Embodied Agency In Octavia Butler's Kindred

Rachel Heinen Dr. Bolis ENGL 1301W 3 March 2023 Analytical Response #4 - Kindred In the novel Kindred, by Octavia Butler, there are many instances of direct and indirect characterization. Direct characterization involves the technique of directly telling the readers something about a character while indirect characterization involves showing the reader through actions and dialogue. An excellent example of direct characterization is how Butler directly tells the readers right away in the novel that Dana is African American.

Analyzing Character Development: Dana Octavia Butler’s novel, Kindred, provides a unique look into slavery in the antebellum South through the eyes of Edana Franklin, a black woman living in the late 20th century, who is suddenly sent through time to the early 19th century where she is suddenly faced with the task of protecting her ancestor, Rufus, from many dangers in order to ensure her existence in the present. Dana begins her adventure with no knowledge of how or why she has been given this responsibility and, as a result, must adapt to her new and unfamiliar surroundings. As the novel progresses, the reader sees Dana’s internal battle with herself as she decides whether or not Rufus is worth saving, or if she should let Rufus die

Kindred is a story about the past intertwining with the present. Dana, a black woman from the 1970’s, is taken back in time to the antebellum South. She gets sent to Rufus, the son of a plantation owner, to protect him time and time again. Each time she travels back to the South, she remains there for a longer period of time with a higher risk of death accompanying her stay. She ended her long spell of being trapped in the South by murdering Rufus, thus making it impossible for her to return to the past.

Kindred In the novel Kindred, the author uses the source of time travel to travel back to the nineteenth century in the United States, to experience the lifestyle of enslaved African Americans by the Whites. Traveling back in time, the author uses Dana to revert to slavery, experiencing abuse and having to adapt quickly to the environment. Readers can experience both mental and psychical experiences the antebellum slaves experienced during this time, though treatment varied from master to master, the diurnal living of a slave was still difficult. Throughout the novel, differences of the modern and past time are illustrated to see how the society has changed with time and how it responds to the decision and the way of life of others.

Instead, he implores them to be more political. His goal in writing is to make people aware of the social injustices occurring. The Negro writer who seeks to function within his race as a purposeful aren has a serious responsibility. In order to do justice to his subject matter, in order to depict Negro life in all of its manifold and intricate relationships, a deep, informed, and complex consciousness is necessary; a consciousness which draws for its strength upon the fluid lore of a great people, and more this lore with concepts that move and direct the forces of history today (Wright,

The key points that support this interpretation are as

Though Dana is highly educated in her own time, her studies of history do nothing to prepare her for the reality of living in the time. Harriet Tubman, being that she had suffered through a lifetime of the oppression of slavery, was able to use her own intelligence of her experience to escape and aid others in doing so. This comparison between the educated and uneducated shows the importance of experience aiding in a true understanding of a situation. “Butler’s Kindred suggests, in fact, that ignoring the similarities between the past and present is not only pointless but dangerous” (Mitchell) due to the persistence of racism in society. Dana understands racism as she deals with it in her relationship with Kevin in her own time; however, her knowledge of history’s systematic racism only aids her in understanding how to deal with her antagonists, not how to escape from their oppression.

Though many changes have transpired in America since the days of slavery, adversity, absence of chances and issues such unfairness and prejudice, which proceeds to gradually develop and encounter by a few, regularly thwarts one from prevailing. The topics of injustice and racism were greatly discussed in all the three letters from James Baldwin, Dr. Martin Luther King and Ta-Nehisi Coates. I thought all three letters were very powerful pieces, as they were beautifully written, reflective and moving. “My Dungeon Shook” by James Baldwin is a captivating read, it entails the social struggles faced in the US by African Americans and white stereotypes of black identity.

The speaker is uneducated, so the writing in the first person is readable for beginners as well as educated adults. Walker addresses the audience specifically to to create deeper imagery, where the audience can add their own experiences to the story, such as “You’ve no doubt seen those TV shows” (46). The speaker directly addresses the audience, and so anyone reading the story, whether a minority, or the majority, will be connected to the story. Purpose: Walker describes the impact of oppression on the relationship between mother and daughter, and how the oppressed view themselves.

Dana and Rufus’s Relationship Ever wonder what it's like to have a changing relationship with a plantation owner's son back in the 1800’s? Dana Franklin is a younger African-American woman married to Kevin Franklin who is a middle-aged man. Dana travels from California in 1976 back to the early 1800’s whenever Rufus is in trouble. Rufus is a plantation owner son and is also the father of Dana’s ancestor. Dana’s travels are random; she gets lightheaded and dizzy when she is about to travel.

Racist and sexist stereotypes are depicted in the short story, Kindred. Kindred, is about an interracial couple living in California during the 1970s. Dana and Kevin are happily married, when Dana suddenly time travels back to the antebellum south during the time of slavery. Dana is an educated black woman, in the 70s it is normal for a black woman to have higher roles in society, but it is not

Harriet Jacobs and Sojourner Truth are women who face adversity categorized in an invisible sub-group, making it difficult for black women to compete in the world. This sub-group is known as intersectionality. Black women struggle with the perception being inferior placing them at the bottom of the social class. Jacobs and Truth, however, share their experiences to other men and women allowing them to be aware of this invisible group. They willingly chose to speak out against this discrimination.

Situations are defined by choices. Small actions in one moment of time alter the future of what happens forever. In Kindred by Octavia Butler Dana, the main character, is a black women born in 1976, who time travels back to the early 1800’s in order to save her relative, Rufus, a white boy who is the son of the owner of the plantation. Along the way she also meets her other relative, Alice, a slave born free, but enslaved since she helped her husband run away. Alice is owned by Rufus, who is convinced that he is in love with her.

In Jamaica Kincaid’s essay “On Seeing England for the First Time”, she clearly voices her animosity towards the one place her whole life surrounded as a child in hopes of persuading her audience into understanding that there is a fine line between dreams and realities. As an adult, Kincaid finally is able to travel to England to witness firsthand what all the hype was about and why her childhood and education happened to be based around the fantasy customs of this country. Noticing that every detail of her life revolved around England, from the way she ate her food to the naming of her family members, Kincaid found her hatred growing more and more. Coming from a British colony, the obsession with England drove Kincaid crazy to the point that she finally traveled there one day. She says, “The space between the idea of something and its reality is always wide and deep and dark” (37).

Maryland in 1815, like much of the south, was a hot bed for slavery plantations. For slave owners in particular, it was a benefit if your slaves were not educated, as they would be less likely to question the oppressive treatment, and not adequately be able to express the conditions under which they labored. In the novel Kindred by Octavia Butler, various aspects of education are intertwined throughout, effectively depicting how education and slavery do not go together cohesively. Specifically, in the case of Dana, the novels protagonist, her intelligence led to her owners feeling inferior, which prompted many verbal and physical attacks, an exploitation of her abilities, and the overriding attempt to suppress the education of other slaves