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Kindred
Dehumanization, although a concrete historical fact, is not a given destiny but the result of an unjust order that engenders violence in the oppressors, which in turn dehumanizes the oppressed -Paulo Reglus Neves Freire Pedagogia do oprimido (Pedagogy of the Oppressed) 1968

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Octavia E. Butler's Kindred is a science fiction novel published in June of 1979 about an African American woman named Dana in the year of 1976 who time travels to the year 1800 to the time of her great great great grandfather Rufus Weylin. Rufus is the son of plantation owner Tom Weylin. By necessity, Dana lives in that time as a slave and so meets a variety of other slaves such as Alice Greenwood (who was born a freewoman and lost her freedom helping a slave escape), Sarah the cook, Nigel, Rufus’ personal slave and Carrie, Nigels wife. All of whom are trying to make the best of their situations under slavery.

Analysis
The novel depicts slavery as a separation between oppressor and the oppressed showing its use to thwart and discourage any attempt on that of those who are oppressed from ever being truly free from their oppression. And while it does that. it also dehumanizes the oppressors to the point of making it so that they can't ever see or understand humanity in those that they oppress. This dehumanization is shown in the book as something that cannot be surpassed. While separating the oppressor and the oppressed, slavery also serves to bind those who are oppressed into a union, where they all support and relate to one another and create a community in order to survive their troubles as they live lives as slaves. This community is one that while created under the horrid conditions of slavery is a one that is strong and worthy of commendation.

Separation of the oppressor and oppressed
To begin, the book deals with the subject of slavery as a method to keep the classes of slave and master separate. This can be shown when Dana reports on how Tom Weylin, the slavemaster and owner of the Weylin plantation, whips a slave for–as Tom perceives it–having talked back to him:

Weylin ordered the man stripped naked and tied to the trunk of a dead tree. As this was being done—by other slaves—Weylin stood whirling his whip and biting his thin lips. Suddenly, he brought the whip down across the slave’s back. The slave’s body jerked and strained against its ropes…It drew blood and screams at every blow. I watched and listened and longed to be away. But Weylin was making an example of the man. He had ordered all of us to watch the beating—all the slaves. (Butler 41)

The example set forth by Tom’s whipping was that the slaves were not above being made a spectacle for any (perceived) reason, that they are not people protected by rights, that they only live by the will of their master. By making other slaves undress and tie this man to a tree and then making those slaves witness this man being beaten so viciously and severely, so plainly and easily without remorse, Tom Weylin asserts his power, over not just the man being whipped but over all the slaves. Making them watch forces them to learn they are helpless, and, most importantly, they learn their place in the hierarchy. They learn that they are beneath Tom. Forcing other slaves to become shameful cohorts compliant in the abuse of one of their own also makes the slaves feel even more helpless and worthless.

Tom also uses violent force to thwart any progress made by any slave that could inch them closer to him. When he catches Dana with an old spelling book, he drags her outside and whips her sick, to the point of her convulsing in her own vomit as he screams at her, “didn't I tell you I didn't want you reading!” (Butler 106). Tom cannot read well and the idea of a slave being able to read well compared to him would put him beneath a lowly slave in his mind. Should one best him in such an important aspect as being educated, then who knows what else they could best him in?

In other attempts to keep the relationship of slave and master unbreakable, Tom and his son catch Dana during her attempted escape from the plantation, knock her out cold and then strip her, tie her up so she cannot defend herself, and then beat her into a stupor so strong she was unaware of the events that happened after and only able to focus on the pain of being beaten and battered. All of this was done to discourage any further escape attempts. In punishing Dana, Tom directly enforces his will over her so that she may never escape from his grasp. He wants the beating to be something she fears if she were to ever think of escaping again.

Through the characterization of Tom’s son, Rufus Weylin, Kindred makes clear that this white supremacist oppression dehumanizes both the slave and the slave owner. Rufus sometimes seems desperate to escape his inevitable role in oppressing the people he loves, which makes him a monster in their eyes. For example, he laments and excuses his rape of Alice by blaming her for his behavior: “I wouldn't have to hurt [Alice] if she hadn't just kept saying no” (Butler 123). Rufus is utterly unfamiliar with the idea that he could love a woman without needing to have her, that he would have to respect her feelings about the idea of loving him. He is incapable of loving her without thinking she has to be his, making him devoid of empathy towards Alice. He wants to love her but he can’t do it without making her his own. Tom understands this inescapable divide between slave and slave master when he tells Rufus that he is “going to have to whip [Alice] sick again to get what you want from her” (Butler 161) after Alice has recuperated from the traumatic wounds inflicted by hunting dogs as she escaped Rufus after the rape.

