The Grasp That Reaches beyond the Grave

Venetria K. Patton

Description

The Grasp That Reaches beyond the Grave investigates the treatment of the ancestor figure in Toni Cade Bambara's The Salt Eaters, Paule Marshall's Praisesong for the Widow, Phyllis Alesia Perry's Stigmata and A Sunday in June, Toni Morrison's Beloved, Tananarive Due's The Between, and Julie Dash's film, Daughters of the Dust in order to understand how they draw on African cosmology and the interrelationship of ancestors, elders, and children to promote healing within the African American community. Venetria K. Patton suggests that the experience of slavery with its concomitant view of black women as "natally dead" has impacted African American women writers' emphasis on elders and ancestors as they seek means to counteract notions of black women as somehow disconnected from the progeny of their wombs. This misperception is in part addressed via a rich kinship system, which includes the living and the dead. Patton notes an uncanny connection between depictions of elder, ancestor, and child figures in these texts and Kongo cosmology. These references suggest that these works are examples of Africanisms or African retentions, which continue to impact African American culture.
Acknowledgments

Introduction: Revising The Legacy of Kinlessness Through Elders and Ancestors

Part I Preface: The Elder as Culture Bearer

1. Othermothers as Elders and Culture Bearers in Daughters of the Dust and The Salt Eaters

Part II Preface: The Dead Are Not Dead: The Ancestral Presence

2. Ancestral Prodding in Praisesong for the Widow

3. Ancestral Disturbances in Stigmata

4. Beloved: A Ghost Story with an Ogbanje Twist

Part III Preface: The Child and Ancestor Bond

5. The Child Figure as a Means to Ancestral Knowledge in Daughters of the Dust and A Sunday in June

Conclusion: Looking Backward and Forward: The Ancestral Presence in Speculative Fiction

Notes
Bibliography
Index

Sujets

• África
• Ethnic studies
• Africa

Informations

• Publié par: State University of New York Press
• Date de parution: 20 juin 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781438447384
• Langue: English

