Meaning and Connection

 Jalisa Garth  

Professor Jaleesa Harris  

AA English 2017  

25 April 2023  

Final Project: Essay  

Meaning and Connection  

History. The sum of all things past tense. The epitome of circulatory events. It reveals its  repetitive tendencies in various ways. It continuously walks over itself until the tracks connect  and the beginning is no more. History causes this longing to “[deepen one’s] understanding of  the events that brought us to the crossroads we find ourselves at today”. (Whitworth 1)  

 A plethora of races have been strained and drained to subsidize the prosperity of the  United States. What these races have in common is an equal number of losses to contributions. A  country planted on indigenous grounds with fruits of white supremacism. African Americans  have been the laborers of said fruit, genetically denied the ability to indulge. This race has  suffered endlessly at the hands of an entity systematically structured based on ethnocentrism;  however, mundanely structured by the hands of its laborers. Like any hard work, payment is not  far behind, but history has shown that African Americans receive no such thing. On the contrary,  it motivates an embarkment for “meaning [or] human connection”. Over time, this cycle of Anti Blackness has poisoned today’s lifestyles, systems, and minds into a cureless plague called  inequity. (Whitworth 1)  

In the texts Kindred & A Different Drummer and the films Lovecraft Country &  Candyman there is a persistent pattern of loss. Each character faces affliction and misfortune in 

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response to succumbing to the necessary atonement. Dana, from Kindred, loses a sense of self  and in the end, loses a piece of herself. She and Anthony (Candyman) were both without choice,  Anthony becoming a murderous sacrifice for a larger cause. Leti, in the series Lovecraft Country,  willingly took on the role of a channel to bring pieces of deceased African Americans back  together. Finally, A Different Drummer displays how the identity of Blacks is an illusion to those  considered superior. Tucker Caliban had been stripped of any familial practices or family ties. It  has been stated that some view African Americans as “expendable commodities”, hence the  African American community regularly being “denied… their personhood and imposed a  socially constructed identity”. Stereotypes and ideologies have been forced upon us and infected  the minds of those around us, birthing Afro-pessimism. We are used- almost randomly- as  conduits that must make life-altering libations to contribute to the birth-given debt of capitalism.  (Sargent 5, Davis 2).  

There has been much controversy around the topic of reparations. After reading and  watching the texts and films above, it came to my attention that this topic became relevant due to  one of two reasons. Either the African American community is aiming for a more  unified/equitable society (connection) or they are simply looking to gain forms of compensation  as acknowledgment of all that was lost (meaning). History has been the greatest depiction of why  reparations should be considered. Addressing the various parts of history that played a role in the  arbitrary system we have today “is essential to establishing conditions of justice”. When we look  at characters like those mentioned previously, we notice the pattern of loss. Reparations would be  a means of an attempt to not give back the many people that lost their lives, the horrendous  amounts of bloodshed, the thousands of gallons of tears, and the humiliating shame placed upon 

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those of color, but to understand that history does not have to repeat and that- with the right  tools- a bright future could be ahead of us. (McCarthy 2)  

It is understood that the African American community has suffered, but “the suffering of  the past does not stay in the past”. Whether or not it brings about aims to unite with another  community or to claim what was lost, some form of reparations must be allocated. Meaning and  connection both have a ring of peace. The African American race can no longer suffer, and  history can no longer tread amongst the present. (Assensoh and Alex-Assensoh) 

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