Slave Breeding

            An article on an upcoming Crosstown Arts event recently caught my attention. While Southern author Margaret Winkle visiting Memphis to discuss her debut novel Wash seemed intriguing, it was the novel’s central theme that I immediately wanted to learn more about—slave breeding and owning a slave (or slaves) solely for that purpose. This controversial subject was briefly mentioned in Johnson’s Soul by Soul as he tended to discuss more about the slave market itself than slaveholders breeding male and female slaves to reproduce slave children. This book about an American Revolution veteran who starts breeding his slave Wash to save his Tennessee plantation from financial ruin isn’t the only controversial matter however—one book review statement saying, “the basic notion of a white Southern woman from a privileged background taking on the voice of an antebellum male slave put out to stud” is as well (Tarkington). The author explains that her reasons for writing a book like this grew from the desire to investigate the slave breeding relationship in the early nineteenth century after hearing reports that her own ancestors may have bred slaves.

            The fact that slaves were reproduced on purpose to increase the assets and wealth of the slave masters baffles me. To a certain extent, I understand that slave owners raped their slaves and forced them to do unthinkable things. But whatever their inexcusable reason why, I never thought in terms of a potential pregnancy as the sole purpose. As slave breeding is studied further though, whether it be through scholarly research or a fictitious novel, more theories emerge about the mind of the white master, as can be seen in Johnson’s Soul by Soul. In spending free time in the future, I look forward to reading Wrinkle’s book and seeing how she portrays one of the worst degrees of chattel slavery. But until then, I encourage anyone who’s free to check out the Wash reading by local actress Jazmin Miller and following discussion moderated by University of Memphis director of African and African American Studies Ladrica Menson-Furr at 430 North Cleveland Street on October 15^th from 6:00pm to 8:00pm.

http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2013/oct/11/authors-to-appear-in-memphis-with-books-about/

http://www.chapter16.org/content/wash-her-debut-novel-margaret-wrinkle-explores-horrors-slave-breeding-antebellum-tennessee