The Dehumanizing Effect Of Slavery In Beloved, By Toni Morrison

A sense of identity is what makes a person who they are. Without it, one would be nothing but a ghost of who they had the potential to be. Through the process of dehumanization, basic human rights, desires, and needs are taken away from a person, eventually causing their mind to be stripped of everything that made it individual. The human mind can only endure so much of this abuse, and once someone is deprived of these things, they begin to doubt their own humanity and struggle with the trauma at the base of the issue. Thoughts like these are the base of the book, Beloved. The author, Toni Morrison, writes about slavery and the negative effect it had on those who were involved. Morrison also acknowledges the trauma felt by all former slaves

This is demonstrated when we are first introduced to the Sweet Home slaves: “And so they were: Paul D Garner, Paul F Garner, Paul A Garner, Halle Suggs and Sixo, the wild man. All in their twenties, minus women, f*cking cows, dreaming of r*pe, thrashing on pallets'' (Morrison 13). The men at Sweet Home were being dehumanized through the deprivation of their basic human needs. Under these circumstances in which they are being forced through the most horrible physical and psychological experiences, they cannot be expected to act completely civilized. Morrison’s use of harsh words to describe Paul D and his fellow slaves at Sweet Home add to the illusion that they are viewed as dirty animals who aren’t worth nearly as much as white people. With the motif of having sex with cows, Morrison brought to light the horrible ways in which slaves were treated, and at the same time explained that white people truly believed black people to be the inferior race and less than human. The schoolteacher illustrates this when he says to his students, “No, no. That’s not the way. I told you to put [Sethe’s] human characteristics on the left; her animal ones on the right” (Morrison 228). Upon overhearing this, Sethe snaps. With the schoolteacher admitting that they truly view her as animalistic, Sethe desperately wants to run away from Sweet Home. She is determined to ensure her children will

Paul D has constant doubts about whether or not he is a man, and he explains the root of his problem: “Mister, he looked so…free. Better than me. Stronger, tougher” (Morrison 86). Paul D recounts that as he was locked in the bit and walked past the barn, he could see the rooster, Mister, looking at him. He felt so vulnerable at that point in time that he felt that Mister was stronger and tougher than he was. Because of all the psychological torment that he was going through, Paul D felt that he had been degraded to something less than human. So much so that he feels humiliated under the gaze of a rooster. Years later, when Paul D finds out about what Sethe did to her children, he tells her: “You got two feet, Sethe, not four” (Morrison 194). With this language, Morrison intended to bring to mind an image of a four-legged animal, which, in a way, Paul D is comparing Sethe to. By using this expression, Paul D is showing that he finds Sethe’s behavior desperate enough to be thought of as animalistic and reflexive. Because of how she’s been treated her whole life, Sethe has been trained to react fast to protect the few things left in life that deserve her care, love, and protection. So, in the situation of the schoolteacher finding her at 124, Sethe’s animal-like reflexes kick in, and she kills Beloved and attempts to