Underground railroad and
the engagement with history
One of the best ways we can talk about history is to not only talk about actual historical events, but to take these real-life events and place them in a context as a way to speak on the bigger picture. The Underground Railroad is a major historical event that uses this from the perspective of slavery that took place in America, its lasting affects still rippling across this country as well as around the world. Magical realism is a tool used by authors such as Colson Whitehead as a way to use magical elements as a way to make a point on reality, and is a way to explore real events, and in this case, explore something truly horrific that happened in United States history.
Whitehead was not shy about using this event that most Americans are familiar with and using it as away to examine other cultural aspects of race, class, and the economy. By taking a step back, allowing for people to see the full scope of everything slavery represents, readers are able to put together a fuller picture of its long-lasting effects that are still prevalent today. In this literary map, we not only will go over a few specific locations that our main characters go to in search for freedom, but also a few key events to go into detail about slavery's lasting effect on America and its black population.
Whitehead was not shy about using this event that most Americans are familiar with and using it as away to examine other cultural aspects of race, class, and the economy. By taking a step back, allowing for people to see the full scope of everything slavery represents, readers are able to put together a fuller picture of its long-lasting effects that are still prevalent today. In this literary map, we not only will go over a few specific locations that our main characters go to in search for freedom, but also a few key events to go into detail about slavery's lasting effect on America and its black population.
📍 generational curse
The first stop is family and how slavery is not only a way to shape individuals, but also one family. Cora, a fifteen-year-old girl, had generations of slavery to live in and be surrounded by. Often times, we don't hear from the perspective of a young black girl and her relationship with society and her slavery.
In GEORGIA, we are introduced to her grandmother and mother, and how the trauma that occurred to Cora's family, and many others, was passed down like a generational curse. An important facet of slavery to expand on the trauma and survival the slaves had to undergo, their entire existence being enslaved by their both physical and mental owners. |
Everyone is going to be fighting for the one extra bite of food in the morning, fighting for the small piece of property. To me, that makes sense; if you put people together who’ve been raped and tortured, that’s how they would |
📍 economic value of black labor
Writing it now, the question was: ‘How can I make a psychologically credible plantation?’ And that means thinking about people who’ve been traumatised, brutalised and dehumanised their whole lives. It’s not going to be the pop culture plantation where there’s one Uncle Tom and everyone is just really helpful to each other. |
Over time, slave owners developed a systemic way of breaking up black families and saw new children as new labor. Capturing slaves was a lucrative business, and was another way to reinforce the idea that they were property to be returned. Core encounters this while still in GEORGIA, however this is an important aspect of the novel that Whitehead attempts to sprinkle in throughout the novel. Constantly, we are told Cora's "value" as a slave and the strides slave catchers will go to take her body back, another way of claiming her and her body. This represents how black bodies are consistently seen as not only inferior, but also a thing to be manipulated for capitalism's gain.
Throughout the novel, we see how Cora is engaged with the economy, and asks that if land equals wealth, what is the value of the labor from people who were forced to work these lands? Unpaid black labor from years of slavery helped build the American economy that vaulted the nation to the forefront as one of the most powerful nations in the world. And if we continue to use such an archaic economic system where there will always need to be a class of poor, disadvantaged people, should it still be used? |
📍 historical living documents
While in SOUTH CAROLINA, Cora becomes involved in the museum as a model reenacting the black slaves "dark ages" in Africa before the whites brought them to Africa. Museums and libraries are important for every culture as they show the progression of a culture, and that piece of themselves being another thing disconnected from the enslaved blacks is one more way they feel disconnected from themselves. America's history is recorded and very detailed, even including the very documents like the Constitution that rule it. The Constitution being described as a "living document" shows to us that America's laws can always change, and it does.
Cora's journey here also highlights that no matter where she is, the racism and slavery is so ingrained in society, that is the same everywhere she goes. This also echoes the idea that the blacks in America (inhabiting America both during and after slavery) is something very new - they'll have to make their own model for what it looks like, unattached to the white's interaction with America. |
📍 Scientific racism
Still in SOUTH CAROLINA, Cora experiences a new, more specific kind of racism when she encounters a doctor who goes on the specifically talk about birth control. Sterilization and eugenics has been a horrifying way to control a portion of the population since humans have walked the Earth. (And still is today.) While childbirth is a popular way to make more wealth and free labor, it can also be seen as a way to "overpopulate" the ruling class. This type of racism is quiet, and Cora sees straight through it right away.
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WORK CITED:
https://bookriot.com/2018/02/08/what-is-magical-realism/
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/jul/07/colson-whitehead-underground-railroad
https://bookriot.com/2018/02/08/what-is-magical-realism/
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/jul/07/colson-whitehead-underground-railroad