Duality in "Afro-American"

Afro-American by Henry Dumas has many contradictions that shed light on to the situations of slavery in America, America itself and Christianity. At the basic level in the poem we get the distinct difference in how his "black mother" and "white mother" are described. He describes the white mother using terms like whore and overall just using language with negative connotations and negative wording. In contrast to this he describes his black mother as "a fine beautiful thang" and uses other language that describes his black mother in a positive light.

The other major contradiction is in how religion is described. The first instance we get of this is in the first stanza when the narrator says said that the white mother sanctified and crucified me. Although both are religious, sanctification is a very positive, giving holiness to somebody, and crucifixion is a very bad side of the religion, being a cause of death. Another duality happens when the narrator says "the holy white plague." White plague is already a contradiction as white usually implies pure or undisturbed while a plague only happens when something is tainted. In addition, there is a distinct contradiction between holy and plague as usually something that brings death isn't holy.

This paradoxical religiously slanted wording provides a very nuanced view of America and Christianity. Although there are good aspects of both, looking at them from another view point can make them look really terrible. In addition to this paradoxical nature, we also get a fairly bad view of Christianity, which seems a little weird as the slave population used Christianity often to reverse the power dynamic and give themselves hope for the future. Overall, the poem gives us a different view of Christianity than we might expect, but the bashing of the whites in charge of slavery/the state of America during the slavery era is portrayed badly as it often is.