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Roots

180 statements
34 feature instances
12 referencing feature instances

Roots	type	TVTItem
Roots	label	Roots
Roots	page	Roots
Roots	comment	Roots: The Saga of an American Family is a Pulitzer Prize-winning historical novel written by Alex Haley and published in 1976. It describes, with varying degrees of accuracy, the tragedies and triumphs of Haley's known direct ancestors, highlighting each one of them in turn within the narrative.It starts with the birth of Kunta Kinte, a typical boy from the village of Juffure in the Gambia, who, after manhood training, grew up to become a reasonably successful farmer and trader. Around age 17, after his night watch duties, he wandered into the nearby forest to chop some wood to make a drum for one of his brothers. There, he was attacked and captured by four slave traders who hauled him away.From there, it follows Kunta's life for many years, being owned first by the cruel John Waller, who renamed Kunta to Toby (though Kunta would never recognize the name as his), then sold to John's brother the kinder (but still staunch slaver) William Waller, and from there to his marriage to the house cook Bell and the birth of his daughter Kizzy. The narrative then flows to follow both Kunta and Kizzy, taking special care to note that Kunta would tell Kizzy stories about his life in Africa whenever the opportunity arose, and taught her some words in his native Mandinka language. The story follows them both until Kizzy is sold away from her parents to a plantation in another state, after which the narrative then follows her alone until the birth of her own child, George, who was born as a result of frequent raping by her new master Tom Lea.The book gradually shifts away from Kizzy's life as a slave cook to a high focus on George, but not before noting that she took special care to pass all the stories and Mandinka words she learned from her father to her son, so that he might know who his proud African grandfather was.As George grew he became the right-hand slave to the master, who was an avid gamecock farmer and fighter. George's natural skill at raising and training gamecocks earned him the nickname "Chicken George," a tag he wore with pride for the rest of his days. While detailing Chicken George's life, the book notes that he ultimately had eight children through his wife Matilda. After each birth, he rounded up his entire extended family and told them all the stories and Mandinka words he had learned from Kizzy through their great-grandfather, the African Kunta Kinte.One of Chicken George's boys, Tom, was a little different than the rest of the children. He was quiet, reserved, and thoughtful, very much unlike his boisterous and gregarious father or his sullen and cranky brothers. He turned out to have a natural talent for blacksmithing, and after gaining freedom from the end of the Civil War and the whole family moving to Tennessee, he became a very successful traveling smith. He ultimately had seven children of his own, and like his father before him, at each birth he brought in the entire extended family to retell all the stories and Mandinka words of their African great-great grandfather Kunta Kinte.Tom's youngest daughter, Cynthia, grew up as thoughtful and intelligent as her father, and married a man named Will Palmer, who became a successful lumber yard owner — the first black man to run such a large business in Tennessee. They had one daughter, Bertha. Cynthia made it a point to stay in touch with her extended family and periodically gather them to her home, where she continued the family tradition of telling everybody, including Bertha, the family legend of their African ancestor and all his wonderful stories and strange Mandinka words.Bertha went to college, where she met and married a struggling young man named Simon Haley. They had three sons before Bertha's death at a young age.The eldest of their sons, Alex, grew especially close to his grandmother Cynthia, and loved sitting on her porch and listening to all the old stories Cynthia and her kin would tell about their African ancestor: the man who had been stolen away by four men while chopping wood to make a drum for his brother, and had gone by boat to a place called "Naplis" where he was sold to a man named John Waller, who named him Toby, but he would only answer to his birth name of Kinte. And how this Kinte tried four times to escape, but was recaptured and got his foot cut off, and then was sold to John Waller's brother William, and that on William Waller's plantation he married the cook Bell and they had a daughter named Kizzy whom he taught his history and many Mandinka words, but was sold away and then had a son Chicken George who was a famous gamecock trainer and fighter, and then Chicken George had a son, Tom the Blacksmith, who had Cynthia.The book concludes with Alex Haley describing the research he did to verify independently as much of his family's story as he could, claiming that through written records and oral history from the region he identified as the likeliest place of Kinte's birth he was able to piece together enough of the story to know the tales had to be at least mostly true — that a Mandinka named Kunta Kinte had disappeared without a trace, that a slave ship called the Lord Ligonier had traveled from that land to Annapolis, Maryland at the time Kunta would have been around 17, and that a John Waller had sold land and a slave named Toby to his brother William. He also found a census form with Tom Murray, blacksmith, on it — Cynthia's father — from the town in Tennessee where Chicken George was said to have taken the entire family after Emancipation.Haley then wrote the book, filling in from his imagination all the parts that couldn't be verified (primarily conversation and some filler events), but noting that, to the best of his knowledge and study, the lineage information was accurate. His stated goal was for the book to be a kind of analogue for all American blacks who had lost their family histories through the brutality and dehumanization of slavery. He knew he was incredibly lucky that any shred of his African heritage had survived the systemic suppression of the Slave Codes and of families being torn apart by sale, and that most black Americans have no way to tell such a story.The novel got two miniseries adaptations, one in 1977 and one in 2016.
