Responding and Reflecting #2

Something that I have learned from Beloved so far is the fact that slavery took away African Americans humane rights and just degraded them as human. Through the psychoanalytical lens, I can see that both Sethe and Paul D both have troubles of slavery. Both of them saw things in their life that scarred them for life. Both of them were looked inferior and they did not get any respect from their white owners. Due to slavery they lost who they were as people, instead of doing things for themselves as their own individual they had to live under someone who beat them to do things that they wanted. African Americans had to struggle through getting taken away from their family, dealing with getting whipped, seeing people die, walking through forests to get to their freedom.

Toni Morrison contrasts that, when looking at Sethe and Paul D, even thought they have gone through a lot of slavery and a lot of hardships, that they can still find a life afterwards. Kind of like a second chance, and that is what Sethe and Paul D have to do, they get a chance to find themselves because they never got to. Even though slavery was so bad and it took away people's lives/identity, that the African Americans have found a way despite their past to move on and go through life and find their true identity.

This goes with my beliefs of giving people a second chance, slavery held them down and made them lose their identity, but the African Americans got back up and are on a path to find themselves and identity. It is really interesting to see how a negative past can affect a positive future.