Racial Dictatorship

In Omi and Winant’s book, Racial Formation in the US, they discuss the idea of racial dictatorship. It is clear that the United States was previously a racial dictatorship, prohibiting the participation of non-white races in politics. They discuss the view of Antonio Gramsci, who held that “hegemony is always constituted by a combination of coercion and consent”(p. 199). He claimed that, “Although rule can be obtained by force, it cannot be secured and maintained, especially in modern society, without the element of consent” (p. 199). In my opinion, the African role in the slave trade is commonly overlooked. We have discussed the motives of Africans involvement in the slave trade. They could either provide slaves or be provided as slaves. There was also the gun/slave cycle—Africans could acquire warfare technology for the trading of slaves. The initial involvement of Africans provides part of the consent that Gramsci mentions.

The Africans who profited consented and helped secure and maintain the slave trade. But once the slave trade transformed into New World slavery, this form of consent disappears. There is little to no balance between coercion and consent. This is the point in which I ask, how much of a part did African Americans have in their own oppression? How much of a part could they have had? It amazes me that the institution of racial slavery was not extinguished during its onset, but it is difficult to say who would have extinguished it. Perhaps it was the consent of society that allowed the development of slavery. Either way, as the institution of slavery gained strength and support, it only became increasingly difficult for anybody to oppose. It seems that regular resistance by African Americans did not start until the Revolutionary Era, which began in 1763. It is from 1765-1783 that we witness the runaway of tens of thousands of slaves. Up to this point, it is doubtful that African Americans agreed with the establishment of slavery; yet, the major slave revolts of groups and individual slaves were observed mostly after the American Revolution. Perhaps the ideas fueling the white American’s revolution gave rise to black American’s discernment of their own persecution. In modern America, the principles of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are almost ingrained attitudes. However, at this point in history, these were innovative ideas that hit home with the black race.

Daniel has summed up the different ways in which slaves led ‘individual revolts’, in which slaves not only avoided, but also resisted slavery. We ended class on Friday with this question: what did the individual revolts mean? Professor McKinney suggested that they meant African American slaves were not completely powerless. No matter how many basic rights they lacked, or what little security they enjoyed, they still had some way of practicing self-preservation and self-protection. I believe this basic power, though seemingly elementary, revealed the potential for African American to win their freedom from slavery.

Which Came First Slavery or Racism?

In the early 17^th century slaves and non-slaves were not split by the color of their skin but rather drawn apart by their hereditary and religious beliefs. The Europeans looked down upon those who were not European and the Christian Church condemned all those who belonged to another faith. The lines that separated humanity were Christianity vs. heathenism and European vs. non-European. The idea that skin color was the main contributor to the separation in humanity is a modern day concept. It was not racism that led to slavery but rather the high demand for cheap or free labor. Racism only formed as a response and justification for American actions.

When Europeans first came to the “New World” they acquired large pieces of land that needed to be worked but became power hungry for progress. Americans were in desperate need of cheap labor in order to succeed and make money. At first, they experimented with indentured servants to do their work at a low cost and for a while this idea flourished. However, within five to seven years the indentured servants were freed and the Americans had to find new laborers. Americans dabbled in the idea of enslaving the Irish, who technically had no rights in the European world because they were Catholics. At this point it is clear that Americans had no racial prejudice because they were adamant about enslaving the technically white Irish. Although this idea did not last long, Irish were still looked down upon in the “New World” because of their faith.

Still desperate for cheap labor, Americans believed that enslaving Native-Americans would be profitable because they were already in their homeland. However, this was not an effective solution and yielded many problems. Native Americans were not immune to the diseases European-Americans had brought to the “New World”. Not only did Native Americans put up quite a resistance but also many died from small pox. Once again it is clear that American’s did not enslave people because of the color of their skin but rather enslaved them for cheap labor. Americans justified these actions through the Christian Church and believed that anyone who did not practice their religion was technically a heathen and breaking the laws.

In 1619 when America imported twenty slaves from Africa, they were not considered slaves but instead indentured servants. The color of their skin was not held against them and they were freed twenty years later. Perpetual slavery had not yet been introduced and race had yet to become and issue. Seeing the benefits of importing black African slaves, Americans began to monopolize on the situation. However, the free labor was too good to put an end to and slavery became a life sentence. Forced to become Christians when entering America, African slaves were not only forced to adapt to American culture but also forced to leave their culture behind. American slaveholders realized that in order for them to place a lifetime sentence of slavery on their slaves they must have a reason. Technically, African slaves were not criminals and they were newly converted Christians; so it was now, that race began to play a crucial role.