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Roots / int_1b73fada	type	The Dandy
Roots / int_1b73fada	comment	The Dandy: Chicken George, with his trademark green scarf and black bowler decorated with a red rooster feather. He spends almost every penny he makes at cockfights on fancy clothes for himself and his family until, middle aged, he realizes he could buy freedom instead.
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Roots / int_1c5002bc	type	The Stoic
Roots / int_1c5002bc	comment	The Stoic: Kunta tries to be this whenever he is enduring some punishment. It seldom succeeds, but not from a lack of effort or will. The punishments are just so brutal that nobody could possibly endure them without screaming or tears.
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Roots / int_1effdd6b	type	White Man's Burden
Roots / int_1effdd6b	comment	White Man's Burden: The slave masters love to cover themselves with this to justify maintaining their brutal and dehumanizing ways. They complain endlessly to one another about the barely-endurable tribulations of taking these poor black savages and making civilized humans of them, teaching them proper Christianity instead of their heathen ways, replacing their natural laziness with industry, offering harsh punishment only as a paternalistic form of loving correction, and that all this is done ultimately for the slaves' benefit. The slaves, naturally and correctly, believe exactly none of it.
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Roots / int_2022e66d	type	Invasion of the Baby Snatchers
Roots / int_2022e66d	comment	Invasion of the Baby Snatchers: Time and again, the fear of family members being taken away, never to be seen again, is the ultimate horror. Kunta was stolen from his family, and then his own daughter Kizzy was sold away from him. Kizzy's grandchildren and all their families were sold away from her, her son was forcibly shipped off to England, and she never saw any of them ever again before her death. Chicken George almost suffered this fate during his stint in England — his family was sold away from him, but on his return he managed to get Tom Lea drunk enough to spill the beans as to their current whereabouts, and found the freedom papers Lea had written out for him before getting shipped off.
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Roots / int_21d70919	type	Crapsack World
Roots / int_21d70919	comment	Crapsack World: The entire existence of a slave.
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Roots / int_423f5a19	type	Killed Offscreen
Roots / int_423f5a19	comment	Killed Offscreen: Kunta and Bell, since Kizzy isn't around to find out how they ultimately died. Kizzy herself, since Chicken George's whole family, except for his mother, is sold away by Tom Lea, and she dies sometime while he's in England working off Lea's debt.
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Roots / int_469e3e2f	type	In-Universe
Roots / int_469e3e2f	comment	Defied In-Universe. While the book is positively dripping with the word, including black people both slave and free referring to each other as such, Kunta realizes that it's a white-man's pejorative slang, so he avoids using it whenever possible.
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Roots / int_6bda9a30	type	Meaningful Name
Roots / int_6bda9a30	comment	Meaningful Name: Kizzy. In Mandinka, the name (properly "Kiese") means "to stay put." Kunta used it as a kind of incantation to ensure she would never be sold away from her family. The trope is subverted.
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Roots / int_6cdc784f	type	You No Take Candle
Roots / int_6cdc784f	comment	You No Take Candle: Kunta takes a very long time to learn to speak English. Until he has been a slave for over 20 years, his speech is almost entirely broken.
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Roots / int_7815ba15	type	N-Word Privileges
Roots / int_7815ba15	comment	N-Word Privileges: Defied In-Universe. While the book is positively dripping with the word, including black people both slave and free referring to each other as such, Kunta realizes that it's a white-man's pejorative slang, so he avoids using it whenever possible. Played straight in the macro sense. The author of the book was of course black, and used it wherever the narrative demanded for period authenticity without it being exceptionally jarring. The audiobook version is read by Avery Brooks. There is no way in hell that a white person could have narrated the book without it being beyond cringeworthy.
