From the description of White and Black men in Chesnutt's story "The Sheriffs Children" there is a notion present as to the entitlement of what it means to be white. I would venuture to say that a white men, based on history and Chesnutt's wiriting, is a man endowed with all God indended him and is not hindered by (what Antebellum whites considered) he inferiotity that GOd intenteded of blacks. In other words I am saying that society recogines wheather a man is black or white. The facts of this is first the Color of their skin. A white man can have a black ancestor but if he bears no resemblence then in antebellum society that person would not have been subject to inferior status of haveing a black ancestor. If your skin is white then God intended it to be white and thus intended you to be endowed with knowledge, power, education, law, leadership, etc. over all of the earth (according to antibellum society). The Mullato in "The Sheriff's Children" is the son of the white Sheriff and posses a white spirit but due to the inferor genes given to him by his mover and its effect on his darker skin, he is seen only for his considered inferior genes and thus not worthing of his white blood and is not endowed to have all the rights of whites. If Cicely's son had only had the light skin to go along with his white spirit, the man would have prospered and not been subjected to slave society and had his white sprit crushed and his endowment of white blood taken from him becasue he is darker.
For the antebullum society Race was soley judged by skin and if a white man had any amount of black in his genes that person all needed to keep it a secret and he would be mingled and drafted into society or I should white society which was (belived by divine right of God) the domante race.
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Shea,
ReplyDeleteThis was some really interesting background information and thoughts on how one could hide his heritage of the African American race as long as he had white colored skin. This really makes us think about how ignorant society was and how far we have come in the world today. To judge a person solely on skin color, when their ancestory could possibly still be the same as yours, seems very ridiculous. These misguided concepts are truly displayed through the character of the sheriff. The sheriff, even after finding out that the mulatto prisoner is his own son, seems to disregard that fact, and doesn't truly seem to care what happens to him. He offers and attempts to heal the prisoner's bullet wound, but in the long run this does not matter because he never attempts to try to save him from going to court, and only offers him suggestions. So either way the prisoner, and his son was bound to die, due to the fact that the sheriff was ashamed to admit to anyone that the colored man was of his own flesh and blood.
Back in the days, even if you had a tint of black in your skin, people instantly thought that you were black and since you were black, you had to work for the white men. In fact, in the story I wasn't too sure if the prisoner was really telling the truth or not because honestly, who wouldn't lie to save their own life? It's only when the prisoner reveals that he's his son does the sheriff even give a second thought to this man. The prisoner goes on to explain that he has pretty much struggled with himself his whole life only because he was given a white father, but not white skin. During class discussion, we talked about how the color of his skin symoblized his "jail". People didn't really know much better then though, but looking back now from a different century and a different view on people, you see how quick we were to judge and how selfish we were.
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