spookypatroldetective-blog

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“A Bunch of Birds Doing What Birds Do.”

http://motorcitymuckraker.com/2014/06/08/lens-on-detroit-controversial-mens-rights-group-draws-protest/

On June 7, 2014, protesters insisted that Detroit’s Hilton Double-Tree Hotel cancel the Voice for Men International Conference on Men’s Issues due to the group’s notoriously “misogynistic” agenda and “dismissive [views regarding] sexual violence” (Neavling). According to Wayne State student of gender and culture, Kelly Jackson, Voice for Men is essentially “a hate group” ( Abbey-Lambertz). However, despite the presence of over 200 protesters and a petition of over 1,000 signatures calling for the cancellation of the conference, Voice for Men founder, Paul Elam, remained calm, encouraging protesters to “‘buy a ticket, come in and have a seat and let [Voice for Men]help you earn your way out of your ignorance’” (Abbey-Lambertz). 

Elam’s condescending attitude towards the feminist cause and the Hilton Double-Tree’s lengthy deliberation on the issue reflect years of failure to take the women’s rights movement seriously. In Toni Cade Bambara’s The Salt Eaters, we see a similar response to Velma Henry and her fellow activists. Near the start of the novel, we see how the group’s driver, Fred Holt, views their rapid movement from one sociopolitical discussion to next as reason to refer them to a “good psychiatrist” (Bambara 67). Furthermore, when he witnesses the women partaking in traditionally masculine tasks like “[taking] apart machines” and handling cameras, he interprets the activities as implicitly sexual and perverse (Bambara 68). 

Although people have grown increasingly receptive to feminist ideology since the time period during which The Salt Eaters is set, clearly we have a long way to go. 

Abbey-Lambertz, Kate. “Controversial Men’s Right’s Conference Sparks Backlash.” Huffington Post. Huffington Post, 30 May 2014. Web. 4 Apr. 2016.

Bambara, Toni Cade. The Salt Eaters. New York: Vintage Contemporaries, 1980. Print.

Neavling, Steve. “Lens on Detroit: Controversial Men’s Rights Group Draws Protest.” Motor City Muckracker. Motor City Muckracker, 8 June 2014. Web. 4 Apr. 2016.

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‘Are you sure, sweetheart, that you want to be well?’

Toni Cade Bambara, The Salt Eaters

(via nabilahwrites)

I felt the same way about the way this was narrated. The amount of information that is delivered in such a jumbled or clustered way was frustrating to read at first. I did not know I - as the reader - was inside of Velma's head and "seeing and believing as she" or if what was being narrated the true events. However, this chaotic style had me sympathetic to Velma and for all who suffer with mental health. I experienced just a bit of frustration with reading, I cannot fathom if what it must be like to actually feel this way.

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I come from a place where breath, eyes, and memory are one, a place from which you carry your past like the hair on your head. Where women return to their children as butterflies or as tears in the eyes of the statues that their daughters pray to. My mother was as brave as stars at dawn. She too was from this place. My mother was like that woman who could never bleed and then could never stop bleeding, the one who gave in to her pain, to live as a butterfly. Yes, my mother was like me.

Danticat, Edwidge. Breath, Eyes, Memory. 2nd. New York: Vintage Contemporaries, 1998. Print.

In this passage on page 234 of Edwidge Danticat’s second edition of Breath, Eyes, Memories (Danticat) originally published in 1994, Sophie the narrator is thinking about her birth mother, Martine, who recently passed away. I think it’s a pretty good description of Sophie and Martine and the similarities that they share. In which, after years of living in Haiti and being raised by her aunt Tante Atie, who is like a mother figure to her, Martine asks for her to go live with her in New York. For years Sophie is pressured from the expectations of the women in her family like her mother and aunt. She longs to be free from them, wanting to do what she wants. Sophie and Martine are quite similar as stated in the quoted passage. While, Sophie is pressured by the expectations of her family, having to go through a virginity test and having such a traumatic experience with it, Martine herself has a traumatic past of her own. For Martine is raped by a Tonton Moncoute at a young age. Mother and daughter were both violated unwillingly. Whereas, Martine didn’t know about her assaulter, Sophie’s very own mother performed a virginity test on her constantly. With Martine’s rape and Sophie’s virginity test, both characters fled when things were too much for them. For instance, Martine left for New York, leaving her daughter behind in Haiti and Sophie ran away from Martine and got married. They both left to be free, one of the themes in the book, from what was traumatizing them. However, it is Haiti that ties these two characters together. At one point in the book, they’re in Haiti together and left it to go back to New York at the same time. Even though freedom is important in the story, I think the concept of home, that place being Haiti, is more significant. I say that because it is Haiti where everything began and ended, in connection with the quoted passage. Haiti was where Martine was raped and the place where Sophie learned about the virginity test done to girls, gaining a little more insight on why her mother did it to her. It was where Martine was laid to rest, free from her demons and Sophie was finally able to understand her mother. Haiti, with its beliefs and customs was what defined Martine and Sophie as a person.