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Roots / int_7febc23b	type	Establishing Character Moment
Roots / int_7febc23b	comment	Establishing Character Moment: The first time the reader meets Master Tom Lea, he's drunk out of his mind and rapes his new slave, Kizzy (who is only 16).
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Roots / int_863fa679	type	What Happened to the Mouse?
Roots / int_863fa679	comment	What Happened to the Mouse?: After Kizzy is sold away, we never hear from Kunta or Bell again. Justified in that Kizzy never saw her parents again after being sold, and would have no more stories to tell of them.
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Roots / int_95428daa	type	Rite of Passage
Roots / int_95428daa	comment	Rite of Passage: The first chapters in the book go into great detail the various rites of passage that the male villagers of Juffure could expect, and each one is treated with a ceremony of sorts to let them know they have moved to the next level. As Kunta ages, he goes from naked (infant and toddler), to clothed (young child), to school and tending goat herds (older child), and from there to "manhood training" — essentially military training and survivalist camp with a circumcision finisher — after which he is accorded full status as an equal among other grown men. The other rites are not shown, as Kunta is stolen away before going through whatever rite would have made him a village elder.
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Roots / int_978379ad	type	Token Enemy Minority
Roots / int_978379ad	comment	Token Enemy Minority: George Johnson, the only white man who is a genuine friend to Haley's ancestors.
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Roots / int_97aaa7f3	type	In the Blood
Roots / int_97aaa7f3	comment	In the Blood: It's implied that Chicken George's tendency to philander and drink, and his unusually strong aptitude for raising and fighting gamecocks, comes from him being the son of Tom Lea. Tom the Blacksmith is also naturally skilled at his chosen profession. Alex Haley learns during his research that the Kinte clan of antiquity were known for being good blacksmiths in Old Mali and Mauritania.
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Roots / int_a1841170	type	Generational Saga
Roots / int_a1841170	comment	Generational Saga: This whole book is an extended example, going through seven generations, starting in Africa and moving through slavery in America.
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Roots / int_ab2df806	type	Red Baron
Roots / int_ab2df806	comment	Red Baron: George Lea, son of Kizzy and slave of Tom Lea, is such a skilled gamecock trainer and fighter that he eventually earns the nickname "Chicken George." He wears it like a crown his whole life.
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Roots / int_ab802f4b	type	Work Off the Debt
Roots / int_ab802f4b	comment	Work Off the Debt: In one of the most horrible fashions imaginable. Tom Lea loses both his entire estate and Chicken George's life savings in a cockfighting wager with an English nobleman. Rather than give up his plantation to repay the remaining debt, he doesn't do anything himself, but rather sends Chicken George to England for five years to work as a gamecock trainer. He promises to repay Chicken George's loss, both financial and familial, by granting him his freedom on return. Instead, he sells off Chicken George's entire family and conveniently forgets about the offer of freedom.
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Roots / int_b1346878	type	Fate Worse than Death
Roots / int_b1346878	comment	Fate Worse than Death: Kunta considered slavery as this, and was willing to join his ancestors who had already met Allah rather than succumb, but found himself unable to die. He went into every escape attempt believing that if he failed, he'd be killed, and he was just fine with that. But he never was killed, only recaptured and eventually maimed.
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Roots / int_b2e94341	type	Based on a Great Big Lie
Roots / int_b2e94341	comment	Based on a Great Big Lie: Not intentionally, but much of the work is admittedly a product of the author's imagination, and some of the independent documentation of the family history was not as rigorous as it should have been. It's possible that he has the wrong slave ship, and it's almost certain that the oral historian ("griot") he listened to in Africa was telling Haley a story that he heard, in a roundabout way, from Haley telling other people, hoping to find someone who knew it. The story probably got to the griot during Haley's search, who then told the tale back to Haley, who considered it proof of independent verification.
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Roots / int_b4c406a6	type	Death by Despair
Roots / int_b4c406a6	comment	Death by Despair: Chicken George. The brash, boisterous, gregarious man becomes sullen and withdrawn after his beloved Matilda dies of a heart attack, and he follows her to the grave soon after. It's implied that he let himself be burned alive in the fireplace.
