The Ancestral Connection to the Sea

 Lawren Williams 

11/9/2022

Final Project Essay

The Ancestral Connection to the Sea

Although we have come a long way from slavery, there are still many hardships that African Americans face because of it in their everyday lives. This is referred to as the afterlife of slavery. “The Black Gothic” is defined as a digestible method of communicating the fears of African Americans created by slavery. More specifically, it takes the fears that are only experienced by African Americans and presents them in a way that is less painful and more relatable. Some responses to “The Black Gothic” are: “The Sea is Haunted, “The Sea is Home,” and “The Sea is Healing.” These terms are used to describe the way that African Americans cope with these fears by finding a comforting prospect amid the transgressions they fell victim to. An important aspect of “The Sea is Haunted, “The Sea is Home,” and “The Sea is Healing” is the ancestral connection that African Americans share. 

The ancestral connection binds each African American to the sea, which can be represented by any body of water. African Americans can connect to their ancestors because of the lessons they learn from the sacrifices those ancestors made in the past. According to the website, “... the deaths signaled a powerful story of resistance as these captives overwhelmed their captors in a strange land, and many took their own lives rather than remain enslaved in the New World. The Igbo Landing gradually took on enormous symbolic importance in local African American folklore” (Momodu). This honorable decision helps us connect to them because it teaches us to maintain strength and resilience no matter how difficult it may be to do so. The Igbo Landing always motivates and inspires the African American community. 

There were many other slaves besides those that participated in the Igbo Landing that perished at sea during the Transatlantic Slave Trade (Miller). According to the Christian religion, death of the body does not mean the death of the soul (Strauss). All the bodies that died at sea unified with the sea, but the souls of those bodies live on and influence the future of African Americans. The sea is not just a large body of water; it is a symbol of the ancestors and can represent haunting, home, and healing. 

Haunting is a way of providing the appropriate consequences for the corresponding actions in the African American community. In the narrative Homegoing, the author includes a character who loses his family after helping build ships which was previously used to transport slaves (Gyasi 104). It is inferred that losing his family was a consequence of helping build the ships because his mother figure, Ma Aku, warns him of this (Gyasi 104). Ma Aku spent most of her life freeing slaves, and as a result, she lived a long life with a small family of her own (Gyasi 121).  This shows how our ancestral connection can punish or reward us for the decisions we make in our community.

 Home is defined as a safe and comforting place or group of people that one can always go to. Our ancestral connection to the sea gives us a home. Homegoing showcases this in its last chapter by having two characters swim in the beach (Gyasi 273). This shows the separation of the family finally coming to an end. No matter how much time passed and how far away the family traveled from their home, they were still able to return to one another. The body of water that they swim in plays a big role in their ability to reunite. It also represents the home that they have with their ancestors. 

The healing aspect of the sea is apparent in Beyonce’s visual album “Lemonade.” Beyonce’s grandmother reads the instructions for making lemonade, and afterward Beyonce says that her grandmother found healing where it did not live (Knowles). The instructions for making lemonade are a metaphor for creating healing out of the pain that was experienced. Our ancestral connection promotes healing even when it seems impossible. 

  “The Sea is Haunted,” “The Sea is Healing,” and “The Sea is Home” are all phrases that are based on our ancestral connection to the sea.  This is a reply to “The Black Gothic” because it puts the effects of slavery into a different perspective. For instance, instead of treating haunting as completely negative, it is a necessary action that can be either positive or negative. In “The Black Gothic,” African Americans are denied a home, but in “The Sea is Home,” it is given. “The Sea is Healing” provides healing from the fears and traumas we face in “The Black Gothic”. The ancestral connection is a part of each African American and influences and affects them every day. 


Works Cited

Gyasi, Yaa. Homegoing. Viking, 2016.

Lemonade. Directed by Beyonce Knowles, Parkwood Entertainment, 2016.

Miller, Joseph. "The Transatlantic Slave Trade and the Middle Passage" Encyclopedia Virginia. Virginia Humanities, (08 Jul. 2022). Web. 16 Nov. 2022

Momodu, Samuel. "Igbo Landing Mass Suicide." The Black Past, 25 Oct. 2016, www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/events-african-american-history/igbo-landing-mass-suicide-1803/.

Strauss, Lehman. "The Consciousness of the Soul After Death." Bible.org, 4 Jun. 2014, bible.org/seriespage/8-consciousness-soul-after-death.

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