Decades of colonization and subjugation of other cultures by a predominantly western or eurocentric society has led to increased changes in a cultural and social value system, often to the detriment of indigenous and African cultural value systems. For all its development and advancements concerning the human race, the West remains deeply divided over the inclusion of other societies into its cultural value systems. While the face value, there are some great strides made towards promoting diversity and equality still, many of the social structures available still do not recognize foreign entities and cultures in the West as inherently inclusive of the West but as a byproduct of western domination of the world, as such they continually stifle them. Herein the problem lies as people are continually discriminated against in their day-to-day human conditions and treated differently. This is an aspect that is clearly expressed in various black literature that emanates from the region. Themes of racism, colorism, gentrification, acculturation, identity discrimination, and marginalization of Africans in the western diaspora continue to dominate how black literature is written and the major thematic points. A great example of the effect of subjugation can be observed in the racial division that dominates the island, making up Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
In contrast, both islands feature a larger sign of people of African origin, either creolized or African diaspora or racially mixed with African blood; racial divisions spurred by Europeans during their colonial days have permeated to conflict and division. In the case of Haiti, from its colonial day until to date, the country has always been a place of chaos and continually undermined by countries around. Women have borne the most brunt as they either remain and risk their lives or move abroad to the US and lose their culture. This is what Danticat seeks to portray in the narrative Nineteen Thirty-Seven and, with a theme of melancholy, reveals the pain in many African diaspora hearts that linger from the effects of colonialism.
Edwidge Danticat is an American-Haitian writer whose work focuses on women’s lives, especially from Haiti, as related to the issue of power, poverty, injustice, and community. Danticat’s Nineteen Thirty-Seven is based on the above aspects as it relates to the interaction of African diasporic cultures with the West and their experiences with a dominant Eurocentric culture. It tells a story from the perspective of Josephine, a young girl describing her experience as observed from the subjugation, torture, and murder of Haitian women under the Dominican culture. Specifically, it focuses on Jospehine’s grandmother and the further incarceration of her mother by the government in 1937. This is a very representative story concerning the injustice and cruelty that Haitian people (majorly African diaspora) lived, especially those under the Dominican republic and soldier’s domain. The story begins with Josephine possessing a doll called Madonna, whose cultural significance is similar to Virgin Mary’s. Her grandmother gave her the doll. She is on her way to visit her mother in prison.
Before the visit, the story outlines a massacre ordered by the Dominican republic soldier-led regime. It occurred in a river that separates Haiti and Dominican Republic. The massacre rendered Josephine motherless after her mother was taken away and jailed for fear that he was a witch and that she killed her friend’s baby while her grandmother had died trying to save her. Josephine was born on the day of the infamous 1937 Massacre, where Dominican Republic army officials ordered all Haitians within the Dominican Republic to be purged. In the story, Josephine’s grandmother was brutally killed while her mother scampered for safety, and thereafter Josephine was born. The inhuman treatment of women, the increased insistence that powerful women practiced witchcraft, and the shared painful experiences between a variety of women who do not know each other effectively work to criticize the way the Haitian societies treat African women and continue to undermine them, especially in the diaspora. The river, as such, is presented to have significant cultural importance to Josephine and her mother.
From the narrative’s focal theme, Nineteen Thirty-Seven is a story that is narrated in a manner that exudes or compels a reader toward feelings of melancholy about the plight of Josephine. This is done intentionally so as to explore the state of pain that dominates remnants of Haitian society living in the Dominican Republic (DR). Women particularly have borne the brunt of the pain, and the focus that Danticat places on women, in particular to some regard, speaks to her own experiences, herself being of Haitian descent. Danticat outlines her journey and fears of being a female writer as expressed by her mother, who feared that her bold writing would come to harm her; she further states that she grew up in an era of feverish nationalism under the Duvalier dictatorship, where mulatto elites were killed and exiled (Adisa). Her personal reflection on race and injustice, as explained through her experience, sets the mood which intentionally identifies and contextualizes a period of social injustice, havoc, and suffering in Haiti’s history, especially for women. Research identifies that Haiti, from its colonial day to the present always been unstable and continually undermined by countries around it; women have borne the most brunt as they either remain and risk their lives or move abroad to the US and lose their culture (Abrahamson). In her narrative, women are specifically her main point of focus, as they usually do not take part in spearheading the carnage, but women and children are always left behind to bear the brunt of the violence since they do not have the means to represent themselves or unshackle themselves from the society that undermines them.
