Cultural Resistance and Identity in Black History

Tabula rasa

The theory that when African enslaved people were (forcibly) brought to America, they were essentially a blank slate.

Docility

The theory that African enslaved people would willingly accept American culture & completely let go of their own.

Infra-politics

Daily acts of resistance against those in power, not meant to be noticed by anyone else but those who are performing them.

Agency - Levine

The action enslaved people could take.

The "Archive"

The limited archive of recorded black American history/culture; very little could have been written especially by themselves during slavery, and a lot of what was recorded is lost/destroyed.

Hartman's "recombinant narrative"

Taking the facts that are known but are rather vague and inserting dialogues/other parts to the story, 'making' a story/narrative with what is available.

Hidden transcript

Forms of songs, jokes, stories, and more that become a part of daily life as disguised protests.

Oral sources (disadvantages / advantages)

Pros: unfiltered, easily passed along generations; didn't require the ability to write. Cons: changed as they are passed down; only those who heard them knew them; when recorded, often was censored.

Survivals (definition / their limitations)

Aspects of African culture that survived & was integrated in Black culture; however, culture is a process not a fixed position.

Slave spirituals

Religious folk songs associated with the enslavement of African people in the American South; held communal values and tended to be focused on Old Testament, where Moses freed slaves.

Slave musical style (five aspects)

1. Pervasive functionality - multiple purposes/communicating multiple messages; 2. Call & response forms; 3. Improvisational character - may not ever be the same song twice; 4. Full-body expression - full performance w the body; 5. Group nature - collectively created, sung, performed.

"White derivation school"

The belief that white people were the sole influence of Black culture.

Sacred versus secular (to slave / slaveholder) - Levine

Sunday was sacred, but there was a separation of the regular world & what was sacred to slave owners; slaves saw all of life/time as sacred, there was no compartmentalization.

Sacred time/space (according to Levine)

Time - for slaves, songs of God and the mythic heroes of their religion were appropriate for any situation; Space - process of incorporating within this world all the elements of the divine. Connects them to the past and gives them a sense of community.

Ring shout

A ritual in which worshippers shift their feet and move their bodies in a circle to symbolize a connection between past, present, and future.

Hush Harbors

Slaves would secretly hold meetings where they could perform their version of Christian worship, hidden from slave owners who feared rebellion.

Origin Tales

Slaves told biblical origin stories that explained where the white and black race came from, taking control of the narrative.

Animal trickster tales

Represented slaves and their master, focusing on slaves using their wits to outsmart their masters.

Slave trickster tales

Focused on slaves pulling a fast one on each other through food or women.

Brer rabbit

Represented enslaved people and their strength in trickery.

Brer Wolf/Fox

Represented slave owners.

Colonial slavery

Characterized by fewer abolitionists and stricter owners, with much more infra-politics.

Antebellum slavery

Marked by the development of the underground railroad, rebellions, and abolitionists, with slavery starting to break down, especially in the North.

Folk beliefs

Worked alongside Christianity as a belief system, stemmed from Africa, and included distrust of white doctors in favor of voodoo/hoodoo medicine.

Conjure

Belief that specific people are bestowed magical powers.

Conjurers

General protectors of themselves and possibly other slaves, respected by all including slave owners.

Highly religious women/womanhood

Provided women a leadership role where they demanded respect and forced white people to confront stereotypes about black women.

Patriarchalism

Asserts men as the top of hierarchy in society and family, justifying it by their 'natural authority.'

Paternalism

Justifies slavery by claiming the owner knows best and has the responsibility to guide those below him.

Truancy

When an enslaved person ran away from the plantation and then came back on their own terms.

Fugitive slave

A runaway slave.

