Unit 5: Perception and Misperception: Melville's Benito Cereno

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Perception and Misperception: Melville’s Benito Cereno primary texts: Benito Cereno by Herman Melville (1855) secondary resources: images of stock black characters: Mammy/Aunt Jemima, Little Black Sambo, Uncle Tom, the coon, etc. o with information from the Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia (http://www.ferris.edu/htmls/news/jimcrow/menu.htm) Herman Melville’s Benito Cereno is the only primary text for this unit because it so effectively opposes itself. Conditioned by his background and expectations, Amasa Delano boards a stranded slave ship on which blacks outnumber whites and sees a beautiful picture of racial harmony. He enjoys seeing the black slave Babo faithfully support and care for his Spanish master, Captain Benito Cereno. Comparing himself to the effete Spanish captain, Delano secretly gloats over his superior authority and American vigor. The truth is that the slaves on the ship have revolted, killed most of the crew, and demanded to be taken back to Africa. What Delano sees is an elaborate show orchestrated by Babo for his benefit—as is revealed by the novella’s bloody ending and appended court documents (based on a real case). As well as showing a dream of racial harmony and a nightmare of racial revolt, Benito Cereno straddles two historical moments: it is set in 1799 during the Haitian Revolution and Spanish Inquisition, but published in the turbulent pre-Civil War period of 1855. Negotiating the novella’s historical context and multiple allegories will be an appropriate challenge for our final unit in “American Dreams and Nightmares.” Instead of focusing on a particular topic (though it touches on many of the tensions we’ve studied), we will read Benito Cereno as a lesson on seeing and not seeing, appearance and reality, what’s on the surface and what lurks below. Key Questions In what ways does Delano read the situation on the Spanish ship correctly? Incorrectly? What impression does the novella give us of Americans? Africans? The Spanish? How should historical context affect our interpretation of the novella? What can we glean if we read the novella as an allegory for the American north and south? What can we glean if we read the novella as an allegory for the relationship between America and Spain? (Or Protestant and Catholic?) Who triumphs at the end of the novella?

Transcript of Unit 5: Perception and Misperception: Melville's Benito Cereno

Page 1: Unit 5: Perception and Misperception: Melville's Benito Cereno

Perception and Misperception: Melville’s Benito Cereno primary texts:

• Benito Cereno by Herman Melville (1855) secondary resources:

• images of stock black characters: Mammy/Aunt Jemima, Little Black Sambo, Uncle Tom, the coon, etc.

o with information from the Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia (http://www.ferris.edu/htmls/news/jimcrow/menu.htm)

Herman Melville’s Benito Cereno is the only primary text for this unit because it so effectively opposes itself. Conditioned by his background and expectations, Amasa Delano boards a stranded slave ship on which blacks outnumber whites and sees a beautiful picture of racial harmony. He enjoys seeing the black slave Babo faithfully support and care for his Spanish master, Captain Benito Cereno. Comparing himself to the effete Spanish captain, Delano secretly gloats over his superior authority and American vigor. The truth is that the slaves on the ship have revolted, killed most of the crew, and demanded to be taken back to Africa. What Delano sees is an elaborate show orchestrated by Babo for his benefit—as is revealed by the novella’s bloody ending and appended court documents (based on a real case). As well as showing a dream of racial harmony and a nightmare of racial revolt, Benito Cereno straddles two historical moments: it is set in 1799 during the Haitian Revolution and Spanish Inquisition, but published in the turbulent pre-Civil War period of 1855. Negotiating the novella’s historical context and multiple allegories will be an appropriate challenge for our final unit in “American Dreams and Nightmares.” Instead of focusing on a particular topic (though it touches on many of the tensions we’ve studied), we will read Benito Cereno as a lesson on seeing and not seeing, appearance and reality, what’s on the surface and what lurks below. Key Questions In what ways does Delano read the situation on the Spanish ship correctly? Incorrectly? What impression does the novella give us of Americans? Africans? The Spanish? How should historical context affect our interpretation of the novella? What can we glean if we read the novella as an allegory for the American north and south? What can we glean if we read the novella as an allegory for the relationship between America and Spain? (Or Protestant and Catholic?) Who triumphs at the end of the novella?

Page 2: Unit 5: Perception and Misperception: Melville's Benito Cereno

Is this novella pro-slavery? Anti-slavery? Something else? How is Benito Cereno gothic? How does reading Benito Cereno help us reflect on perception and misperception in the other narratives of the course (Franklin, Petry, Crèvecoeur, Du Bois, Rowlandson, Whitman, Farrar, and Foster)? Use of Secondary Resources Introducing students to images of Negro “types” from the 19th and 20th centuries will support our discussion of how our assumptions and biases affect our perception. Here are some examples: