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Huck, Jim, and American Racial Discourse Author(S): DAVID L Huck, Jim, and American Racial Discourse Author(s): DAVID L. SMITH Source: Mark Twain Journal, Vol. 22, No. 2, Black Writers on "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" One Hundred Years Later (FALL, 1984), pp. 4-12 Published by: Alan Gribben Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41641246 . Accessed: 06/06/2013 06:26 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Alan Gribben is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Mark Twain Journal. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 67.67.42.11 on Thu, 6 Jun 2013 06:26:26 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions DAVID L. SMITH Huck, Jim, and American Racial Discourse They[blacks] are atleast as brave,and more adventure- the specificform of racial discourseto whichthe some[compared to whites].But this may perhaps pro- novel responds. Furthermore,Huckleberry Finn ceed froma wantof foře-thought, which prevents their offersmuch more than the typical liberal defenses of a tillit be present- aremore ardent seeing danger They "human dignity"and protestsagainst aftertheir female: but love seems with them to be morean cruelty. itcontains some such itis more eagerdesire, than a tenderdelicate mixture ofsentiment Though elements, and sensation.Their griefs are transient. Those number- fundamentallya critiqueof those sociallyconsti- lessafflictions, which render it doubtful whether heaven tutedfictions- most notably romanticism, religion, has givenlife to us inmercy or in wrath, are less felt, and and the concept of "the Negro"- which serve to soonerforgotten with them. In general,their existence justifyand todisguise selfish, cruel, and exploitative appearsto participate more of sensation than reflection. behavior. To thismust be ascribed theirdisposition tosleep when WhenI of"racial discourse," I mean more abstractedfrom their and speak diversions, unemployedinlabor. than attitudesabout "race" or conventions of - ThomasJefferson, Notes on theState of simply Virginia about"race." Most I (187-88) talking importantly,mean that "race"itself is a discursiveformation, which delimits any Euro-Americanintellectual of the social relationson the basis of alleged physical nineteenthcentury could have writtenthe differences.4"Race" is a strategyfor relegating a Almostpreceding words. The notionof Negro in- segmentof the populationto a permanentinferior ferioritywas so deeplypervasive among those heirs status.It functions by insistingthat each "race"has of"The Enlightment"that the categoriesand even specific,definitive, inherent behavioral tendencies thevocabulary of Negro inferiority were formalized and capacities, which distinguishit fromother intoa tedious,unmodulated litany. This uniformity "races."Though scientifically specious, "race" has increasedrather than diminished during the course been powerfullyeffective as an ideologyand as a of the century.As Leon Litwackand othershave formof social definition,which serves the interests shown,even theAbolitionists, who actively opposed ofEuro-American hegemony. In America,race has slavery,frequently regarded blacks as inherently been deployedagainst numerous groups, includ- inferior.This helps to explain the widespread ing NativeAmericans, Jews, Asians, and even- for popularityof colonizationschemes among Aboli- briefperiods - an assortmentof European immi- tionistsand otherliberals.1 As forJefferson, itis not grants. surprisingthat he held such ideas, but it is For obvious reasons, however, the primary impressivethat he formulatedso clearlyat theend emphasis historicallyhas been on defining"the of theeighteenth century what would become the Negro"as a deviantfrom Euro- American norms. dominantview of the Negro in the nineteenth "Race" in America means whitesupremacy and century. In manyways, this Father of American black inferiority5;and "the Negro," a socially Democracy- and quite possibly of fìve mulatto constitutedfiction, is a generalized,one-dimension- children- was a man ofhis timeand ahead ofhis al surrogate for the historicalreality of Afro- time.2 Americanpeople. It is thisreified fiction which In Julyof 1876, exactlyone centuryafter the Twainattacks in HuckleberryFinn. American Declaration of Independence, Mark Twainadopts a strategyof subversion in his attack Twain began writingAdventures of Huckleberry on race. That is, he focuses on a number of Finn,a novelwhich illustrates trenchantly the social commonplacesassociated with"the Negro,"and limitationswhich American "civilization" imposes then he systematicallydramatizes their