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The Farming Of Bones Sparknotes

893 Words4 Pages

Matthew Nicol
ENG-3299
Prof. Higgins
4/18/2023
Final Exam Part II

In Edwidge Danticat's novel, The Farming of Bones (1998), Danticat details the events surrounding the 1937 Parsley Massacre in the Dominican Republic. The Parsley Massacre was a mass killing of Haitians living in the Dominican Republic's northwestern frontier and certain parts of the Cibao region in October of 1937. Troops in the Dominican Army from different areas of the country carried out the massacre on the orders of Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo. The novel is shown through the eyes of Amabelle Desir, a Haitian-Dominican girl who is both a victim and a witness to the many tragic events that occurred during this time. Through Amabelle, Danticat uses the ideas of …show more content…

This is even furthered when Pico smashes the cups and saucers Senora Valencia used for coffee and arrives later with soldiers to gather up and deport any Haitians they can find, even running over one with their truck in the process. This causes a change in Amabelle's national identity as she knows that the Dominican Republic does not respect nor want people like her in their country. Another instance of symbolism that Danticat uses in chapter 27 is parsley. Parsley is used in the story as a test of national identity and the signifier of who was Haitian and who was not based on how those tested pronounced the herb. Amabelle's national identity is firmly cemented with Haitians as a result of being beaten by an angry mob in a violent frenzy due to eating the herb and pronouncing it without "the thrill of the r and the precision of the j." After escaping and the deaths of Wilmer and Odette, a metaphor Danticat uses to showcase the spirit as well as the personal identity of the survivors of the massacre, including Amabelle, is the following: "I'm one of those trees whose roots reach the bottom of the earth. They can cut down the branches, but they'll never uproot the tree. The roots are too strong, and there are too many" (Danticat 210). This quote was used by General Toussaint Louverture, a Haitian General in the Haitian Revolution, to rally against their French

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