The field trip we atteneded about the 1811 Slavery Volt was epic. I witness a lot of different music, culture, words, etc. There were a lot of different actors. When we first arrived there were slaves standing on the sides of the walkway. They were slaves that died trying to fight away for freedom. The play showed the ending at the beginning. Almost like foreshadowing the events that lead up to the ending. The first scene was at a dinner table. Where the prince kept making the black slave do anything his white dinner guest wanted. They would make him run around the table picking their glasses up. The slave was the brother of Charles Deslondes. He was the leader of the slavery volt. They treated him with such disgust about himself. I'm sure he did get fed up because he ended up killing them all. The part I like most about the poem was the end. When Charles's mother gave her daughter , his sister the power to carry on. While the rest of the people went to the battle. She was the one that survived. The mother drew lines on them with chalk. And she made it like her passing down her torch. She taught her daughter dances and she taught her that she was powerful enough to keep their culture going even though she wouldn't be there. The part that I really didn't understand was the middle scene. Where this white woman was in this room. She wasn't able to do anything because she was ill. She couldn't have any company or anything because people might catch what she had. But her maid kept coming in risking her own health. I didn't understand what this had to do with anything though. I really like the African music thought. There were actual people beating on drums and things. And there was also a band where the people played the violin when something important was happening. I do wish that there were more of a contribute to women though. Charles and his brother were like the stars of the play. Almost like the leading men of the whole thing. The only part that had to do with woman was the daughter in the end. But the slaves from the beginning of the play died. I think there should have been a little more involvment with them in the play also. Because the white woman had a whole scene to herself. And back them I'm sure white people weren't that important to the slavery volt. They didn't have much apart in it either. but i think the play was actually worth going see. Instead of just using it as an excuse to be out of school. It was really cool.
-Kirktisha Cheneau
Kirktisha,
ReplyDeleteThat's a really interesting summary of the play. I didn't get to see it, but I wish I did. I'm glad you wrote on it.
It sounds like that scene with the white woman who was sick and the black maid who was risking her health to continue to serve her might have been another effort to show how the lives of slaves where seen as kind of disposable---maybe helping set the conditions within which the slaves revolted.
I think you raise a good point about the women not having a significant enough role. Think of the major social institutions we covered at the beginning of the course and ask yourself who are the major decision makers? Control means being able to document what happens in life. Forms of culture like art and movies and theater are in part ways of documenting life. Women have not traditionally been involved in that, and so their voice is often absent. Which does not mean, of course, that women didn't play any important role in forms of resistance throughout history. It's just not recorded that well. It's a reality and knowledge that is needed.
Mr. Ostertag