ISP Blog Post #6

Looking at The Book of Negroes from a post-colonial point of view gave me the most insight into the book. Slavery is the main focus of this novel, which makes it easy to look through a post-colonial lens. As I said in my first ISP blog post, “Post colonialism examines the effects of the conquering nation on the local culture; exploring how a local culture is first stripped, then the dominant culture is imposed on the locals and finally how the local culture is forever impacted and changed by the exposure to the dominant culture”, which is a basic overview of the plot of this novel. Aminata goes through each of those stages and without looking at the novel from that point of view you might miss those connections between the events in Aminata’s life.

Without looking at The Book of Negroes from a post-colonial point of view I would never have known how Aminata never felt accepted by her own people. I would only have seen that slaves hated being taken from their homeland and thought they only wanted to be returned. But the reality is that they were not accepted anywhere. Even when Aminata went back to Africa she was never accepted. Fatima and the slave traders that take her back to Bayo show Aminata and the readers that she is not accepted in her homeland. They do not believe that she is an African no matter what she says; she is “toubab with the black face” (Chapter 4).

Aminata grows up facing rejection; she learns that white people only want her to use her talents. No one cares about her, they only care what she can do for them. i.e. working in fields, catching babies, reading and writing, etc. She also cannot escape the dangers of slavery even when she has returned “home” and the African’s believe she is tainted by the Toubab.

I would definitely use Fatima as an example; I would also use the slave traders that pretend to take Aminata to Bayo. I think those are great examples because Fatima shows that the "true" African believe the Nova Scotian's to be foreigners. The Slave traders are a good example because they show that Aminata is not safe even when she is back in Africa, she narrowly escapes repeating the cycle of slavery. I would also show that Aminata has been rejected by people all her life. The white people reject the Negroes and treat them as property instead of human beings. She is only useful to them when they can exploit her skills for their benefits.

A first draft of my thesis would be: Without a post-colonial look at The Book of Negroes the rejection of Negroes in their homeland would not be understood. Aminata gives us that insight and I think that rejection is the reason she decides to go England to help the cause to end slavery. She has experienced the effects of rejection in all forms and she doesn’t want anyone else to go through what she did, so she accepts Clarkson’s offer to help end that circle of hate.