While Chesnutt's Uncle Julius stories contain two narratives by two narrators, the lingiuistic difference between the two is incredibly radical. In "The Goophered Grapevine", for instance, the language of the unnamed narrator is very easy to understand, especially as compared to the nearly unintelligible verbiage of Uncle Julius ("Is you de Norv'n gemman w'at's gwine term buy de ole vimya'd?" [4]).
Chesnutt's choice to portray former slaves as incredibly difficult to understand, and juxtaposed against the well-learned speech of a white narrator, is a bit confusing to me given his outlook on race relations after the abolition of slavery. Unless I am misunderstanding, the book's introduction emphasizes Chesnutt's belief that it's crucial blacks receive a good education in order to be seen as equals by whites. Yet in stories written mostly for white readers (p. v), he portrays black characters as having a terrible, nearly unintelligible grasp of English.
Sure, Uncle Julius's speech does highlight the issue of little/no education for former slaves. I found his sections to be so incredibly difficult to understand that I at first tried to skip them and just read the white narrator's narrative — it didn't work, of course, as the narrative arch is made by Julius's account. Reading it made me feel resentful and completely puzzled by Chesnutt's choice to portray his speaker this way.
What do other students think of this?
I don't think that Chesnutt was trying to portray Uncle Julius as an idiot with the language but presenting the dialect of former slaves, who didn't have the luxury of education, as accurately as possible.
ReplyDeleteThe language is also so difficult to read that to me, it makes a case for former slaves to receive more education because it shows just how bad their speech could be.
I also find this topic to be particularly interesting. Personally, I think that Chestnutt was trying to display the dialect of former slaves, and accordingly, contemporary readers may find this lingo difficult to understand. However, I do not think Chestnutt is purposefully construing Uncle Julius as someone who lacks intellect, but rather, as someone whose life has lacked a formal education. The language, which is incredible difficult to decipher at times, made me feel bad for these individuals which bodes well for those advocating for increased education amongst slaves.
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