Rufus doesn't protest at all about what his father is telling him because there's no other choice to make a woman who doesn't love you obey you. Rufus understands that he can't love Alice as a wife and she won’t love him as a husband, not unless under the immediate threat of being whipped or sold. Still, Rufus is unrelenting in his chase to make Alice his, and doesn't have any level that's too low to stoop to in order to get what he wants, as he tells Dana after she is reluctant to help him convince Alice to have sex with him willingly: ”I'll have her whether you help or not. All I want you to do is fix it so I don't have to beat her, you're no friend of hers if you won't do that much!” (Butler 164). Not only is he forcing Alice under the threat of violence but he is guilt tripping Dana to help. Here he is thinking he's offering her the most amicable solution to the situation but Dana and Alice are both being hurt here. He wants Alice to love him and he won't tolerate Alice being anything else but his lover. Doing this only causes Alice to suffer and Dana is bound to live with her guilt, further dehumanizing himself in their eyes.

Slavery, albeit a horrid institution, does result in some form of community, though at first that community seems to be merely an introjection of the roles imposed by the slave master.

Community from slavery
Butler shows this community created by slavery by using some slave children playing pretending to be slaves at a slave sale with one another. When one child says that another slave child is worth 200 dollars, they reply that they’re worth more than 200 dollars to which the first child leads with: “You ain’t supposed to say nothing. When Marse Tom bought Mama and me, we didn’t say nothing”(Butler 99). The child speaking here has accepted his life as a slave and is even trying to find fun in being someone who buys slaves. They’ve integrated being slaves in their games and playing with the other slave children this way shows a common ground they all share with each other. Within the novel Butler often shows examples of slaves trying to make the most out of their lives and fostering a community. Many try to lessen the indignity of living as a slave. Sarah, for instance, has lost many of her children to the slave trade and as a consequence has accepted her situation out of fear. As the Weylin’s cook, she is considered the “mammy” of the Weylin plantation, and as such she is resented by some of the slaves. even though she tries to keep them out of trouble by giving them chores that need to be done. Unfortunately, her orders sometimes get ignored by those who would rather not do any labor, so Sarah fears that “[i]t'll get them the cowhide if they don't” (Butler 144). It is clear she is not doing this for the owners of the plantation but for the slaves’ own sake. She’s protecting her community here with no real gain or consequence happening to her if she did not keep each slave working.

The community that is fostered under slavery’s oppression is so strong that anyone that goes against the freedom of a fellow slave is punished. Alice, Carrie and Tess (who is also a slave) severely beat down a slave for thwarting Dana’s attempt to escape the plantation.

We let her know what would happen to her if she didn’t. Now she’s more scared of us than of Mister Tom”(Butler 179). Both Alice and the other slaves have nothing to gain by protecting Dana, but they understand, just like all the other slaves, that the desire to escape is one that they all share. They believe that if any of them were to run that the rest of the slaves would want them to make it to the North to be free. It's a sentiment shared by the community and because of that anyone who inhibits someone's attempt to be free is an enemy. A community who wants nothing more than the safety and even freedom of other members of said community regardless of what they gain is a true community.

The novel Kindred shows that slavery is a institution that separates slave and slave owner into two distinct experiences so that one can never really relate to the other dehumanizing both the slave and the slave owner and serves as a barrier from either class breaking free from their roles. In 1852, American social reformer, abolitionist and writer Frederick Douglass, spoke of slavery’s existence in the newly independent colonies as turning the humanity of those who benefit from it into a lie. Its grip was strong upon even those who tried their damnedest to escape. But although the separation between slave and master existed, it resulted in a community that is unified and  hardened by its far-reaching influence.

Further reading/ Further learning


 * Frederick Douglass, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?”
 * Ta-Nehisi Coates (2015)--We were eight years in power
 * The Origins of Modern Day Policing
 * The New York Times Magazine The1619 Project:
 * Yale University’s Legacies of American Slavery