In 1661 Virginia first recognized slavery and a year later a law was passed stating that children inherit the status of the mother. Laws had to be passed in order to keep slaves as slaves. In 1663 Maryland passed a law stating that every black person, even the free ones, were to become slaves. It is with these laws that racial prejudice developed. Eric William stated “slavery was not born of racism: rather racism was the consequence of slavery.” Attitudes of Americans changed when laws toward African slaves were passed. Racism emerged as a justification to why African American slaves were treated differently from former American slaves. Slavery existed well before race, but race only encouraged slavery.

Slaves Vs. Slavery

By the early and mid-1800s, slavery had become a part of almost every aspect of American life, whether the economy, the church, or politics. The slave trade, in fact, was one of the most involved and complex systems in the American economy before 1865, and under the chattel principle, “any slave’s identity might be disrupted as easily as a price could be set and a piece of paper passed from one hand to another” (Johnson 19). Although the slaves were almost powerless in the South, they weren’t completely powerless. Slaves resisted their enslavement and the slave trade at all costs, and there were three main ways in which they did this:

One way was through revolts and slave breaks. David Walker, when discussing blacks, said that they have an obligation to claim their freedom by any means necessary, meaning that he would support violence in order to accomplish emancipation. Nat Turner, in 1831, led one of the largest slave rebellions in North America, killing about 55 whites, including women and children. Another famous revolt was the Stono Rebellion in 1739, in which several whites were killed. Although both rebellions were suppressed and the both revolts used violence, which could potentially have lost support for the cause, both rebellions helped to spread the message that all people deserved equality and would be willing to fight for their rights. Also, slaves really had no option but to resort to violence.

Another way to resist slavery was but simply avoiding the work. A slave could intentionally cut back on the amount of work that they did per day or purposely do the work badly. Even though there would be short-run ramifications from the master who was angry at how little work was done, the master would start to expect less from the slaves, giving them room to be lazier. Slave parents could also teach their children to be rebellious so that they would try to find a way to escape or frustrate the masters. Many others would sabotage their masters by breaking equipment, among plenty of other things.

The biggest way to avoid slavery was through the slave trade, which, as previously noted, was very ingrained into American life. Slaves, under the slave trade, could be separated from friends and families almost instantly, so they did everything in their power to avoid being traded. The best way to do this was to make themselves have as little value as possible. They could, for instance, act sick, injured, argumentative, or even crazy so that slave buyers wouldn’t want to buy them. They could even threaten suicide, which would, of course, render them “worthless” to slaveholders. And, if all else failed, they could just run away. Usually, “it was men who were most likely to find themselves in a situation where they had nothing to lose by running away” (Johnson 32), possibly because they didn’t have families to take care of. Usually, in order to prevent slaves from this sort of rebellion, masters would lie or trick them into being sold. All of this resisting, deception, and lying involved with the slave trade made it almost a sort of game between master and slave.

These modes of resistance, among others, made slavery one of the most controversial, risky, and even dangerous systems in America. No other institution in American history involved so much negotiations, trickery, or rebellion. With all the controversy and shadiness revolving around slavery, the future conflicts seemed eminent.

Representations of Slavery in Contemporary Art

Yesterday marked the first of many events to be hosted by the African-American Studies program this academic year as they examine this year’s theme, Flipping the Script: Reinscribing Identity Through the Performing Arts. To begin the discussion was Tony Horne, Professor of Directing and Musical Theatre at the University of Wisconsin and Director of the theatrical production, “Gem of the Ocean,” a play written by August Wilson that opens this Friday (9/23) at Playhouse on the Square. While listening to his discussion on Wilson and how he used black colonial history to construct critical narratives in his plays, I began to find vast similarities between him and a sizeable group of contemporary African-American visual artists. Immediately coming to mind are the likes of Glenn Ligon, Carrie Mae Weams, and Kara Walker, the foremost being who I briefly discussed during the event.

By utilizing historic imagery, photography and caricature, these artists recontexualize our understanding and relationship to the dark crevices of slavery. The formal differences these works have speak heavily to their respective creators and their individual interests as artists; however, they each share a commonality in their warped application and (as a result) representation of historic iconography.