Bibliography  

Danticat,  Edwidge. Breath, Eyes, Memory. 2nd. New York: Vintage Contemporaries,  1998. Print.

(via moua94)

The similarities between Martine and Sophie are not always apparent or appreciated when reading Breath, Eyes, Memory. I like how you connect the two women. With Sophie, it was a long time coming that she recognized that there was a connection between herself and her mother. I think that might be because she spent the first twelve years of her life without her mother but also without the explanation as to why her mother left. I wonder how many girls will grow up to realize how much alike our mother we actually are?

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"Here's What the Real Colors of the Kente Cloth Actually Mean" "Minnie Ransom herself, the fabled healer of the district, her bright-red flouncy dress drawn in at the waist with two different strips of kenti cloth, up to her elbows in a minor fortune of gold brass and silver bangles, the silken fringe of the shawl shimmying at her armpits." In this rather interesting description of Minnie Ransom - a character from Toni Cade Bambara's novel, "The Salt Eaters" - why did the kente cloth stand out? It stood out because of what the colors of the cloth mean. According to Ofori-Mensa, while the clothe is made by the people of the Asante and Ewe, the colors are what hold the most meaning: "Red: sacrifice, Yellow: royalty, Green: earth, Blue: shy, Heaven, Black: strength." The meaning behind the colors seem to describe Minnie Ransom's character. She is a 'healer' but more spiritual and connected to African Diasporic Religions and their practices in using nature and natural elements to heal. Bambara, Toni Cade. "The Salt Eaters" Vintage Books (New York)1980 p. 3 www.omgvoice.com

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"Enough With The Strong Black Woman Mantra" "You need to be a STRONG black woman"! "Black Women are Strength"! "You don't need nobody, be a Strong Black Woman"! And so on and so forth. These are just some of the thinks I've heard my whole life. I am a black woman and sometimes I feel that society will only look at me in one of two ways: Strong or Whore. There seems to be no in between or middle ground. There are definitely no complexities that I might grasp onto to be seen as an individual. It is akin to when boys are taught at a young age that 'boys don't cry'. Well 'black women are strong' and there is no room for anything else. So how do we change this? Is there a way to change this? Trudier Harris suggest that we must first recognized the label of strength when applied - when applied to black women as a positive thing - is really a disease. But in thinking of it this way we must understand that diseases are notoriously hard to cure and many will suffer before there is one available. Harris, Trudier. "This Disease of Strength: Some Observations on the Compensating Construction of Black Female Character" The John Hopkins University Press (Literature and Medicine) 1995 www.yourblackeducation.com

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"A true conjure woman...She turned the moon into salve, the Stars into a swaddling cloth and healed the wounds of every creature walking up on two or down on four" These words were used to describe Sapphira Wade in Gloria Naylor's novel Mama Day. So what is a 'true conjure woman"? Is she someone who can heal any living being? Can she do all the above state and more? Is she is myth? Many in today's society might argue that a conjure woman is a myth or that the idea of a conjure woman is a beginning of a joke or Halloween festive entity. However, the conjure woman is a part of some religious beliefs such as Vado. In the view above, Renee Stout brings the conjure woman into contemporary society. She begins with a brief history lesson and what is entailed in the healing process. It is a great lesson in appreciating the differences between cultures and not using the difference in ideas or beliefs as a joke or punchline. Naylor, Gloria. "Mama Day" Vintage Contemporaries (New York) 1993 p.3

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www.likesuccess.com In Breath, Eyes, Memory the subject of bullying came up and within that context the "Four H's" of HIV stereotype was stated. Within the book it was a statement of fear for the type of bullying an immigrant child would face. However, this is a stereotype that people believe and plays into the fact that HIV and AIDS continue to be spread among people that are not in either of the "at risk" categories. Stereotypes such as the "Four H's" of HIV - when they are believed - have a severely negative affect on attempts to eradicate such diseases. People who are not heroin addicts, hemophiliacs, homosexuals or Haitians who believe this stereotype will more likely not take the proper precautions to prevent the contraction of STD's and STI's. We as a community must put stereotypes and clichés aside and focus on real and true statistics. Only then can things truly change. Danticant, Edwidge. "Breath, Eyes, Memory". Vintage Books (New York) 1994 p. 51

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It’s ok boy. Let’s just go to your place. You got lard in the house, right?And some baking soda? Well, I can bring down the fever with that.

In this quote Naylor is highlighting the importance of slave history and culture that is carried throughout generations.The use of nature to heal was the only option for many people in the past, and often was more trusted one. The book describes modern medicine as a threat to their culture identity. 

