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Abina And The Important Men Essay

1379 Words6 Pages

Abina and the Important Men, written by Trevor R. Getz and illustrated by Liz Clarke, is an adaptation of Abina, a slave’s story and her trial for justice. Abina believes she was sold into slavery despite it being illegal in the British Colonies. The crisis, I believe, is that she struggles to prove her slavery past in court, making it difficult to receive any compensation for her forced labor. The book as, at first, a graphic novel with pictures incorporated with the dialogue. The second part is the actual transcript between Abina and everyone else in the court. I noted a few differences in the experience between reading the primary and secondary document. I believe Abina’s crisis is her inability to express in the court's vernacular that she was wrongfully enslaved, and I believe the differences between the primary and secondary documents change the course of the crisis. Getz and Clarke created this graphic novel to give a voice to Abina because history is traditionally told by “the winners”. In fact, in the end of the novel, the narrator states that though little can actually be found on Abina, “much of …show more content…

There was much debate in the dialogue over the meaning of the beads. The beads culturally differentiated a woman as a married woman. When Abina has her beads broken to her it meant she was no longer a wife. She believed he would come back for his wife, but he never does. Right after, she meets Eddoo who provides her with cloth and informs her she is to marry Tando. Abina’s lawyer explains that it is tradition that the cloth symbolizes belonging, but Eddoo’s lawyer asserts that it does not guarantee a slave and maser relationship. Merton was unaccustomed to these cultural norms for the African colonies, and all though Abina tried to explain, Eddoo’s lawyer spoke more eloquently and could misconstrue the symbolic meanings

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