Glenn Ligon, Untitled from Runaways, Lithograph, 1993

In Runaways, Ligon references the imagery and style of nineteenth century runaway slave posters. The text consists of descriptions of the artist’s physical appearance and habits as described by a close friend. The imagery, although contextually unrelated to those historic posters of lost slaves, becomes definitively similar to them nonetheless, an unsettling and uncanny realization for both the artist and the viewer. On these works, Ligon states the following on Moma.org: “I would say, in general, that this series is about the power of language to reinterpret the visual image.” The language plays a role in this work by juxtaposing the relationship between a would-be slaveowner and his lost slave with Ligon and his closest friends.

Similar to Ligon’s use of language, Carrie Mae Weams applies text to photography in simultaneously graphic ways. The following is a link to her 1995-1996 piece entitled, “From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried”:

http://carriemaeweems.net/galleries/from-here.html

In this collection of 33 altered prints, Weams layers jarring text atop visceral, red-tinted prints of African slaves and contemporary depictions of blacks. The text is subversively blunt for a reason; she’s demanding that the viewer interact with her image-paired text in order to further understand the grave effects slavery had on the construction of racism, as well as the defacement of an indigenous people. The text is written by Weams herself, however it is intended to be understood through the eyes of the native African woman who frames the collection of photographs. The chilling effect is a consideration of slavery from the oppressed lens, a lens that was and continues to be generally overlooked.

Kara Walker, MY COMPLEMENT, MY ENEMY, MY OPPRESSOR, MY LOVE, 1994

In Kara Walker’s large wall installations, the representation of antebellum slave life is shamelessly depicted through caricature of slaves, slaveholders, plantation landscapes, and objects. Through her large-scale black cutouts of dense and highly suggestive imagery, Walker creates a critique of slave history that ignites conversation. The following comes from the Whitney Museum regarding her work: “Walker has invented a repertoire of powerful narratives in which she conflates fact and fiction to uncover the living roots of racial and gender bias. The intricacy of her imagination and her diligent command of art history have caused her silhouettes to cast shadows on conventional thinking about race representation in the context of discrimination, exclusion, sexual desire, and love.” (Whitney.org)

These artists use varying techniques and methods to demonstrate and reinterpret slavery, as we currently know it. How do these images change our understanding and relationship to a history we all are so distanced from? The physical manifestations of these images are powerful responses from these artists. Their understanding of both themselves and their past is visually represented for the rest of the art world (and hopefully, THE world) to internalize and interpret.

I’ll leave you all with this, a link to an article published in Art in America earlier this year on a rising internet phenom and pseudo-art critic, Jayson Musson, aka. Hennessy Youngman. In the interview, one of his videos entitled “How to be a Successful Black Artist” is extensively discussed. I recommend the video if you can handle its nature. I’d like to hear your thoughts on how he sees the artwork of black artists through his semi-satirical, unconventional-yet-discoursive-art-critic lenses.

http://www.artinamericamagazine.com/news-opinion/conversations/2011-03-24/hennessey-youngman-youtube/

The Formation of Racism

In examining the history of racial slavery in the New World, we start with the discovery of different races and the subsequent emergence of the conception of race. The interpretation and explanation of the African race would play a pivotal role in the formation of slavery. This process is worth contemplating because it is possible that these initial conceptions have carried on in our modern perception of race. Smallwood points out “When we see the end of a process…we too easily take its place there for granted as something natural or given” (p. 294). So how exactly did the Europeans come to view this other race as inferior? Europeans looked to cultural traits and labeled Africans as barbaric because of their unusual customs and habits. Perhaps it is natural to dislike anything different, and Europeans criticized the Africans in fear of the unfamiliar. However, as we discussed in class, many of these “savage practices” were actually similar to those observed by Europeans themselves.

It could be that the circumstances precipitated racial discrimination. Perhaps negative conceptions of Africans were formed as an excuse to take advantage of this ideal opportunity. This outlook would support the stance that race drove slavery. In discussing the discovery of the African American race and what they call ‘racial formation’, Omi and Winant point out, “never before and never again in human history has an opportunity for the appropriation of wealth remotely approached that presented by the ‘discovery’” (Omi and Winant, p. 191). It is entirely possible that these Europeans, consumed by greed, actually convinced themselves that African people were inhuman. In order to set slavery into motion, Europeans must have formed this belief initially. But then they faced task of explaining how a group people—of the same species, with an identical anatomy, who (arguably) share the same ancestors—could not be considered human in the same way.

