Jakari Jewell

To be a man means to be a conqueror, brave, a leader, and most importantly masculine. However, as a black man, your masculinity is often challenged, and people often stereotype who you are as a person just because of the color of your skin and the unfair narrative we were so wrongfully given. Ever since the white colonizers so wrongfully dragged Africans out of their home country and brought them to America, they have tried to take away our dignity doing whatever they can to emasculate us and take away our sense of pride and manhood. While traveling on the ships which brought Africans from Their home country to America White men raped black men and women to kill our spirits, but this is a long story of torture and abuse on the ship is only the start of the injustice. As soon as our ancestors stepped foot on American soil our bodies were picked at and examined for deformities and disease the white men who wore their fancy suits and hats stood back and shouted numbers for our ancestor's ownership as if we weren't human and we were less than them. Even their genitalia were felt and picked at most of the time the males went first ultimately separating them from family or people that they had grown accustomed to. Losing your close ones and having your body examined is enough to break anyone down. I present this exhibition today to depict how America has tried to strip black men of their masculinity and turn it into us being hypersexual and hyperaggressive. I also intend to depict what a black man truly is and what we can accomplish even with the odds never in our favor. The story I tell today has been going on for well over hundreds of years and still very well continues to go on. After all, being oppressed is just one of the downsides of the African American experience.

“Slave Auction Block,”

Tuscaloosa Area Virtual Museum, accessed May 1, 2023, https://tavm.omeka.net/items/show/571.

The first artifact in my exhibition is a drawing of the Atlanta store shows with the slave auction block at the corner. I couldn’t stomach giving an actual representation of the horrors that went on during these auctions. So, I chose this drawing as it still has history behind it. The drawing holds stories of black men, women, and even children being violated and stripped of any humanity. This is only the start of what has been done to African American men and women in order to bring them down to be seen as less than those who have oppressed us. For a man to be touched in places that are meant to be private and sexually assaulted tear up any ounce of masculinity that he may have had. Also, being torn away from family members and friends messes up his mental state. These are all things that took place on the auction block and even the trip to the auction blocks via boat.

Receipt of payment for Dillard, a 16-year-old male slave, 1853 January

Box: 1, Folder: 5. Documents of the Enslaved, 0000-0000-0000-0111. Robert W. Woodruff Library of the Atlanta University Center, Inc.

The next artifact is a receipt of payment given to the owner of an African slave named Elijah W. Traver. He was bought for $900 which in current revenue translates to $35,279.53. The receipt speaks of Traver as property, not even using his name. After the initial statement, he is seen just as a body and nothing more. He is described as copper colored, and it is stated that he will have to follow all lawful claims and demands of the person who just purchased him stripping him of any sense of pride and manhood that a child his age should have. Taking away a man's power and pride emasculates him by taking away his fighting spirit and will to do anything.

List of slaves belonging to the estate of Daniel Payne, undated

Box: 1, Folder: 10. Documents of the Enslaved, 0000-0000-0000-0111. Robert W. Woodruff Library of the Atlanta University Center, Inc. http://findingaids.auctr.edu/repositories/2/archival_objects/104225 Accessed May 03, 2023.

The third artifact is a list of “Negroes” owned by Daniel Payne. It tells the same story as the receipt for Ellijah except with less names and less humanity given to each slave. The list also acted as a written agreement that Daniel was giving up his ownership of the slaves to a person of his choosing when he passed. Basically, it acted as a written will of inheritance but instead of actual property, it was for slaves. The artifact once again tells a story of stripping us of our humanity and labeling us as less than what we are. This list connects to my exhibit in the sense that when we are stripped of our masculinity, we lose sense of who we are as most names given to the slaves listed seem to be that of a physical feature or just basic names.

George Stinney Jr.

Hopson, Angelo. George Stinney Jr., Unsung Martyr, 2019 Acrylic paint and marker.

The fourth artifact is simply a painting detailing the story of George Stinney Jr. Now that our oppressors can no longer sell us as property or examine us just for our bodies, they must find different ways to oppress and emasculate us. The modern way they have found effective is simply wrongful jailing us and killing us. Stinney was just 14 years old when he was convicted for the murder of two white women. They locked him in a room and questioned him without his parents or an attorney. They forced a confession out of him which was a lie, saying he wanted to have sex and he did indeed kill the woman in question. He was given the death penalty at just 14 years old. Now that we have our rights and have started to gain our masculinity, it came at the price of being labeled hypersexual and hyper-aggressive. We were wrongfully given these stereotypes because of situations like George's and The Central Park 5 who experience very similar treatment.

Martin Luther King, Jr., 1956

The Joseph Echols and Evelyn Gibson Lowery Collection. Atlanta University Center Robert W. Woodruff Library. Series: Photographs; Subseries: People, http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12322/fa:199 Accessed May 02, 2023.

My final artifact is Martin Luther King Jr’s Mugshot. I chose this as my final picture because he signifies what it truly means to be black in America. Even through all the years, the attempts of emasculating black me, with a new narrative that we are sexual and aggressive, he fought these claims and racial oppression peacefully. Even though violence and the system were used to oppress us, he still found it best to be peaceful. This process worked; he gave African Americans and black men a new name. But, the picture also goes to show that no matter how peaceful the man is, he can still fall victim to the systems designed against us. He is the personification of what it truly means to be a black man who has redefined his masculinity and taken control of his own story no matter what the wicked oppressors threw at him.

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