April 4 2017 Class Notes

Our class today on April 4, 2017 began with a quote from Things Fall Apart which Dr. West wanted to share.  The quote from Achebe is that “there is no story that is not true’ said Uchendu. ‘The world has no end and what is good among people is an abomination with others’” (Achebe 141.  Dr. West wanted us to consider this quote in context of what can be culturally appropriate in different societies, and what is universally true for all human beings. In this class specifically where we are discussing difficult subjects like the slave trade, it is important to keep these ideas in mind.

            Jordan and Zariah began the class and discussion about the slave trade with the discussion about the Trans-Atlantic and Trans-Sahara slave trades, discussing the and comparing the differences of Islamic slave trade and the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.  Jordan began with the subject of slave trade.  The TS slave trade was conducted in the Swahili coast, where many slaves perished in route to the Arab world.  The slaves were viewed as lesser than the slave owners, much like the slaves in the Trans-Atlantic slave trade.  Children were often killed at birth, and women were sexually exploited.  It is estimated that 140 million slaves were victims of the TS slave trades.  The spread of Islam was also a result from the TS slave trade, resulting in now Muslim majority nations in Africa such as Morocco and Egypt.  Another important factor that Jordan spoke about in her presentation was that slavery was not abolished until recently, until the early to mid 20^th century.  The TS slave trade had been in place since the 15^th century, and the effects of the trade have been lasting.  Zariah presented her information on the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, which is the slave trade discussed in the book Homegoing. She explained that three million slaves were brought to the new world in countries such as Haiti, Brazil, Jamaica and America.  She discussed the beginning of the Gold Coast, and how the treatmnts of different slaves in different castles varied among the gold coast.  As the need for slaves increased the more routes came to and from the Gold Coast, where they would cargo men, women and children.  Zariah explained the harsh conditions for the slave ships, including tight quarters, where 12% of the people would die from disease.  She explained the different methods of  how the slaves were auctioned off and sold throughout the states, which was an emotionally painful and scaring process.

            Dr. West spoke about her own personal experiences with living in the deep south of Jackson, Mississippi and why she speaks a lot about racial literature.  Being the descendants of probable slave owners, she shared her personal testimony living in an environment where racial inequality was very much the norm.  It was important as students to hear her experience since it allows us to understand where she is coming from and why she chose this path to study African-American literature.

            The rest of class discussed Homegoing and the context surrounding the story. Dr. West presents a PowerPoint presentation about racial discrimination against African Americans in the history of America and also the slave trade.  The importance to talk about the slave history is because we are continuing to recover from the affects of African American exploitation in American history.  We discussed conversational ideas like the invention of race, the four subcategories of Homo sapiens, and humankind’s diversity.  We also talked about terms such as ethnicity, and diaspora, the idea of dispersion of people from their original homeland by force. 

            At the end of class, we got into a circle and discussed how the class felt about the book.  Many people discussed how they liked the generational aspect, and the historical viewpoint of the entire family. They enjoyed the individual stories, and how the stories in them have  glance in the lives of the characters which are eventually cut off.