Mothers of the Land

In Jacqueline Royster’s Going Against the Grain, she talks about the lives of African American women as slaves, and how they fought through the struggle to get where they are today through expressing literacy. The many things that Royster said throughout the reading connected to many of the other readings we’ve been reading and discussing within our class.

One way that they connected was that in Elaine Richardson’s To Protect and Serve, she talks about how African American women used storytelling to express their literacy, and Royster touches on this as well. She talks of how they used storytelling to express their beliefs to their community.

Royster also says that women played two roles in their communities, “They were the interpreters and reinterpreters of what was going on. They were the transmitters of culture as mothers, actual and fictive, as teachers, as social activists” (110). Like in the other readings, Royster is touching on how these women became mothers of their communities. They have maternal literacy as they know how to nurture their people and teach them things that they believe they should know. They give them knowledge that they know they were not getting anywhere else due to the oppression of African Americans.

These women were also responsible for taking care of the illnesses of their people. They provided support for other African Americans because they knew that it was important for no one person to be alone. It is important to help your people to become knowledgeable, and according to Royster, black women did exactly this. They used their vernacular showing that it was acceptable to express their culture and beliefs.

These women were very powerful and helped fight the struggle for not only African Americans but for the women as well. It is vital that we recognize all of the important women because they helped to shape the lives of African American women today as we are awarded more opportunities than before.

 I appreciate Royster’s words as she helps me to become knowledgeable of happenings that I did not know previously. She, like the women she talks about, passes her knowledge down to another African American female like myself.

Danielle Broadnax