Political Breakthrough

infra-politics being replaced with external actions

Emancipation Proclamation

executive order by Lincoln that deemed all enslaved people in the Confederacy as freed

13th Amendment

forbid slavery in the U.S. & all its territories except for criminal punishment

14th Amendment

guaranteed citizenship, equal protection, & due process for all under U.S. law

15th Amendment

guaranteed the right to vote regardless of race, color, or prior enslavement

Moderate Reconstruction

didn't support Black voting rights or reparations just wanted slavery & treason to end

Radical Reconstruction

supported Black voting rights, reparations (land redistribution), & equality

Compromise of 1877

Radical republicans turn their backs on freed Black people

Cultural self containment

a group whose cultural standards & world views are determined largely by the group itself & held w/ a lack of self-consciousness

Cultural marginality

a group, posed between 2 worlds, wants to absorb & emulate the dominant group's culture to enjoy their status/privilege, while trying to continue to identify / their own traditions

Gospel music

elements of jazz & soul, focused on here & now, spirituals focused on the future

Gullah / Gechee

African Americans who lived in South Carolina/Georgia, including the Sea Islands

Sea Islands

an area of fred Black people where they developed and maintained their own culture away from others

Changes in literacy following emancipation

literacy increased due to teachers from the North, pushed forward 'proper english' & signified classism

World of sound/World of vision

The spoken world of communication between slaves. Everything that was spoken, sung or chanted. The written and drawn world of communication. Written stories or pictures.

Blues music

music created by working class Black southerners, meant to envision a different world & vent of the current realities

Field Hollers

simple songs Black people came up with during and post enslavement, sung while working, used for communication, entertainment, and/or emotional expression

Integration / Assimilation

Black Americans trying to gain respect/equality through assimilation into White American culture/systems

Separatism

Black Americans declaring the systems aren't meant for them and pushing to establish themselves separately from White Americans

The Atlanta Compromise

Booker T. Washington's promise that Black people will stop pushing for equality and political rights if White people lend a hand & help them assimilate into a post-slavery society

Down the Dirt Road Blues

blues song about the hardship of White supremacists' violence

The Great Migration

approximately 6 million Black people moved from the rural South to the urban North in the 1900s

Gender dynamics of the Great Migration

women had more economic opportunities in cities, to be independent and earn more money

World War I

started the great migration because they needed more people working and offered higher wages than the South

Red Summer 1919

period of race riots led by white supremacists in response to the great migration

Black Codes

laws that significantly reduced freedom, particularly economic freedom, for freed Black people

Plessy v Ferguson

supreme court ruling that upheld segregation under "separate but equal," so as long as facilities were equal, segregation was legal

Sharecropping

practice enacted post-Civil War where white landowners would contract their land & tools out to Black people in exchange for a portion of the harvest, often an abusive relationship since landowners held most of the leverage

NAACP

oldest civil rights group that demonstrated respectability politics, led by educated & middle class

Congress of Racial Equality (CORE)

civil rights group who praised nonviolence and is most known for the sit-in movement they began called the Freedom Rides, a movement meant to protest segregated interstate transportation

Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC)

civil rights group formed post-Montgomery bus boycott, focused on nonviolence and had middle class, highly educated leadership

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

student-led civil rights group formed after the beginning of student sit-ins at businesses, committed to nonviolence, this group showed a shift in leadership with younger, less wealthy leaders

Black Panther Party

idk

Brown v Board of Ed

supreme court ruling that supposedly ended racial segregation in public education

Montgomery Bus Boycott

boycott began by Rosa Parks's arrest, fueled by frustration from Black bus riders being forced to the back of buses, shortchanged, assaulted, & left at stops

Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA)

organization that helped set up a car pool system during the montgomery bus boycott, also negotiated settlements with montgomery city officials & teaching nonviolent classes

Sit-in Movement

began by students who sat in at white-only spaces/businesses, often were violently attacked but remained nonviolent

Freedom Summer 1964

campaign to register as many Black voters as possible in Mississippi

Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party

democratic party that separated from the main democratic party in the South over black rights, they believed black suffrage and equality was important, main dems believed squashing Confederate treason & slavery was enough

March Against Fear

event where MLK Jr led a group to march against the restriction of Black voter registration after James Meredith, who began the walk by himself, was shot by the second day, 270 miles over 21 days

Black Power

self-determination for black people - make their own power outside of a system that caters to white people

Black Nationalism

Black nationalism is a nationalist movement which seeks representation for Black people as a distinct national identity

Black aesthetic

decentering suffering from black expression/art, "Black is beautiful", adjusting beauty standards to center Black features