Wednesday, April 16, 2014
Follis.Jordyn.HeartofDarkness.
In Heart of Darkness, the author Jospeh Conrad, displays to the readers how low the black African Americans are in the capitalist system. "He allowed his 'boy' -- an overfed young negro from the coast -- to treat the white men, under his very eyes, with provoking insolence." (90) Through this quote, the readers get opened up too the situation about how animalish the black African Americans are looked at by the society through the Conrad's thoughts and opinions. In the book the readers were introduced to the manager. The manager is a powerful man who all the guys have to listen too. The manager gets to own his own slave. This quote demonstrates exactly how the slaves are the domination of another person higher up in the socialist order. The words Conrad uses his story "his 'boy'..." Reference how the black African American is the managers property. Back then when slavery was a issue, slaves were peoples property. Slaves weren't just original people they were owned by the richer people. The dominant class could treat them however they wanted to. When owning a animal, you get to choose how they are treated, for example if you feed them or not. Animals are known to be overfed when it is about the time for being bouchered. The quote displays to the viewers how the manager can order the slaves around like a animal with rude behavior or speech. It also demonstrates how the slave is being referenced to be a animal by being overfed. Throughout the book Heart of Darkness, Joseph portrays the black African Americans to be weak to the rest of the society and to be apart of the lower social class.
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I thought you did a great job pointing out the dominance of one culture and the enslavement of another, this is reoccurring theme the whole story and we see it a lot. The quote you used was a great example, they "boy" is being compared to an animal who is overfed. This overfed part shows how he is dependent on the man, he was fed, because how could he possibly feed himself? Boy also has connotations behind it, as the boy is really a man, but because he is black to make him seem dependent and "lesser" he is called "boy". You showed that connection between the dominate force and the dependent force well with your analysis of the passage. I think you could also look at other quotes as well, like one on pg. 84 " He lapped out of his hand" Conrad is again choosing to give the Africans animal like motifs with them always comparing them to animals. I think you might have tried to cover too much, with adding the butchering part, and it would have been better if you started with the manger, and shown his power, then the quote. Other than that your analysis was great!
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