Scientifically, race was considered a biological variation. Some supported monogenesis, such as Kant, who argued that all humans come from the same natural genus. He claimed our ability to reproduce with one another—regardless of race—served as evidence of a single line of descent. However, the dissimilarities within our species were considered more carefully. Species distinctiveness was an essential argument in the justification for racial slavery. Voltaire claimed, “the negro race is a species of men as different from ours as the breed of spaniels is from that of greyhounds” (Omi and Winant, p.194). Jefferson asked his fellow Americans, “Will not a lover of natural history…excuse an effort to keep those in the department of Man as distinct as nature has formed them?” (Omi and Winant, p. 194). This definition of race distinguished Africans as a different type of human being, which justified the different rights granted to them.

However, racial suppression and injustice were committed before this biological understanding of race. The justifications for slavery developed simultaneously with the institution of slavery. For this reason, it can be concluded that on some level, racism emerged originally. Though the cause of this racism is difficult to determine, it provided the primary premise for racial slavery.

Slavery or Race: A Continuous Debate

Although we have progressed from this topic in our class discussions, I thought it would be beneficial to continue the conversation regarding the question of which came first: Slavery or Race? The documents presented within Chapter 3 of Problems provide us with considerable information pertaining to the rights of early blacks in America and how loosely defined such rights were. Spanning a timeline of roughly 85 years (the first document dating from 1619 and the later 1705), these early writings counter the common misconception that Africans were immediately stripped of all their rights as humans once they stepped off the ships and onto the shores of the New World. However, what becomes apparent after reading these documents is a sense (and later, a reality) of the steady deprivation of rights amongst blacks. A clear example of this is the 1664 Maryland document defining the duration of enslavement for life to those both imported to and born in America:

“…all Negroes or other slaues already within the Prouince And all negroes and other slaues to bee herafter imported into the Prouince shall serue Durante Vita And all Children born of any Negro or other slaue shall be Slaues as their ffathers were for the terme of their liues…”(Holt and Brown, 89).

In examining this document and the ones that were written before it, what becomes clear of the earlier years of the American slave institution is their devoid from the institution itself. Winthrop D. Jordan points this out in his article, “The Mutual Causation” of Racism and Slavery, stating the following:

“The complete deprivation of civil and personal rights, the legal conversion of the Negro into a chattel, in short slavery as Americans came to know it, was not accomplished overnight”(Jordan, 95).

The steady yet eventual stripping of various rights from blacks came at the cost of very little, if nothing, to Europeans. As Edmund S. Morgan bluntly states in his article, The Paradox of Slavery and Freedom, Africans were never given a conception of privilege: “No one had told them that they had rights”(Morgan, 106). This statement leaves me confused, in that it brings about yet another investigative question: Did the Africans have rights, and if so, why weren’t those rights brought to their attention? I’m left with the collective response that they both did and did not. I believe their rights, early on, were heavily predicated by the inexistence of laws that would have clearly defined and restricted their rights. Laws defining the rights of Africans did not exist when they arrived in 1619; however, that doesn’t provide grounds to assume that Africans were granted rights upon their arrival either. The Europeans didn’t have a slave manual to reference in the early days of its existence. Yet, there remains something to be said about the discrimination that steadily develops as new laws begin to define the rights of blacks as mandated by their restriction of such. This discrimination was not necessarily racial, however we can clearly determine it was hierarchical. In describing the socio-economic effects of England’s growing population between 1500 and1650, Morgan states the following, “… there was nothing gentle about the government’s treatment of the poor…” (101). If there wasn’t an existent prejudice against Africans for their skin color, there certainly was one, assumedly, for their lack of social status, a difference nonetheless. Distinctions amongst class doubtlessly suggest an awareness of superior and inferior groups. I believe a similar sense of superiority and inferiority of race existed as well.

Jordan ends his article by touching on the molding of slavery’s debasement of Africans as it further became worked into an institutional construct. He makes a note, however, to tell the viewer to keep in mind the following: “…slavery was at bottom a social arrangement, a way of society’s ordering its members in its own mind” (98). This statement suggests that there was a direct correlation between slavery and societal structuring, an awareness of superior and inferior social groups, and (arguably) the presence of discrimination and racism towards Africans.