colonialism and violence
Author: Keishunda Curtis
Black Art, Black Atlantic, Matriarchy | February 22, 2021
“Until women and men cease equating violence with love, understand that disagreements and conflicts in the context of intimate relationships can be resolved without violence, and reject the idea that men should dominate women, male violence against women will continue, and so will other forms of violent aggression in intimate relationships. To help bring an end to violence against women, feminist activists have taken the lead in criticising the ideology of male supremacy and showing the ways in which it supports and condones that violence”.
Bell Hooks, a black female African American Feminists writer speaking on reform in Feminist Theory.
Hooks (2000) further contends that new social orders are established gradually and we have been socialised to believe that revolutions are always characterised by extreme violence between the oppressed and their oppressors or that revolutions happen quickly.
A possible reason Atlantic Africans cannot just ‘open their heart’ and shift the paradigm is because the trauma is so multi-dimensional and generational. Imagine that extreme trauma happened in a family for centuries. For centuries the families’ ancestors also had no rights and were considered property. A recent Facebook post by a black spiritual mentor reminded me that those of us in the Atlantic World who have a skin tone that is considered ‘lighter’ is majorly the result of rape. Extreme levels of abuse and exploitation happened for generations. Although social, political and economic strides have been made in black communities there no sense of sustainable unity and strength in Atlantic Africans relationships.
Relationships between people of African descent are weak on many levels and this means that the sense of community and self-pride that is normally present in people who share the same heritage, has been declining for centuries. A major source of the disenfranchisement of Atlantic Africans is the violent and oppressive environment that they were forced to live in during the Atlantic slave trade.
This trauma and abuse changed the DNA of Atlantic Africans (White, 2017). “Sexual exploitation and migration correlates with the genetic relationships with each other and genetic risks for disease.” According to White, there are historical drivers of demographic changes that shaped present-day genetics.
Most European DNA entered the gene pool before the Civil War and White (2017) contends that this period reflects the decline in sexual exploitation. White also explains how larger fractions of European ancestry in African American DNA could be the result of the privilege afforded to lighter-skinned African Americans. The psychological effects of these traumas are arguably still present in these communities today.
It is evident that at this stage, connectivity is still not a practice that comes naturally for this marginalised group. Therefore, it has to be forced on some levels. We are so used to exploiting each other as we mirror our oppressors. Through conscious and unconscious Social Learning Theory, the oppressed became their oppressors. This is why a meta-capitalist approach may work as it combines and balances old and new paradigms.
Kwame Nkrumah reminds us when discussing colonialism that “European occupation of Africa was carried out for the benefit of Europeans”. He further quotes the French Colonial Capital of State in 1923 as admitting that “the origin of colonisation is nothing else than enterprise of individual interests, a one-sided and egotistical imposition of the strong upon the weak.”
Bell Hooks (2000) reminds us that “revolutions take time”. It is this idea of alchemizing the way we do things in order to inject them with good intentions. Re-learn, re-purpose, re-love- can we not continue to have commercial and personal interactions with each other that is respectful and intentional. In light of the heightened activity around environmental issues globally, we have to account for the scale and time takes to have a Revolution.
The History of Mary Prince
The violence that plagues the black community can be compared to a post-war conflict. Many researchers understand how these traumas affect people in this context. The same methodology has been applied to the conditions we are seeing amongst black people.
The History of Mary Prince is the earliest first-hand account of the conditions and impact of slavery in Bermuda and the West Indies. Though the text was subjected to extreme scrutiny as a propaganda tool and an act of defamation, it is heralded as a major contributing factor in the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade in the United Kingdom and territories in 1834.
Violence is prominent in the text. It also paints a picture of what it was like to be enslaved. She describes her emotional attachment to her first owners “loving them more than herself”. She details being separated from her mother and subjected to extreme working conditions. She describes being prodded and preened for market where she would be sold to potential buyers.
These experiences have affected the psyche of Atlantic Africans and also sheds light on present day disparities. The role of commerce during that time is also highlighted. It is this familiarity with being bought and sold and traded that will be reimagined later in the research as a tool for healing.
Mary Prince, is a Bermudian woman born into slavery in the island of Bermuda. After surviving a lifetime of abuse, violence and suffering, she managed to arrive in England where slavery didn’t outlawed and joined the Abolition movement. With the help of Thomas Pringle, its president and Susanna Moody, as his secretary they produced a first-hand account of the abuse and violence the Atlantic Africans had endured.
Enslavement was a psychological condition as well as a physical one. Packwood whose seminal book on slavery in Bermuda Chained on the Rock (2012) describes how “when slavery was instituted blacks were property and owned for life” and “could not live together unless they were owned by the same person”. Enslavers had the final word on partners and no legal right to offspring. This meant that not only were Atlantic Africans considered slaves, they possessed no legal rights. They were systematically stripped of their language, religion and other culture practices which would impact generations of Atlantic Africans till present day.
Mary Prince was born into an environment that taught her that she is subordinate to white people. As a young girl she was owned by the daughter of her mother’s enslavers who was close to her age. Mary (2006) describes how “[she] was made quite a pet of Miss Betsey and loved her very much. She would lead me by the hand and call me her little nigger. This was the happiest period of my life; for I was too young to understand rightly my condition as a slave and too thoughtless and full of spirits to look forward to the days of toil and sorrow”.
Considering herself ‘a pet’ to another human being would have profoundly impacted her self-image especially at a young age. It is clear that she also thought of herself as less than human. Some would argue that it is the same denial of one’s humanity that exist in the black community today. Mary (2006) also describes how “she was truly attached to her and next to my own mother, loved her better than any creature in the world”.
It is clear that the love for self was lacking even at this early stage. One must recognise that at no stage since the enslavement of Africans in the Atlantic world has there been any systematic attempts to heal or acknowledge the self-hate that still exist. These conditions have been internalized and perpetuated for generations. Thus, violence directed towards self and others who reflect the same image is familiar.
Resources
Hooks, B. (2000) Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center. 2nd ed. Cambridge: South End Press.
Innes, E. (2014) How the trauma of life is passed down in sperm, affecting the mental health of future generations. Available at: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2611317/How-trauma-life-passed-SPERM-affecting-mental-health-future-generations.html (Accessed July 2019).
Prince, Mary. (2006) The History of Mary Prince: a West Indian Slave. Available at https://www.gutenberg.org/files/17851/17851-h/17851-h.htm (Accessed: June 2019).
Packwood, C. (2012) Chained on the Rock: Slavery in Bermuda. Bermuda: National Museum of Bermuda Press.
Nkrumah, K. (1963) Africa Must Unite. London: Panaf Books.