The Unfoldment of the Allmuseri in Middle Passage
Often times when we here of something unfolding, it has to do with the clarification or unfurling of new information regarding an investigation or legal proceeding. The unfoldment tends to have a substantial effect upon the exposure of veiled truths. The exposure of these truths creates new paths of thought and realization. The "unfoldment" of the Allmuseri in Middle Passage, serves as a catalyst in the alteration of Rutherford Calhoun's outlook on life, and ultimately his own self-discovery.Rutherford Calhoun, a newly freed slave and disorderly rogue, is desperate to escape the confounds of his own life which consisted of unscrupulous bill collectors and a looming marriage to a proper speaking, well mannered schoolteacher. He jumps aboard what he believes to be a river boat, but in truth is a slave ship en route to collect members of a legendary African tribe, the Allmuseri. Calhoun describes the Allmuseri as:"...popular servants. They brought twice the price of a Bantu or Kru. According to legend, Allmuseri elders took twig brooms with them everywhere, sweeping the ground so as not to inadvertently step on creatures too small to see. Eating no meat, they were easy to feed. Disliking property, they were simple to clothe. A
For example, when asked what Calhoun and his brother Jackson wanted as compensation for them being held as slaves by their master, Chandler, Calhoun replied, "there's a lot I need" (117). Throughout his life, Calhoun detested his father for abandoning him and his brother Jackson after their mother's death, and leaving them at the discretion of their master. Often times, an unfoldment must first occur before deliverance can be issued. In Middle Passage, it was the unfoldment of the Allmuseri which brought Calhoun deliverance from ignorance, shame, selfishness, and insecurity. " However, it is later discovered that Calhoun's father escaped slavery to only be swept up by the hands of death. The unfoldment challenges Calhoun to accept his dualism as an American and as an African. As a black man in America, and now as an American among Africans, Calhoun has met trouble identifying with either group, instead consuming a "middle-ness". He was (to me) the possible-me that lived my life's alternate options, the me I fled. They fell sick, it was said, if they wronged anyone" (78). Calhoun pleads:"I have searched the faces of black men on Illinois farms and streets for fifteen years, hoping to identify this man named Riley Calhoun, primarily to give him a piece of my mind. While on board the Republic, Calhoun being a product of both African and American culture, befriends one of the slaves, Ngonyama. He carried with him an abhorrence toward his brother and father, and later transferred that contempt of collectiveness toward Isadora in his refusal to marry her.
Common topics in this essay:
Orleans Africa,
Riley Calhoun,
Ngonyama Ngonyama,
Rutherford Calhoun,
Middle Passage,
Kru According,
Falcon Africans,
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African Throughout,
,
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riley calhoun,
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discovered calhoun's father,
calhoun's father,
american colored,
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Acceptance Essays