Women are presented as a symbol of hope for Haiti; they propagate or provide a backbone for cultural continuity. Josephine’s grandmother sacrificed herself to see Josephine get born, and her mother sacrificed her freedom to ensure that Josephine would live a free life. They also ensured to make Josephine aware of the 1937 tragedy and make the river a central place in their culture. They provide Josephine with Madonna to ensure that she is spiritually protected. Here are some elements of continuity of the cultural value system that intentionally work to educate Josephine on her past and provide her a perspective for her future. Danticat also agrees with this in her personal life and outlines that women were a great pillar and hope for her society from her upbringing. As such, it was sad to witness the constant attack on women, and her work came to be a means to oppose the establishment’s treatment of women. Danticat’s motivation is to pursue storytelling to make Haiti’s past and present known in history. Danticat outlines that “Women are middle pillars of society…The women may not be labeling themselves feminists or womanists, but they’re doing the work. They’re keeping the children alive. They’re keeping the family going. That’s a developed-world and a developing-world reality” (Adisa 348). For this, they should be admired. This is why in her narrative, as part of black literature, the woman-motherhood framework goes beyond women as mothers but inherently terms motherhood as a cultural library for future generations.
As such, her story takes the perspective of the sad women’s realities in the developing world not just to show the plight of women but to fundamentally show that this is indeed part of their lived experience. There is a sense of passing on motherhood to the daughter to maintain women’s purity and show how their experiences are separate from men’s. There is an undeniable bond between Manman (Josephine’s mother) and Josephine, even though she is in prison. She encourages Josephine to be strong for her society by refusing to kiss her when she departs from prison, as this was the best way she knew how not to make her a failure or make her endure the troubles that she went through. Distancing her love and emotional support from Josephine to provide her freedom. They also walk barefoot to Massacre River, a tradition that they used to honor the departed soul, all these devotion to their culture and values point to the struggles and position of women in Haitian society- as pillars and propagators of cultural values. Her work as part of black literature creates a platform that allows the wider African diasporic society insight and a critical look into the failures of its society, and through reviewing these important articles, the society can identify and create countermeasures that seek to redress the situation through civil and political participation. She effectively tells a story criticizing poor social discourses of injustice and violence against women. Dionne suggests, “It is not the job of writers to lift our spirits. Books simply do what they do”. Western society, for all its advancement, does not acknowledge its role in creating the typical ignorant image that perpetuates African diaspora social marginalization and injustices. Despite her book being from a Haitian perspective, such, she does not present a homogenized experience for all Africans in the diaspora; Danticat’s works, like many other black writers, present certain common elements that make up the foundation of social injustices meted upon the race through any social context (Palmer). It provides a sense of respect and acknowledgment of people’s differences, a factor that is critical in maintaining their unique identity and respecting them for their cultures and values.
The female-motherhood framework, as such, becomes a major point of focus in Danticat’s story as it reflects a need to perpetually remain in appreciation of women amidst suffering and in hope for a better day. Manman is a powerful woman who is also devoted to traditions; she, like her mother, sacrifices herself to maintain her daughter Josephine’s wellbeing and still encourages her to be strong despite being undermined in prison to the point that she looks like a scarecrow. Themes such as witchcraft, while at one point in time true and very real now, are used as tropes to explore deeper social struggles that women face and the political implications of gendered society and racism. Powerful women are undermined and baselessly accused of being sentenced to death. Despite women’s gains in Haitian society, their role is still undermined, and they are exposed to tons of dangers by men. Like in most of her stories in the story collection Krik? Krak! where Nineteen Thirty-Seven is published, “The mother in this story feels obligated to pass on Haitian values to her daughter.” (Abrahamsson, 7). This is beneficial to society. This is done as a means of propagating the culture. Danticat reveals that within her culture, storytelling was majorly done by many people, but the subjective reality of women as an oppressed lot becomes increasingly hindered since women, for the most part, have become constantly undermined. In the interview, she outlines that crimes such as rape have been perpetuated constantly on women stating that “I see rape as an actual act. I would never use it as a trope. … the actual rape of girls and women by people in positions of power and authority in Haiti, both foreign and local” (Adisa, 349). This works to indicate a real problem faced by women. The imagination of women as witches, shedding skin to reveal wings and fly away, comes in handy to outline an inescapable reality. Josephine and her mother touch the massacre water, hoping they will be pulled in, but they only see their reflection. They both had the hope that they would find something different but came to the realization that they were only victimized. In prison, they are forced to punishment and torture for a forced belief that they are witches. Still, Manman and the rest of the women from different parts of Haiti are forced to live miserably and in pain due to false accusations, representing other forms of torture that women collectively go through in Haiti.
