LITR 5731: Seminar in American Multicultural Literature
Sample Student Midterm, Spring 2006

Karen Hrametz

March 2, 2006

Alternate and Dysfunctional Family Patterns in

Life of a Slave Girl, Song of Solomon, and Push

Nearly four centuries ago, the first Africans were plucked from their native land and transplanted to America to begin a frightening life of enslavement. They were stripped of their dignity and their possessions; many families were torn apart. They learned quickly that to be black in America meant that their protests would go largely unheard, their voices silenced by a system that considered them less than human. The wounds of enslavement are deep and widespread, and, while the healing continues today, the damage caused cannot be overestimated. One of the most serious effects of slavery and its aftermath is the negative impact on the structure of the African-American family. From separation issues during slave trading, to the northern migration, to the advent (and failure) of social reform programs, family ties have been strained or severed, often resulting in dysfunctional and alternate forms of parenting. This phenomenon is reflected in African-American literature as well, with Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Song of Solomon, and Push providing prime examples for review.

Family separation issues were a major source of anguish among slaves. Harriet Jacobs tells in her narrative of the ever-present threat of losing relatives on the auction block. However, unlike many slaves, Jacobs enjoyed the love and presence of a large extended family. She was surrounded by her parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and siblings, and was so sheltered that she did not realize she was a slave until she was six, when her father died. Having then lost both of her parents, she moved into the slave owner’s home, where she was treated much like the other children, even enjoying the rare privilege (for slaves) of learning to read and write. Her life in the house ended upon the death of her mistress, and Harriet was sent to live with her beloved grandmother, Miss Marthy.

For Jacobs, Miss Marthy provided not only a loving home and the nurturing of a mother figure, but also some level of protection from her cruel slave-owner, Mr. Flint. Miss Marthy was well known and respected in the community; consequently, Mr. Flint feared reproach if word reached the community that he had mistreated his slaves. Nevertheless, as Jacobs grew into a young woman, he took advantage of every opportunity to sexually harass her. He began by whispering obscenities in her ear, and progressed to writing her lewd notes.  His advances did not stop even when Jacobs gave birth to her own children; instead, he used her children to threaten Jacobs into submitting to his advances, promising to sell them if she refused. Mr. Flint underestimated the will of Jacobs to protect her children, for when his threats became too much to bear, she fled. She was out of his reach physically, but her freedom was far from certain.

Jacobs spent seven years in the crawl space of her grandmother’s porch roof, with only the hope of being with her children in freedom to sustain her.  Her physical and mental anguish were comforted only by being able to watch her children play in her grandmother’s yard. Once her children were purchased by their father and sent away to safety, Jacobs fled her tiny confines and sailed north to finally be with her children. Still, Mr. Flint pursued her doggedly, and until a female friend arranged for her purchase, she lived in constant fear of capture. 

Jacobs’ story illustrates the anguish that slaves experienced over family separation issues. She endured much pain, as did all slaves, but she was one of the more fortunate:  not only did she escape slavery, but she also became free to raise her children as she so desired.  Still, in order to live her dream, she had to leave her grandmother and other relatives behind, a most painful decision for her indeed. Through hardship and sacrifice, she remained steadfast on her mission: to unite mother and children together as family. It could be truthfully said that Harriet Jacobs was a stellar example of the ultimate single parent.

Toni Morrison, herself a single mother, raised multiple parenting issues in her exquisitely complex novel Song of Solomon. The story’s protagonist, Milkman, is born into a nuclear family, but his relationship with his parents is far from ideal. His parents, Ruth and Macon Dead, share a marriage in name only. Macon provides materially for the family, but not emotionally.  Ruth and Macon abandon their sex life when Macon suspects that Ruth has been engaging in an incestuous relationship with her father. Ruth obtains her needed sexual and emotional gratification by secretly continuing to breastfeed her son until the age of 5, thereby earning him the nickname “Milkman” when her secret is discovered by the town gossip. As Milkman ages, he grows ever more distant from his parents, and eventually takes on an affected limp that serves to make him feel a strong connection to F. D. Roosevelt, whom he felt very close to, “closer, in fact… than to his own father” (63). 

