in an understandable way.
Johnson, James Weldon.
Life Ev’ry Voice and Sing.
New York: Scholastic,
1995, 15 pages.
Music is provided, but the main focus of the text is the illustration
of the the anthem.
The illustrations are by Jan Spivey Gilchrist.
Johnston, Johanna. They
Led the Way. New York:
Scholastic, 1973, 126 pages. The epository text
provides details on frontier American women, including Phillis
Wheatley (pp. 22-40) and Harriet Beecher Stowe (pp. 80-86.)
Kulling, Monica. The
Escape North: The Story of
Harriet Tubman. New York:
Scholastic, 2000, 48 pages. This
is a “step three book” in a “step into reading”
Series. It is well
illustrated and presents Harriet Tubman’s biography in a straight-forward
way.
Leeming, David and Jake Page (eds.) Myths, Legends and
Folktales of America. New
York: Oxford University
Press, 1999, 221 pages. The text
contains everything from Creation Myths
to mythical monsters and heroes and heroines of the new world.
Any student with an interest in
the topic would enjoy the book.
Lester, Julius. To Be A Slave.
New York: Scholastic,
l968, 160 pages. The title of the
Expository text indicates the content.
Stories and quotations from slaves and ex-
saves reveal the various aspects of slavery as told to the members of
the American Anti-Slavery Society
(1870s) and the Federal Writer’s Project (1930s.)
The stories included are of two
types: those conforming to
literary conventions and those recorded
to preserve speech patterns and language.
Sources are provided and the text is
organized around topics: to be a
slave, the auction block, the plantation, resistance
and emancipation. This is an excellent book for middle school students.
McGill, Alice. Miles’ Song. New York: Scholastic, 2000, 212 pages. The novel is historical fiction, set in 1851. Miles is a twelve-year old slave who is sent to the“breaking ground” when he is accused of breaking house rules. He is befriended by Elijah, who knows how to read and who tells tales of the north. Miles is inspired to