inade- on individualfreedom. The booktakes special note quacy. He uses theterm "nigger," and he showsJim ofways in whichracism impinges upon the lives of engagingin superstitiousbehavior. Yet he portrays Afro-Americans,even whenthey are legally"free." Jimas a compassionate,. shrewd, thoughtful, self- Itis thereforeironic that Huckleberry Finn has often sacrificingand even wise man. Indeed, his been attackedand even censoredas a racistwork. I portrayalof Jim contradicts every claim presented would argue, on the contrary,that except for in Jefferson'sdescription of "the Negro." Jimis Melville'swork, Huckleberry Finn is withoutpeers cautious, he gives excellent advice, he suffers amongmajor Euro-American novels for its explicit- persistentanguish over separation from his wife and ly anti-raciststance.3 Those who brand the book child,and he even sacrificeshis own sleep in order "racist"generallydo so withouthaving considered thatHuck may rest. Jim,in short,exhibits all the MARKTWAIN JOURNAL, 22:2 (Fall, 1984) 4 This content downloaded from 67.67.42.11 on Thu, 6 Jun 2013 06:26:26 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions David L. Smith qualitiesthat "the Negro" supposedly lacks. Twain's own. A nigger,Aunt Sally confirms, is nota person. conclusions do more than merely subvertthe Yet this exchange is hilarious,precisely because we justificationsof slavery,which was already long know that Huck is playing upon her glib and since abolished. Twainbegan thisbook during the conventional bigotry. We know that Huck's finaldisintegration of Reconstruction, and hissatire relationshipto Jimhas alreadyinvalidated for him on antebellumSouthern bigotry is also an implicit such obtuse racial notions.The conceptionof the responseto the Negrophobicclimate of the post- "nigger"is a sociallyconstituted and sanctioned Reconstructionera (Berkove;Gollin; Egan, esp. 66- fiction,and itis justas falseand as absurdas Huck's 102). Itis troubling,therefore, that so manyreaders explicitfabrication, which Aunt Sally also swallows have completelymisunderstood Twain's subtle whole. attackon racism. In fact,the exchange betweenHuck and Aunt Twain'suse of the word"nigger" has provoked Sally reveals a great deal about how racial some readersto rejectthe novel. (See Hentoff).As discourseoperates. Its functionis topromulgate a one ofthe mostoffensive words in ourvocabulary, conceptionof "the Negro" as a subhuman and "nigger"remains heavily shrouded in taboo. A expendable creature,who is by definitionfeeble- carefulassessment of this term within the context of minded,immoral, lazy, and superstitious.One Americanracial discourse, however, will allow us to crucialpurpose of this social fictionis to justifythe understandthe particular way in whichthe author abuse and exploitationof Afro-American people by uses it. If we attendclosely to Twain'suse of the substitutingthe essentialistfiction of "Negro-ism" word,we mayfind in itnot just a triggerto outrage, for the actual character of individual Afro- butmore importantly, a means of understanding the Americans.Hence, in racialdiscourse every Afro- precise nature of American racism and Mark Americanbecomes just anotherinstance of "the Twain'sattack on it. Negro"- just another"nigger." Twain recognizes Mostobviously, Twain uses "nigger"throughout thisinvidious tendency of ra ce- thinking, however, thebook as a synonymfor "slave." There is ample and he takes every opportunityto expose the evidence fromother sources thatthis corresponds mismatchbetween racial abstractionsand real to one usage common during the Antebellum humanbeings. period.We firstencounter it in referenceto "Miss For example, when Pap drunkenlyinveighs Watson'sbig nigger,named Jim"(Ch. 2). This againstthe freemulatto from Ohio, he is outraged usage, like the term "nigger stealer," clearly by whatappears to himas a crimeagainst natural designatesthe "nigger"as a piece of property:a laws. (Ch. 6). In thefirst place, a "freenigger" is, for commodity,a slave. Thispassage also providesthe Pap, a contradictionin terms. Indeed, the man's onlyapparent textual justification for the common clothes,his demeanor, his education, his profession, criticalpractice of labelling Jim, "Nigger Jim," as if and even his silver-headedcane bespeak a social "nigger"were a part of his proper name. This statusnormally achieved by only a small elite of loathsomehabit goes back at least as faras Albert whitemen. He is, in otherwords, a "nigger"who BigelowPaine's biographyof Twain (1912). In any refusesto behave like a "nigger."Pap's ludicrous case, "nigger"in thissense connotesan inferior,
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