Extrait

The Grasp That Reaches Beyond the Grave
The Grasp That Reaches Beyond the Grave
The Ancestral Call in Black Women’s Texts
Venetria K. Patton
Cover art: Adara (ah DAH rah): Exalted One (2008) by Delita Martin.
Published by State University of New York Press, Albany
© 2013 State University of New York
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
For information, contact State University of New York Press, Albany, NY www.sunypress.edu
Production by Diane Ganeles Marketing by Anne M. Valentine
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Patton, Venetria K., 1968-
The grasp that reaches beyond the grave : the ancestral call in black women's texts / Venetria K. Patton.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4384-4737-7 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. American literature—African American authors—History and criticism. 2. American literature—African influences. 3. African American women—Intellectual life. 4. African Americans in literature. I. Title.
PS153.N5P37 2013 810.9'928708996073—dc23
2012029400
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For my son, Hollis
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction Revising The Legacy of Kinlessness Through Elders and Ancestors
Part I Preface: The Elder as Culture Bearer
Chapter 1 Othermothers as Elders and Culture Bearers in Daughters of the Dust and The Salt Eaters
Part II Preface: The Dead Are Not Dead: The Ancestral Presence
Chapter 2 Ancestral Prodding in Praisesong for the Widow
Chapter 3 Ancestral Disturbances in Stigmata
Chapter 4 Beloved : A Ghost Story with an Ogbanje Twist
Part III Preface: The Child and Ancestor Bond
Chapter 5 The Child Figure as a Means to Ancestral Knowledge in Daughters of the Dust and A Sunday in June
Conclusion Looking Backward and Forward: The Ancestral Presence in Speculative Fiction
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Acknowledgments
This book has been a long time in coming, so I must recognize all of those who assisted me and cheered me along the way. First and foremost, is my partner, Ronald J. Stephens, who was with me before I even knew this was a book. Thank you for always believing in me, encouraging me, and for reading my work and talking things through. I have had the good fortune to have wonderful colleagues who have read portions of this project in its various stages. Much thanks to Wendy Flory, Carol E. Henderson, Maureen Honey, Bill V. Mullen, and Aparajita Sagar. I am particularly appreciative of the insightful comments provided by my English Department head, Nancy J. Peterson, because I know so well how difficult it is to balance administrative duties and scholarly activities, but Nancy has not only emulated how to do this but encouraged me in my own balancing act. I also must give special mention to my writing group, Marlo David and Jennifer Freeman-Marshall; it was a pleasure working through our manuscripts together. I must also make special mention of Viktor Gecas, former head of Purdue’s Sociology Department. Viktor always encouraged me with regard to my progress on my manuscript and it was one of our conversations that led to my “aha” moment regarding Kongo cosmology and the women I was researching. I also must recognize the support I have received from my deans, Irwin Weiser, John Contreni, and Toby Parcel. They all were supportive of my work on this project in terms of course releases and the sabbatical that made all the difference. Special thanks to Delita Martin for the art that graces this cover. And of course, I must recognize James Peltz, SUNY Press’ co-director, for continued faith in my research; my editor, Beth Bouloukos who kept things going; the anonymous reviewers for their excellent comments regarding the manuscript, and everyone at SUNY who brought this project to fruition.
In closing, I thank my son, Hollis, for his patience as I completed this project and my girls, Kiara and Karielle, for keeping me grounded. My family and friends truly kept me sane, especially my mother, Hildegarde Patton, who made everything possible; my cheering section: Frederick, Pinar, Laeres, Christina, Chloe, Lyle-Jehan, Kyle-Roth, and Letiwe; and my sisters in spirit: Zenephia Evans, Carolyn E. Johnson, and Matilda Stokes.
An earlier version of Chapter 3 was originally published as “Stigmata: Embodying the Scars of Slavery” in Imagining the Black Female Body edited by Carol E. Henderson (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010) and is used with permission from Palgrave Macmillan.
Special thanks to the Department of English and the Office of the Vice President for Research at Purdue University for supporting the publication of my research.
Introduction
Revising the Legacy of Kinlessness Through Elders and Ancestors
E lders have traditionally played an important role within African and African American communities. Elders preserve cultural memory and help younger generations navigate the world. However, sometimes the younger generation becomes distant from traditional beliefs and elders must remind them of the importance of tradition and cultural roots. This reliance on elders as guides is particularly evident in matrilineal relationships between mothers and daughters, but also in the bonds shared with grandmothers, aunts, and othermothers. In Black Feminist Thought , Patricia Hill Collins discusses the importance of othermothers and woman-centered networks. She asserts, “African and African-American communities have … recognized that vesting one person with full responsibility for mothering a child may not be wise or possible. As a result, othermothers—women who assist bloodmothers by sharing mothering responsibilities—traditionally have been central to the institution of Black motherhood” (119). Several scholars, such as Nancy Tanner, Carol Stack, and Niara Sudarkasa, have noted that “[t]he centrality of women in African-American extended families reflects both a continuation of West African cultural values and functional adaptations to race and gender oppression” (119). However, Hill Collins admonishes that “[t]his centrality is not characterized by the absence of husbands and fathers. Men may be physically present and/or have well-defined and culturally significant roles in the extended family and the kin unit may be woman-centered” (119). Therefore, we are not talking about matriarchal families in which mothers head the household, but rather matrifocal societies that emphasize the mother–child bond. According to Deborah Gray White, in matrifocal societies, females “ in their role as mothers are the focus of familial relationships” (256). Thus texts by black women often emphasize mother–child relationships or other woman-centered bonds because of the significant roles women play in family relations.
This is the case for the texts under discussion here—men are very present in the roles of father, husband, lover, and community leader—however, the protagonists of Toni Cade Bambara’s The Salt Eaters (1980), Paule Marshall’s Praisesong for the Widow (1984), Phyllis Alesia Perry’s Stigmata (1998) and A Sunday in June (2004), Toni Morrison’s Beloved (1987), and Julie Dash’s film, Daughters of the Dust 1 (1991) are very much a part of woman-centered networks of mothers and daughters and elders and ancestors serving as othermothers. However, these woman-centered networks still have not received sufficient scholarly attention. In the foreword to their book, The Lost Tradition: Mothers and Daughters in Literature , Cathy N. Davidson and E. M. Broner note, “We have already heard the story of fathers and sons, of mothers and sons, even of fathers and daughters. But who has sung the song of mothers and daughters?” (xi). Since the 1980 publication of their essay collection much has changed. In 1983, Alice Walker found her mother’s garden—ten years after finding her literary foremother, Zora Neale Hurston. In her essay collection, In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens , Walker observes, “these grandmothers and mothers of ours were not Saints, but Artists; driven to a numb and bleeding madness by the springs of creativity in them for which there was no release” (233). Since these early discussions of mothers, much attention has been paid to maternity and matrilineal relations. Within the African Diaspora, mothers, motherlands, and mother tongues have tremendous symbolic force. In her 1991 essay collection, Motherlands: Black Women’s Writing from Africa, the Caribbean and South Asia , Sushelia Nasta asserts, “The whole question of ‘motherhood’ is also a major concern universally in contemporary women’s literature and has obvious reverberations in terms of feminist criticism—the relation between mothers and daughters, mothers mirroring and affirming identity or notions of the birth of female identity through transference to text and symbol …” (xix). The aim of this book is to investigate not only relationships between literal mothers and daughters, but to explore the extended woman-centered networks of mothers, daughters, and othermothers in the form of elders and ancestors.
One might ask why I chose this emphasis on m