The house Nigger in Black American Literature

Abstract

This dissertation has emerged out of a deep admiration for the writings of many dedicated Black American poets and playwrights, prose writers and essayists who are atuned not only to their own community's aspirations and social plight, but to those of many Third World people as well. Men and women like Richard Wright and Malcolm X, George Jackson and Angela Davis have all expressed, with eloquent passion and political alacrity-the most pressing problems of millions of Black Amerciaqs as well as Third World people. Writers like these have^ employed their literary gifts to inspire and educate, not only to entertain their appre- ciative audiences. VI Yet even as sensitive, socially penetrating and politically astute literature exists in Black America, there is also another style of Black writing which is antithetical to it in its artistic objectives and its social content. It is this style of writing that will be explored in this thesis under the title of "The House Nigger in Black American Literature". We have taken the title from a turn of phrase made by the late brilliant Black American leader, the late Malcolm X, who identified the man who was a social 'slave' to the political and economic system that oppressed the majority of American Blacks as a 'house negro'. he 'house negro' or 'house nigger' is the man or woman who, during the days of Southern slavery, worked within the white master's house and identified with the white man's interests in opposition to those of the Black majority. According to Malcolm, the house nigger still exists today as a type of thinker although orthodox Black slavery has legally passed away. He is the kind that encourages Blacks not to resist oppression, but rather to endure their present plight in hopes of better days to come in some mystical after life. He is the kind to compromise with his oppressors and to collect cheap short-term gains rather than to stand committed to a larger cause - the liberation of Black people. And above all, the house nigger is a cynic who does not understand that his shattered dreams and disillusionment with life is a matter of fate - the forever consequence of racism in a white man's world - but the function of a social system that can be changed with the will and determination of Black working people. The 'house nigger' lived and moved in Kenya during the days of the Mau Mau War and he was called specifically a 'Home Guard'. He exists even now in South Africa where certain Blacks choose to serve the apartheid system by speaking out on behalf of Bantustans and continued 'separate but equal' development. And the house nigger even lives in the literary world where artists write with a view of retaining the status quo,s even when it oppresses the Black majority. He is seen espousing either outright racist views or implicitly reactionary attitudes. But in the realm of Black £ thought, he plays an especially insidious role as he may seem to some to be a proponent of cultural liberation just because he is a Black person. But in fact, his writing style actually conceals and mystifies the underlying causes of racial injustice. It does little to clarify or clearly articulate the root causes of racial and economic oppression. In other words, he may appear to be black people's friend when in reality he is their enemy, as he implicitly serves the interests of the white ruling class. It is this writer who we wish to unmask through a careful analysis of the attitudinal content of what we will term a 'house nigger' literary tradition in Black American literature. Examining samples of over a hundred years of Black writing, we shall then focus upon the work of one particular present day writer, Ralph Ellison, who we feel expresses in his novel, Invisible Man, most of the reactionary attitudes of the house nigger.^ And we shall see them most clearly manifest in his approach in Black history which he represents in negative and nihilistic terms. yt * ’ j OF V VI 1 1 As a means of establishing a framework within which to work, we shall look first at the writing of several Black political thinkers, including the late and great revolutionary leader from Guinea Bissau, Amilcar Cabral, and the well known Kenyan writer Ngugi wa Th/ifong'o. Both men fall within the category of what NJ^lcolm X termed the 'field negro' or field nigger, meaning the man who stood outside the white master's house, out in the field, and chose to identify with the masses of Black working people. Both men saw the Black revolutionary or 'field nigger' writer as having a special part to play in explaining the nature of political, cultural and economic oppression to fellow Blacks through their art, and so demystifying the dynamics of racism as it was and still is used to foster a fatalistic outlook on the Black experience. By contrast, both Ngugi and Cabral saw the house nigger as someone who employed his artistic gifts to instill a cynical and cyclical view of Black history. He further encouraged Blacks not to resist either racism or the socio-political system of imperialism. Rather he implied, through his writing, that Blacks should endure their fallen fate and await a better day in the afterlife. It was the house nigger's call to foster fatalism and fanciful escapist flight as the one means for Blacks to survive in a racist and stratified society. His style was cynical not affirmative, highly individualist not communal, and often esoteric not analytical-, as the house nigger was less concerned with advancing social change than in 'making it' in the terms of the dominant culture. IX Our ultimate goal will be to advance literary criticism of Black writing beyond the negritude view that an artist's race is sufficient criterion by which to tell whether he is a supporter of black people's struggle for cultural, social and economic freedom or not. Wek will hold that the writer's class position must by analysed as well before one can accurately assess whether he is a 'friend or foe' of Black people. Thus, we will recognise not one, but two images and antagonistic social visions, revealed in Black American literature. Our view is that both have been shaped by what Ngugi describes as, "... the different person's perception of the nature of American society." These two sets of images implicitly express the way the artist views himself vis a vis his own Black history. In other words, we feel that when the Black writer feels positively towards his past - from his people's early days in Africa, through their difficult times in the slave-ridden South, and into the present - then he is more likely to understand the detrimental role that the political and economic system of capitalist imperialism has played in shaping Black history. He is also more likely to see that literature has an important role to play in reclaiming the Black man's past and creating a radical awareness of the need for social change in the present and future. But when the Black writer feels that it is necessary to negate his* -history, even to the point of feeling shame and humiliation, in having to claim it as his own heritage, then we feel that not only does he misunderstand the concrete facts- of his past. His art is also quite likety to reflect this mystified view such that he will X either consciously or unconsciously foster futile and fatalistic attitudes. As such, his style of writing is not the kind that is conductive to creating radical and realistic awareness of the need for social change among Black people. Our thesis is based on the belief that it is important to understand and unravel these two separate antithetical traditions of Black American writing since we feel that without one's understanding the historical fact of \l how Europe essentially robbed and underdeveloped Africa and the entire Black world, Black people will continue to accept racist myths about the insignificance of their noble past. And once they are weakened by a racist ideology, which has been fashioned by the white ruling class and reinforced by the house nigger, they may feel so inadequate that they will remain resigned to their prescribed second class position rather than rise up and resist the racist ruling class oppression. In this thesis, we will try to disentangle the two strains of black American writing by focusing first and foremost on the house nigger tradition which we feel is full of 'foes' in sheep's clothing. The house nigger lives and looks superficially like Black people's friend, but actually he serves the interest of his white master. In exposing his various means of distortion, we trust that we can advance the literary criticism of Black writing beyond merely appreciating an artist for his 'negritude'. Our contention will be that a writer.'s Blackness, without consideration of his class position, must now be seen as insufficient criterion of proof that his art is one which ultimately serves the interests of Black people. We will try, by

carefully reasoned argument and literary illustration, to explain the point that both his colour and his class mustbe taken into consideraton if we are to know whether he is finally 'friend or foe' to the majority of Blacks.