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In the poem November cotton flower some elements of the superstition of the African American culture are shown. Voudooism is a system of belief inherited from a mixture from the African religion, combined with American traditions and some of the European mystic folklore.
In the poem November cotton flower some elements of the superstition of the African American culture are shown. Voudooism is a system of belief inherited from a mixture from the African religion, combined with American traditions and some of the European mystic folklore.
In the poem November cotton flower some elements of the superstition of the African American culture are shown. Voudooism is a system of belief inherited from a mixture from the African religion, combined with American traditions and some of the European mystic folklore.
NOVEMBER COTTON FLOWER (JEAN TOMER) INTERPRETATION
VOUDOOISM; SUPERSTITION OF THE NEW ORLEANS BLACK FOLKLORE IN THE POEM. In the poem November cotton flower some elements of the superstition of the African American culture are showed. African-American superstitions were a system of belief inherited from a mixture from the African religion, combined with American traditions and some of the European mystic folklore 1 . As the text may have several interpretations regarding the social aspects of the life of black people in that time, but from my point of view there is content that might regard superstition in the form of voudooism; this from a relation among three elements found in Voodooism: pillows, feathers and leaves; elements that are not directly stated but that will be shown on following. The first one to be mention is pillow; the most known kind of the voodooist practice may be called pillow magic: which is the supposed art of causing wasting sicknesses or even death by putting certain objects into the pillow of the bed in which the hated person sleeps 2 this with relation of the mention of the text to cotton a material by which pillows had already been produced for several decades (pillowseasy to obtain around 1840 3 ) and in second place with relation to one of the practices of pillow magic which is linked with our second element feathers birds: Another practice of pillow witchcraft consists in tearing a living bird asunder and putting portions of the wings into the pillow 4 . So in order to achieve this malleolus objective it was necessary to kill an innocent bird thus, it is mentioned in the text: dead birds were found. The following element that I found in the text that is related with voodooist practices is the presence of autumn and a rake. Autumn is the season in which leaves drop from their trees and we can easily find them on the floor and a rake is a tool with which we gather them; thus facilitating our next voodooist practice: crumbling dry leaves with the fingers and scattering the fragments before a residence, are also forms of a maleficent conjuring which sometimes cause serious annoyance 5 . Concluding, the elements previously presented might refer to voodooist practices that used to take place in New Orleans in the late 1800. This elements can be found in those practices as mentioned before and even though the poem may be o may be not a
1 The top 20 bsuperstitions black people live by. New One stuff. August 2010 taken from: [ June 22 2014 ] http://newsone.com/631825/20-black-superstitions/ 2 Lafcadio, Hearn. New Orleans from An American miscellany vol. II,(1924) taken from: [ June 22 2014 ] http://www.sacred-texts.com/afr/hearn/nos.htm 3 http://www.madehow.com/Volume-6/Pillow.html 4 Lafcadio. ibid. 5 Op. Cit. reference to them undoubted this elements were part of the African-American folklore and system of beliefs.