Slavery in literature has been a crucial and defining template for understanding past and modern human rights abuse. Due to the influence that these literary works can have on our understanding of history, it is important that the content be authentic, unbiased and historically factual. The two novels: Uncle Tomâs Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe and Kindred by Octavia Butler, there are two very different accounts of being a slave, both of which the readers assume to be historically accurate...
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In the novels âKindredâ by Octavia Butler and âLord of the Fliesâ by William Golding, one of the main points portrayed by both authors is how to exert and maintain power over others. Rufus from âKindredâ and Jack from âLord of the Fliesâ both use similar tactics to maintain their power over their peers. Both boys attempt at hiding their insecurities by hurting others and abusing the power they are given, leading them both to fail at retaining their given...
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âKindredâ, by Octavia E. Butler, tells the story of Dana, a 26-year-old African American woman from the 1970s, who is constantly called into the 19th century antebellum South by her white ancestor, Rufus Weylin. After learning she must keep Rufus alive to ensure her own bloodline, she explores her familyâs roots while at the same time, struggles to witness and endure the hardships of slavery. By allowing Dana to lose her arm on her last trip back from the past,...
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âThe day the power of love overrules the love of power, the world will know peaceâ, - Mahatma Gandhi. This quote connects to a motif shown in each story, âKindredâ and âThe Book of Marthaâ by Octavia Butler. The motif shown in each story is power dynamics, wherein each, they both develop the motif throughout the books and similarly/differently deals with that motif. In âKindredâ, it is about a 26-year-old African American woman named Edana (Dana) Franklin. The current time...
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In the novel âKindredâ, Author Octavia Butler travels back to the time where slavery was the big part of American life. Butler sends the modern characters like Dana and Kevin to experience the past. As Dana traveled back and forth several times and every time she goes there is a new situation behind it. Butler clears up how interracial relationship had changed Danaâs life as living with kevin as a free women she was happy what she had with Kevin,...
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Octavia Butlerâs âKindredâ traces central protagonist, Dana Franklinâs genealogy by physically âreturningâ her to her slave past in antebellum Maryland. By deconstructing the body of the female slave Butler uses Danaâs body as the site for historical markings, so that she is literally and symbolically scarred by her ancestral past. As Michel Foucault notes, the purpose of genealogy is âto expose a body totally imprinted by history and the process of historyâs destruction of the bodyâ, so by using Danaâs...
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In the novel, âKindredâ by Octavia Butler, and the poem âHarlemâ by Langston Hughes, they both use symbolism to communicate how racism destroys the dreams and ambitions of those affected by its grasp. The poem âHarlemâ by Langston Hughes uses symbolism to communicate how racism destroys the dreams and ambitions of those affected by its grasp. Hughes opens the poem by saying, âWhat happens to a dream deferred, does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?â (Harlem, 1-3)....
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âRufus had done exactly what he said he would do: Gotten possession of the woman without having to bother her husband. Now, somehow, Alice would have to accept not only the loss of her husband, but her own enslavement. Rufus had caused her trouble and now he had been rewarded for itâ (149). This quote from the book âKindredâ reveals the powerful theme of the corruption of power, after Rufus inherits the plantation, he gains a lot of power over...
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Octavia E. Butler and Colson Whitehead represent race and ethnicity in âKindredâ and âThe Underground Railroadâ respectively in a number of different ways. Published in 1979 and initially set in 1976 California during the antebellum period, âKindredâ contains elements pertaining to time travel and revolves around narratives in regards to slaves. Whereas âThe Underground Railroadâ, published in 2016, tracks the story of two slaves during the time period of the civil war and the slave trade. From a contextual standpoint,...
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Octavia Butlerâs âKindredâ, tells a story of how a woman from the modern era called Dana was taken back in time from her house in California into the antebellum south to protect a man that would become her ancestor. You could say that her survival essentially relied on her ability to keep him alive and well. Throughout her long and inexplicable journey, Dana discovers the true meaning of freedom when she is able to compare her owl life to those...
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The surroundings of an individual strongly have a large contributing factor in how a person will turn out, while others believe it predestines a person to conduct oneself a certain way. Written by Octavia E. Butler, âKindredâ, takes place in 1815, Antebellum South and in 1976, Los Angeles, California. The protagonist is a young African-American woman writer, Dana Franklin, who unexpectedly travels back to pre-Civil War Maryland. Hearing the screams of a drowning red-haired kid, Dana comes to the childâs...
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