In this case the residents of Willow Springs, in their connection with African roots, were able to preserve many traditional remedies. Mama Day is the head of this community and preforms many functions, from a healer to a community advisor. She is represented as a wise character, her possession of knowledge is transferred from her ancestors and it needs to be passed on to the next generation.  

Naylor, Gloria. Mama Day. New York: Vintage Contemporaries, 1988.

(via em-lit-wsu)

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The stereotypes and superstitions surrounding conjure women is heavy when talking about Creole women. Especially in mainstream. The movie Harlem Nights is a prime example about the beliefs that conjure women have special powers that she would use to 'put a spell' on men. (I had never heard this song.)

In Tony Joe White’s 1970 song “Conjure Woman,” he sings cartoonishly about a witchy woman secluded by the river and casting dark spells. In a baritone voice lathered in spooky dramatics, he characterizes conjure women using flimsy surface knowledge. The presence of the conjure woman in African and African American folklore and history has been around for ages, but in the mainstream worldview, her reception has not always been positive, nor has the character type always been taken seriously. With clumsy bastardizations of the role like that evidenced in White’s song, it’s not hard to figure out why the reception has been so mixed. What Gloria Naylor does in Mama Day takes the idea of the conjure woman back to its roots and reestablishes her authority.

Mama Day and her great-grandmother Sapphira are highly esteemed characters. Their roles as mystics are only complements to their roles as matriarchs. Naylor asserts with the novel that the two don’t have to be mutually exclusive. That the conjure woman doesn’t have to be a stock character, written to fill the void of the “magical Negro” stereotype. Using George as the counterforce to the idea of magic and overall way of life for the people in Willow Springs, the reader has to determine what makes the outside world so practical. Just as they have to confront the sullied, preconceived notion of what it means to be a conjure woman.

Naylor, Gloria. Mama Day. New York: Ticknor and Fields, 1988. Print

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www.archives.gov/education/lessions/slave-trade.html

Bill of Sale, 1864

"Even though Abraham LIncoln issued the Emancipation in 1863, slaves were still being bought a sold in the south."

This bill of sale is a lot like the fictional bill of sale in Mama Day by Gloria Naylor. While the bill of sale for Sapphira in Mama Day is somewhat comical and amusing with the wording of, "not without extreme mischief and suspicions of delving in witchcraft", and "conditional of sale...Final", to show that Sapphira was no meek and mild slave and that her owner was doing the upmost to rid himself of a troublesome slave without return. This fits well into the overall amusing aspects of the novel but it also highlights a fundamental aspect of chattel slavery in America. The fact that human beings were sold as property. The above bill of sale describes the slave Henry as being, "sound and healthy in mind and body" and that he is, "Slave for Life".  

It is extremely hard to know what it must have felt like to be reduced to the sum of your labor. It seems very dehumanizing not only for the slave but for the slave-owners, slave traders and everyone involved in the slave trade. The fact that Henry did not have a last name is yet another indication of the level dehumanization that was central to slavery.

 Naylor, Gloria. Mama Day. New York. Ticknor and Fields. 1988. print

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“Operating Room” Mike LaCon/FLickr.com

http://racerelations.about.com/od/historyofracerelations/a/The-U-s-Governments-Role-In-Sterilizing-Women-Of-Color.htm

In the book Corregidora, the main character has a hysterectomy after suffering a miscarriage as a result of a fall. Because she is a black woman in a time where there was rampant and unchecked racism - and although not specified in the book - I believe that the author may have been planting the seed of thought that this may have been one of those cases. 

The article connected to the above link is about the practices of the United States Government promoting the forced sterilization of women o color. 

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This article discusses the circumstances and broader context of the case of Naomi Freeman, a pregnant African American mother of two young children who allegedly killed her abusive boyfriend after he severely assaulter her. Despite her boyfriend’s history of abuse and the fact of her pregnancy, Ms. Freeman was arrested and held on a $350,000.00 bond. As the article explains, the arrest of black women for defending themselves against their abusers is nothing new. The article thus discusses the case of Marissa Alexander and Project Nia’s “No Selves to Defend” anthology and exhibit, both meant to raise defense funds for Marissa Alexander and to raise awareness about the intersections between domestic abuse and incarceration of black women. The article also provides statistics about the disproportionate domestic abuse and incarceration suffered by black women.

An important question raised by the relationship between domestic violence and incarceration of black women is the question of what justice would look like. It’s because of this question that I connect this article with “Sweat” by Zora Neale Hurston. Even though Delia Jones does not directly kill her husband, and even though the story ends without her getting arrested for his murder, it seems clear at the end that her husband’s death was justified by his own actions. But like Naomi Freeman is quoted in the article stating she never meant to kill her boyfriend but she acted because she feared for her life, the ending of “Sweat” asks us to understand the impossibility of any “good” options for dealing with an abusive partner. And finally, though I don’t have space for it here, both the article and the story make me think about the role of the community in protecting the victim and then ensuring the victim can make a life after the death of the abuser.