While Milkman was detached emotionally from his father, Ruth was overly attached to her father. Ruth experienced the early loss of her mother, and became enmeshed in her father’s life, displaying an abnormal closeness to him that included inappropriate affection of a sexual nature. When Macon discovers Ruth kissing her father’s fingers after his death, he is disgusted and draws completely away from Ruth. Ruth and Macon compete for Milkman’s sympathy, each telling their own story of the events that led to the decline in their relationship. Milkman is so self-involved that he does not “take sides” with either parent. He is distant from both, but he maintains a business relationship with his father for financial gain. Consequently, Milkman does not enjoy a healthy parent/child relationship, but, upon meeting Macon’s estranged sister, Pilate, he begins a relationship that in some ways mirrors a mother-son closeness. 

Pilate played an important role in the conception of Milkman, a fact that helps to create a bond between them. Pilate was instrumental in Ruth’s conception of Milkman, having conjured a folk remedy of greenish-grey grassy-looking stuff” (125) that served as a powerful aphrodisiac for Macon; the resulting four days of lovemaking left Ruth pregnant with her only son. Milkman is curious about his eccentric aunt, and visits her home secretly, where he is always warmly received by Pilate and offered nourishment in the form of food and emotional support. Later in the book, when Milkman and his friend Guitar are caught breaking in to Pilate’s home to steal what they thought was gold, Pilate plays the role of an ignorant black woman (the antithesis of her true nature) in order to free Milkman from jail.  This act proved that she loved him a great deal because she was willing to humble herself in such a way. When Milkman goes to Virginia in search of his roots, it is Pilate he misses: “Milkman smiled, remembering Pilate. Hundreds of miles away, he was homesick for her” (300). Once on a visit to Pilate’s home, Milkman realized that, sitting there, “it was the first time in his life that he remembered being completely happy.” Indeed, Pilate became very important in Milkman’s life – perhaps more important than his own mother.

Pilate may have sympathized with Milkman’s detachment from his mother, as she grew up without a mother herself. Her mother died just before giving birth to Pilate, yet Pilate came “struggling out of the womb without help from throbbing muscles or the pressure of swift womb water” (27). That fact, as well as Pilate’s lack of a navel, combine to give Pilate a sort of “otherworldly” presence. She seems to know and understand everything and everybody, and to be wise beyond her years. She raises two daughters and a granddaughter in her home, which seems to be filled with happiness and love. Macon, who cannot bring himself to allow his sister Pilate back into his life, stands outside her home one night and dreamily watches the family go about their evening routine; he “felt himself softening under the weight of memory and music” (30). Pilate has created a family, albeit an unconventional one, and her strength and love sustain it.  Macon knows it, but his pride gets in the way of reuniting with his sister.  When Pilate’s granddaughter, Hager, dies, a grief-stricken Pilate can only repeat “My baby girl… my baby girl… (her) Words tossed like stones into a silent canyon.” From the sky itself, Pilate hears the acclamation “And she was loved ” (319). Morrison’s beautifully delivered prose mirrors the inner beauty of a woman whose outer appearance belies it, and gives the reader the sense that the Earth is returning to Pilate some of the love that she offers to everyone else  -- clearly, Pilate is the unrecognized glue that holds the Dead family together.

Kristy Pawlik, in her Fall of 2004 mid-term paper, pointed out that “the modern concept of family within the African-American community can be traced to both deeply ingrained traditions and to historical circumstances to which the black community was forced to respond.” Certainly, Song of Solomon demonstrates several alternate concepts of family. Milkman and his two sisters are over 40 years old, yet they still live with their parents; only First Corinthians finally gathers the strength to move out when she falls in love with Porter. Pilate’s grown daughters and her granddaughter all share a home with her. Milkman’s sexual affair with his cousin, Hagar, is not questioned on the basis of morals; in fact, it doesn’t seem to be much of an issue to any of the characters. On Pilate’s travels early in her life, she lives with a group of people unrelated to her, but they treat her as a member of the family. Some of the family make-ups in Solomon are the result of traditions within the African-American culture, while others are probably the result of historical and/or economic circumstances.

The setting for Song of Solomon is a significant factor in the plot, the time of the Great Depression in the 1930’s. Much of the action takes place in a Michigan town, presumably Detroit. At that time in history, the country was torn apart by the extreme poverty of the Depression. As desperate as the situation was for the dominant culture, minorities had it even worse. Families were disrupted as the men left home to find jobs, willing to go anywhere and do anything to keep from starving. Macon Dead lives among the minority culture, but does nothing to offer his fellow African-Americans any relief. As the owner of twelve rental properties, Macon shows no mercy when the rent is due. He doesn’t hesitate to evict Guitar’s grandmother for failure to pay the rent on her shack, despite the fact that she has two young children and no place else to go. He and his family continue to live the life of luxury, while those around them suffer. Macon is so desperate to be like the dominant culture that he parades his family about town on Sunday outings to show everyone how well dressed they are and what fine vehicles they possess. On the surface things seem well, but his family, like his marriage, is in name only. Other families were severed physically by circumstances of the economy, but Macon’s family is severed emotionally by his selfishness and false pride.

