Trauma In Octavia Butler's Kindred

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.

Traumatic Events On occasion there are things that can change a person, called a traumatic event. A traumatic event, as defined by Health Line, is an incident that causes either physical, emotional, spiritual, or psychological harm to oneself (“What Are Traumatic Events?: HealthLine”). This occurs in the novel, Ender’s Game, written by Orson Scott Card in which a dystopian world is brought to justice with the annihilation of a whole alien species, by one child. Within the contents of this text, Card illustrates how traumatic events will change a person, sometimes changing for the better. He achieves this message through his main character, Ender Wiggin.

Moreover, this violent encounter left Dana defenseless until she “[discovered] the thing [she hit her] head on.” By instinct, she “brought it down hard on his head,” giving her the ability to prevent the rape from proceeding. The danger for black people that is common in the 1800s led to the need for Dana to be instinctive to protect herself. Thus, the characterization of Dana as instinctive helps reveal how dangerous the 1800s is for black people and

Dana has these flashbacks that take her to the time of her ancestors and someone that she was related to was Rufus, a white southern slave owner. Dana, being black, had ancestors that were slaves. Dana vacillates between the present and the past because she goes back in the past when Rufus is in danger. When Dana returns to the present, Rufus gets older. Kevin, Dana’s husband, suspects that the reason she returns to the present is because her life is in danger.

Most, if not all of these were present within Kym’s family, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but it was clear that when these conditions were present Kym was negatively affected by them. This was especially apparent when criticism, judgement, or interpretations of Kym’s behaviors as methods to attract attention were present. It is possible that Kym has developed conditions of worth as she would receive more attention and empathy when she was in a crisis, as pointed out by both Rachel and Kym. The conditional positive regard she would receive likely contributed to the development of these conditions of worth and the incongruence between her actual and ideal self. This is further supported by statements by Rachel like that she only wanted Kym to “get better or die”, and Kym telling her family that they cannot dictate her life forever but soon afterwards asking them “who do I have to be now?”.

In his “’No.’: The Narrative Theorizing of Embodied Agency in Octavia Butler’s Kindred,” Bast underscores humanity’s desire for agency, one’s “ability to reach decision[s] about themselves and [express them]” and how one’s agency can benefit a society or a community (Bast 151). In the beginning of his article, Bast labels this decision-making and expression as beneficial and necessary for a community, while simultaneously underlining society’s limitations put on mankind’s freedoms such as discrimination, prejudice, or injustice. Nevertheless, he follows up by stating that it is simply human instinct to want to express thoughts even if other factors oppress them, undermining these social limitations. Furthermore, to support this statement, Bast

The books A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines and Kindred by Octavia E. Butler are set in different time periods but you can see the theme of society and setting playing a huge role on a person’s identity. The book Kindred is set over many years in the eighteen hundreds and in nineteen seventy six. The book A Lesson Before Dying is set in the nineteen forties. In both of these books you can see how the character’s setting affects how they act. Two main motifs that show through during these time periods in that of slavery and racism. These two motifs can be seen throughout almost every chapter of each book.

In the novel, Kindred, by Octavia E. Butler, a lot of ignorance and intelligence is demonstrated all through the book which in a way is dangerous. Kindred is a wonderful work of science fiction that catches the attention of readers by telling a story of Dana, a modern-day African-American woman, who is abruptly transported from California in 1976 to the antebellum South. Not only is Dana abruptly transported back in time but she’s able to experience first-hand the cruelty of enslaved black women and men in the 1800s. The experiences of Dana and the enslaved women in the novel were viewed as mostly women working in households. However, it’s a known fact that the majority of enslaved women worked in the fields. In this novel, the enslaved women experiences mostly consisted of having to work in households as cooks, housekeepers; some as sexual slaves, and how some women became so used to the abuse that it was a norm.

Dana realizes that if she is stuck in the south she might as well be working. She was offered a tutoring job, Kevin disagrees with her decision. Dana says, “I’m here. And I am supposed to be a slave”, she is trying to fit in with the black stereotype. Dana pretends to belong to Kevin while they are in the Weylin’s house to prevent blowing her cover.

A normality in the literary world is that texts deeply nestled in the crosshairs of biopolitics, gender, nationalism, and other identity particularities often fall victim to one sided and dogmatic cultural critiques. Critic after critic find difficulty regarding how to analyze and essentially read a novel where intersectionality is intrinsic to its framework such as Kindred, because it does not fit the fairly common singular literary theory mold. This notion is articulated and defended in “"Some Matching Strangeness": Biology, Politics, and the Embrace of History in Octavia Butler's "Kindred"” where Robertson explores Butler’s usage of Dana’s body to confront universal truths and to cement the idea that Dana is in a historical paradox due

he effect of a horrific memory on a small fragile boy is clearly depicted in the book Fugitive Pieces by Ann Michaels. Furthermore, Jakob’s sister is used during his life to help him cope with the memories of the holocaust. He see’s her during his hallucinations because of his PTSD and is defiantly part of the reason why he is so traumatized. His nightmares continue from his childhood even into his adulthood. Because of the dramatic experiences Jakob has gone though he also becomes a writer of the future, in which he can help prevent such catastrophe’s from ever happening. Ben, the narrator of the second half of the book becomes the interpreter of Jakob’s writing, and is the one who helps make sense of what Jakob was trying to say.

Dana struggles to understand why this is happening, and she begins to experiment with it. Throughout this novel, there is a shift between mental and physical abuse of slaves used to reveal

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

To such an extent that he boy seems to be using dangerous methods of retaliation. For example, in addition to Dana rescuing him from the fire he set to the draperies in his house in retaliation against his father, he also describes previously having set the stable on fire because his father sold a horse he liked (25). Based on his irrational impulses taken when things don’t go his way, it is evident that Rufus is growing up with an entitled and vindictive attitude. Dana is alarmed by Rufus’s actions and logic and analyzes, “The boy already knew more about revenge than I did. What kind of man was he going to grow up into?

She is reminded of the violence that torn not only communities apart but families as well. How the social norms of the day restricted people’s lives and held them in the balance of life and death. Her grandfathers past life, her grandmother cultural silence about the internment and husband’s affair, the police brutality that cause the death of 4 young black teenagers. Even her own inner conflicts with her sexuality and Japanese heritage. She starts to see the world around her with a different