Roots

Roots is a fascinating book.  I highly recommend it.  It is the story of Alex Haley’s maternal lineage, from his Mandinka ancestor Kunta Kinte to the birth of Mr. Haley.  The book covers the time period from the mid 1700s to the early 1900s.  The section covering the slave voyage from Africa to the US is particularly chilling.  There’s tons of slave dialect, so the slaves’ conversations might be difficult for someone who’s used to reading only the Queen’s English.  I never saw the landmark TV mini-series, but I think I’ll rent it or better yet, see if our library has it.  If you’ve got some time to kill, I highly recommend giving it a look-see. If you enjoy it, you might also want to read Queen, which is an account of the author’s paternal side of the family.  Both were written by Alex Haley.  Queen was also made into a mini-series in the late ‘90s, with Halle Berry playing the title character.  Reading the books has made me wonder where I come from.  Am I Mandinka?  Wolof?  Ashanti?  Maybe I’ll know one day.  Also, I wonder how much European is in me?  (I don’t think I have quite as much in me as the M.R.S. does).  I have been in contact with a relative who’s been doing some genealogical research, and she’s traced my paternal grandmother’s family (The Cabbagestalks) back to slaves on a plantation in Manning, SC.  As an aside, I’m sure glad we don’t have the custom of passing along the mother’s name in this country.

One of these days I need to get around to reading Uncle Tom’s Cabin.