The setting for Sapphire’s novel, Push, is the Harlem burrow of New York City, some five decades after the Great Depression. The Welfare Act of 1966 had long since taken effect, but did little to lift the minority culture from poverty. Push tells the story of Precious Jones, an illiterate teenage girl who lives in extreme poverty and is the victim of incest. She lives with her mother in deplorable conditions despite receiving Welfare payments and Social Security for Precious’ mentally retarded daughter. They live check-to-check, and the mother feels compelled to lie in order to maintain her level of Welfare support. Precious’ father left when he discovered that Precious was pregnant with his child, and returns home only to heap more abuse on her. Precious’ is enslaved by her own mother who values her daughter only for the physical labor and financial assistance she provides. Precious’ home life reflects the most serious examples of dysfunctional relationships.

Like Milkman in Song of Solomon had a family, but no home, Precious has a mother and father, but no parents. She has biological parents, but they do not provide the love and care she needs. She is shockingly abused, verbally and sexually, by her mother, and repeatedly raped by her father; both parents beat her as well  Her grandmother is aware of the situation, but does nothing to intervene. Understandably, Precious voices hate for her parents. Alone after giving birth to her daughter, Precious writes “I cry for ugly baby, then I forget about ugly baby I crying for me who no one never hold before” (19). Fortunately for Precious and her children, some kind women enter Precious’ life to provide her some of the parental-like support she needs to turn her life around (Interestingly, no male characters intervene to help Precious on any long-term basis; this possibly reflects the commonality of the woman-child pattern of family structure that is common in African-American culture.)

The first woman to offer affection to Precious is her neighbor, Ms. West. It is she who calls 911 -- not Precious’ mother --  when Precious is giving birth on the kitchen floor. Precious likes Ms. West and knows that she is liked in return. She runs errands for Ms. West, who often gives her money to buy things and tells her to “keep the change Precious.” Ms. West offers emotional support to Precious as well, telling her “You ever wanna talk about anything you could come to me.”  The text hints that Ms. West knows the gravity of Precious’ situation, but her own difficulties prevent her from helping more. Precious has learned to mistrust and hate white people, but it is a white woman, Mrs. Lichenstein, who risks her own safety to visit Precious’ home to inform her of her acceptance into an alternative school – out of harm’s way and into the nurturing environment that Precious so desperately desires and needs. Precious writes, “I would wish for in my fantasy a second chance.” That opportunity came when Precious entered an alternative school.

For Precious, literacy is the key to an escape from her horrid existence. That key is given to her by her teacher, Mrs. Rain. It is from her fellow students and teacher that Precious finally gets the nurturing and affection she did not get in her own home. The class becomes somewhat of a family to her, her classmates like sisters. Precious enjoys social outings with others her age for the first time. Precious gets the chance to be a mother to her son Abdul – the kind of mother that she herself didn’t have. Her motherly love for Abdul is instinctual, but the support and affection she receives from others help to provide a model of caretaking skills for Precious; consequently, it is no surprise that Precious becomes a loving and attentive mother to her son. When Ms. Rain questions whether Precious or someone else can best meet Abdul’s needs, Precious insists “I is best able to meet my child’s needs” (72) -- and she proves it. Precious calls Abdul “the song in my life…the voice of love say, Mama, Mama he call me (96).  Precious and Abdul are family – in the true sense of the word.  Precious finds encouragement and support from Mrs. Rain, who reminds her “you can’t stop now, Precious, you gotta push” --  and she does.

Each of the texts discussed reveal terribly painful situations that can result from family issues, but in each of the books, the main character eventually triumphs over his/her struggle.  Harriet Jacobs overcomes seemingly insurmountable odds to gain life as a free woman and raise her children on her own terms; Milkman matures and finds the importance of family roots; and Precious succeeds in gaining independence to pursue her literacy and parenting goals. The texts discussed suggest a success rate that is probably not reflective of  “real life” situations.  However, they serve the important role of giving voice to the minority culture, and they allow the reader to empathize and identify with the characters.  Readers may find within the text the inspiration to go forth and seek to fulfill his/her own dreams. Perhaps one day there will be no need for terms such as “minority culture” and “dominant culture,” and we will live as one culture, each free to pursue his/her own version of the American Dream.