Danticat also explores memories of pain in her works through Josephine’s and Manman’s constant reflection of the massacre and her vivid description of the deplorable state of the prison. Memories of Manman being dragged away from home while Josephine watched or grandmother being killed as Manman watched create a sense of continuity and perpetual suffering faced by women. Clitandre identifies that “Danticat takes up the task of expressing and evoking the counter-narrative voices of Haitian women by unfolding the intimate and psychological relationships between women within the backdrop of multiple sexual oppression and political terror specific to Haitian women’s lives” (94). Furthermore, the use of memories juxtaposed alongside the lived realities of women as caring becomes ironic, showing how society has transformed and how the notion of home has changed. The symbol of the virgin mary doll- Madonna, ultimately drives this point home. Clitandre similarly states that by introducing new Christian symbols alongside aspects of the voodoo religion, “Danticat further claims that home is no longer that place to which one can fully return.” (94) as Haitian traditions have changed.
While there is a general criticism aimed at the confused state and relationship between voodoo and Christianity, there is also a general criticism of Haitian society as an extension of the African diaspora’s lack of appreciation and respect for the woman and her role in society. Josephine is sad but holds in her tears when she visits her mother. All these memories work to evoke a sense of sympathy for the women and their plight in Haiti. Danticat uses their memories to invoke a sense of guilt and criticize society for constantly letting women down. She
Edwidge Danticat’s short story Nineteen Thirty-Seven explores a time when women were increasingly persecuted in Haiti. It is a social critique that, in exploring past persecution, draws parallels to the ongoing persecution and gender-based victimization of women that is still perpetuated within Haitian society, pointing the finger at the corrupt social values that persist. The story takes a melancholic mood, and through vivid narration, use of imagination, and memories of pain, it evokes feelings of sympathy for the plight of women in Haiti, first showing how they are hated for their skin color- (Grandmother’s death at the hands of the DR soldiers), then showing how they are hated for their positions as feminists womanists and powerful women in general. It compels the reader to evaluate the state of the nation and its values on women as a means of understanding its identity amidst traditions to modernity.
The factors that have played a role in shaping these poor human conditions essential focus the blame on the Eurocentric influenced society’s lack of effort in creating measures to deal with and eradicate social injustice since slavery. For many African diasporic writers, especially in the 19th and 20th centuries, increased racial targeting resulted in a predisposition that life is just a fleeting aspect that could end anytime for any reason. This is because their society treated them as a threat. The threat is cultivated by a variety of factors found by the lack of society in addressing the decades of cultural injustice subjected to the black through the subjugation of their race by the white people. This saw their cultures stripped of their identity, value, worth, and means for economic independence. This resulted in people being marginalized and locked out of opportunities, giving rise to poverty, dysfunctional families, and crime. These important aspects that make up the narrative allow scholars to understand people’s perspectives and ideologies and, in the process, understand their culture and struggles. This reduces the risk of stereotyping and discrimination while assigning people an identity and effectively recognizing their struggles.
Works Cited
Abrahamsson, Kristine. “Mothers and Daughters between Two Cultures in Short Fiction by Edwidge Danticat” Akademi för Utbildning och Ekonomi Avdelning för humaniora.2011. http://hig.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:402886/FULLTEXT01.pdf
Adisa, Opal Palmer. “Up Close and Personal: Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Identity and the Writer’s Life.” African American Review, vol. 43, no. 2/3, 2009, pp. 345–355. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41328611.
Clitandre, Nadége. “Reframing Haitian Literature Transnationally: Identifying New and Revised Tropes of Haitian Identity in Edwidge Danticat’s ‘Breath, Eyes, Memory.’” Journal of Haitian Studies, vol. 9, no. 2, 2003, pp. 90–110.JSTOR www.jstor.org/stable/41715221.
Dionne, Brand. What We All Long For. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2013. Print.
Danticat, Edwidge Nineteen Thirty-Seven. PDF.
Palmer, Colin A. “Defining and Studying the Modern African Diaspora.”The Journal of Negro History, vol. 85, no. 1/2, 2000, pp. 27–32. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2649097.
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