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Roots / int_babc974	type	Sadistic Choice
Roots / int_babc974	comment	Sadistic Choice: Kunta is told he has to lose a body part after his fourth escape attempt. The master makes him choose between his foot, or his penis. He chooses the foot because without a penis, he can't father children.
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Roots / int_bb7ae292	type	Child by Rape
Roots / int_bb7ae292	comment	It's implied that Chicken George's tendency to philander and drink, and his unusually strong aptitude for raising and fighting gamecocks, comes from him being the son of Tom Lea.
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Roots / int_c3c18143	type	Hope Spot
Roots / int_c3c18143	comment	Hope Spot: By the bushel, but this is the South while slavery was in full swing. Every time it looks like Kunta or one of his descendants is about to get free, or at least get something good in life, reality bites them hard. Things only start turning around for the family after Emancipation.
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Roots / int_c868a42a	type	Freudian Excuse
Roots / int_c868a42a	comment	Freudian Excuse: Tom Lea tries to justify his ways to Chicken George by explaining that he grew up dirt poor, that he only has what wealth he does because he has worked so much harder than anyone he knows, including all his slaves, and that his worthless relatives all come begging for money and favors, then sneer at him behind his back. Chicken George feels kind of sad for Lea that his family is terrible, but isn't really convinced that Lea got everything he has by being such a hard worker.
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Roots / int_ca967579	type	Torture Cellar
Roots / int_ca967579	comment	Torture Cellar: The slave cargo hold of the Lord Ligonier. An unbelievable dungeon of filth, disease, and beatings. More than a third of the slaves died during the 80-90 day voyage. Justified in that those were very typical conditions for slave ships in the Middle Passage.
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Roots / int_d0f0a80d	type	One-Word Title
Roots / int_d0f0a80d	comment	One-Word Title: Named for its subject, the family line of its author.
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Roots / int_d66cd0e6	type	Training from Hell
Roots / int_d66cd0e6	comment	Training from Hell: The Mandinka "manhood training" is considered this by boys who have not experienced it, and to some extent by boys going through it. That said, the boys who are going through it tend to harden and adapt fairly quickly, and learn to love the instructor and tough lessons by the end of it. At least until the circumcision, anyway.
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Roots / int_da1c8191	type	Writers Cannot Do Math
Roots / int_da1c8191	comment	Writers Cannot Do Math: Kizzy's date of birth is explicitly stated to be September 12, 1790. She is around 16 when her son Chicken George is born, placing his birth around 1806. However, less than a year after Emancipation, which took place in 1865, Chicken George is stated to be 67 when he should only be 59.
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Roots / int_dda99fa8	type	Despair Event Horizon
Roots / int_dda99fa8	comment	Despair Event Horizon: After Kizzy is sold, Kunta desperately tries to invoke the African traditions that would ensure she would find her way back home — then realizes that he's deluding himself and his daughter is gone forever. He flies into a silent rage, and destroys his counting gourd, the last bit of African tradition he had managed to hold on to.
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Roots / int_e07d3d72	type	Uncle Tomfoolery
Roots / int_e07d3d72	comment	Uncle Tomfoolery: Discussed and exploited. Chicken George and his son Tom both mention that it's one of the ways that black slaves can stay out of trouble — by appearing more foolish and silly than they actually are, they can mitigate a white man's wrath.
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Roots / int_e11b003d	type	Translation Convention
Roots / int_e11b003d	comment	Translation Convention: Nearly all dialogue between Africans while in Africa or aboard the Lord Ligonier. The occasional Mandinka word is added for flavor, such as toubob ("white person"), which is used in its native form nearly without exception.
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Roots / int_e12670cd	type	Freudian Threat
Roots / int_e12670cd	comment	Freudian Threat: Kunta Kinte—after being caught attempting to escape from slavery for a fourth time— given a Sadistic Choice by his master: have his foot chopped off, or be castrated. He chooses the foot (as being castrated would mean he'd be unable to father children) and the master has half of his right foot removed.
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Roots	hasFeature	The Butler Did It / int_594b85e4
Roots	hasFeature	The Red Stapler / int_594b85e4

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