Kindred And Family Character Analysis

When slavery was in the United States, slaves were limited with choices. In other words, the slaves really had no choices. Majority of his or her life he or she thought about freedom and trying not to get punished. In Kindred and Family, each main character has a mind of their own which is dangerous to have around slavery time. Butler portrays her main character, Dana, as a strong minded women which is mostly why she was able to survive the slavery era when she went. Cooper, on the other hand, depicts her character as fierce and determined. Each women struggled but acted differently. Butler had Dana act out in desperation. Meanwhile, Copper had Always act out in power. Dana was adopted so she had little to no idea about her family history. When she travels to the 1800s, she gets a feel of what its like to live as a slave. As she first …show more content…
“No? How about this: You talk to her-talk some sense into her-or you’re going to watch while Jake Edwards beats some sense into her.” (Butler 163) She acts out in order to help Alice avoid pain. She shows that she has no choice because she makes it that way. Although she tries to throw Rufus off the idea, Dana appeals to human feelings and helps Rufus out. Desperation works into this by showing how she’s desperate to help anyone avoid pain especially whipping even though the result is rape. Dana even went far enough to slit her wrist to get away because Rufus smacked her. She felt the trust and respect was lost between them. This shows how her walls are breaking down and she losing her way. This is why her actions are portrayed as desperate because majority of the time she has no idea what to do. All she knows is survive which is a basic instinct. Dana actually kept a secret that she was his ancestor. Thus showing the control she had over Rufus. However, he didn’t know about her leverage. Dana was pulling his strings in hope that it leads to the birth of