Slavery has always been a difficult topic for conversation. African Americans have had a difficult history that cannot be replicated. The reality of slavery in the African community has always been misrepresented in Western culture. For decades, African Americans have been depicted negatively in popular media and African American men have been stereotyped as violent and impulsive predators. Negative representations of African Americans have led to stereotypes about African American people throughout time. Public misrepresentation on black agency has shaped the perspectives of slavery.
Slavery is an ominous chapter in world history. Over the years Hollywood has been reluctant when it comes to filling in the details. The concept of slavery was attempted by Steven Spielberg, in his film Amistad, released in 1997. While it does a decent job of bringing some part of the Transatlantic slave trade to the general public, it has alterations, omissions, and even errors that make it an unreliable source for historical understanding.
The movie begins with Sengbe, a slave, leading the others being transported in a ship called Amistad in revolt against their captors, Spanish conquistadors. All of these Africans were kidnapped from their homeland and were supposed to be sold as slaves. In fear, they killed all the passengers except for two crew members who had promised to navigate the ship back to Africa. However, they led the ship to the US coast; which led them to be caught by US navals.
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A widely-publicized court case became the center of attention. The Amistad legal battle went to the US Supreme Court given its national and international value, but in 1841 it was ruled that the Africans were illegally transported and kidnapped and therefore cannot be called slaves but as individuals who are fighting their rights for freedom against oppressors and were ordered to be freed.
It is fair to say that, even with possible good intentions behind the production of the film, Spielberg was not successful in portraying the truth behind the complexity of the time period. In the film, Baldwin is presented as a young property lawyer who has no particular interest in the Africans beyond representing them in a winnable legal case. In reality Roger Sherman Baldwin was an abolitionist and one of the best lawyers in the 19th century.
Not necessarily sure why Spielberg, would undermine his position. Throughout the movie, he includes the abolitionist Quakers, however, they seem not to have any importance, and he does not demonstrate the role they play during this time period. At first I believed that Spielberg wanted to show that the Africans won the court case on their own legal merits and not as part of some abolitionist cause. After finishing the film, that did not seem to be the case.
Critics such as Iyunolo Osagie point out that the movie starts with this muscular built dark skinned man, sitting in the dark, mumbling a foreign language to westerns, leading a fight against crew members. This scene simply does not make sense. How can a group immediately take action in a revolt against a crew with advanced weapons? The slaves could have not ran for the guns and successfully overtaken the ship without prior planning. Because they were denied agency, they were depicted as animal propensities.
Spielberg may have chose not to show the history prior to the slaves being on the ship to demonstrate the lack of knowledge westerners have on a foreign continent such as africa. He makes Africans seem barbaric, uncivilized and distinct from the Americans because that is how we have been taught to view them as. Showing them as anything else would go against what we have been taught during that time period.
Also, it was filmed as a Hollywood film, and the main objective behind a film was to show what would sell and make a lot of money. One crucial point Lemisch tackles in her critique, is that how maybe the opening scene where Singbe is talking and there are no monologues; maybe that is the scene where he is talking about how they are going to take over the ship.
While Spielberg demonstrates the barbaric nature of the slaves, Roots examines the barbarous conditions of African slaves. The series Roots, produced by the History channel has had a dramatic impact upon the perception of enslavement and the representation of slavery. What is significant about Roots is that the audience was shown the brutality of enslavement, and the lack of representation for the enslaved.
Roots also depicted the strength which enabled the resistance to oppression. Roots focused on the personal histories of individual slaves and their offspring. The film series was able to uncover the overwhelming truth and impact of slavery. The series contains various powerful scenes of capture, enslavement, the Middle Passage and the raping of enslaved women. These scenes leave a dramatic effect on the audience.
Unlike Roots, Amistad focuses primarily on white intervention and the lack of black agency and intelligence. In the beginning of the film, the slaves arise to what appears to be a spontaneous uprising without previous thought. The slaves are portrayed as bystanders throughout the film, while they wait “hopelessly” for the white men to determine their fate. This is consistent with the savior complex americans tend to portray when faced with issues regarding race.
According to Osagie, Sengbe was a rhetorician. He wrote letters presenting his case, and was able to advocate his case in court. Also, the role of black abolitionists were not represented in the film and distorts the role African Americans played in advancing the cause for black emancipation (Osagie 121).
A different perspective on agency is portrayed in Manu Herbstein’s book Ama, a story of the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Ama is a strong, persistent character, with an abundant amount of courage and inner strength when it comes to facing violence. One can admire her idealism, hope and vibrant personality. From the tone of the author, the amount of research put into the book is evident. Herbstein’s writing highlights issues relating to cultural differences, while still recognizing the culture of the slaves, as well as acknowledging their voices.
Something unique that Herbstrin uses in this book, that is not portrayed in Amistad is the use of rape to limit black agency. The slave masters would rape female slaves to demonstrate dominance, control, and power over the slaves. This demonstrated how powerless the male slaves were, and their inability to protect the female slaves. Although the Tran-Atlantic slave trade is over, this book consists of themes that are still relevant today.
It is important to remember that viewers approach the concept of slavery from numerous perspectives. There are those who understand or try and understand the complexity behind racial history, and there are those who are ignorant to such history. When authors or producers lack representation of black agency within their films and literature, it forms an image that individuals of color lack intelligence and decreases their value and role in society. Denying agency, allows the oppressor to keep the oppressed, oppressed.
By being aware of films and literature such as “Roots” and “Ama,” people might hopefully one day begin to gain a greater appreciation for how slavery has influenced our lives. Perhaps, with each new movie or piece of literature, we can appreciate the agency slaves had during times such as the transatlantic slave trade and not be ignorant to history.
