conjure in african american society by jeffrey anderson

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by my homegirl, sheree thomas of
black pot mojo

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Excerpt from the Introduction         to

Conjure in African         American Society
http://www.lsu.edu/lsupress/Books/Fall2005/books/Anderson_Conjure_Excerpt.html


        Jeffrey E. Anderson

      

        Introduction
        The Invisible Conjurer: The Disappearance of Hoodoo from Conceptions of         Black Society

      

Thomas Nelson Page,         one of the major architects of the “moonlight and magnolias”         myth of the Old South, published his most famous novel, Red Rock,         in 1899. Set during Reconstruction, its pages are filled with the standard         characters of Page’s genre: heroic southern planters, dutiful Union         soldiers, and depraved carpetbaggers. One villain, Dr. Moses, is particularly         overdrawn in the depiction of his physical as well as moral perversity.         Rachel Welch, the novel’s heroine, observes, “His chin stuck         so far forward that the lower teeth were much outside of the upper, or,         at least, the lower jaw was; for the teeth looked as though they had been         ground down, and his gums, as he grinned, showed as blue on the edges         as if he had painted them.”

      

Moses is a trick         doctor, a term Page felt no need to define. Modern readers are left         to question why the bizarrely misshapen Moses should be such a threat         to the white population. Other contemporary works provide answers. For         instance, Philip A. Bruce, author of The Plantation Negro as a Freedman         (1899), described the trick doctor as “a man whose only employment         . . . lies in the practice of the art of witchcraft,” who “is         invested with even more importance than a preacher, since he is regarded         with the respect that fear excites.” Moreover, Moses’s physical         appearance is typical of the numerous descriptions of trick doctors that         appeared during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. For         instance, in the early-twentieth-century article “Observations on         the Practice of Conjuring in Georgia” Roland Steiner recorded the         African American folk belief that the spells of blue-gummed blacks invariably         caused death. Likewise, folklorist Mary Alicia Owen, using the language         of her informant, in 1893, described a legendary “witcheh-man”         as “de mos’ uglies’ man in de worl', wid er whopple-jaw         an’ er har’-lip, sidesen er lop side an’ er crookid         laig an’ one eye dat wuz des lak fiah an’ one dat was daid.”         In short, published accounts of African American magic were so common         during the era that Page had no need to explain what he meant by trick         doctor. After Page’s time, however, literary and academic interest         in black sorcery declined. The net result has been that the trick doctor,         also known as the "hoodoo doctor" or "conjurer," has         become virtually invisible in most Americans’ conceptions of black         society, even while the vocation of conjuring lives on in many African         American communities.

      

How can one explain         such a drastic shift in attention to conjure? The answer lies in intellectual         and cultural shifts over the course of the late nineteenth and twentieth         centuries that have changed the ways both blacks and whites have constructed         identity. Between the Civil War and World War II, Americans in general         and southern whites in particular feared losing their cultural identity         to the homogenizing effects of industrial capitalism, and conjure was         one expression of peculiarity that they used to resist the threatened         loss of national and regional distinctiveness. Once war catapulted America         to the forefront of world politics and economics, regional distinctions         became less important than national pride and a united front against Communism.         For blacks, attention to hoodoo was likewise a question of identity. Unlike         whites, however, they tended to view hoodoo as a negative feature of their         society. Its practice, they thought, would have to be stamped out before         they could hope to achieve equality. Recently, the influence of the closely         linked forces of cultural pluralism, postmodernism, and the New Age movement         and rising black assertiveness have made magic an acceptable expression         of spirituality for many. Nevertheless, conjure remains an understudied         facet of black society.

      

        Before the Civil War, southerners, white and black, were well aware of         the existence of conjure. For instance, in a diary entry for 3 March 1816         the South Carolinian George Izard recorded an encounter with a sickly         Mr. Perkins, who explained his illness as a result of a spell cast by         a spurned admirer. After physicians’ remedies failed him, Perkins         turned to conjure. Izard’s experience was far from unique. Many         whites learned of conjure from their slaves. Such was the case with Thaddeus         Norris, author of “Negro Superstitions.” Writing five years         after the Civil War, he admitted that he had “firmly believed in         witches” as a child, a conviction he had acquired through his close         relationship with an elderly “house servant.” Frederick Douglass,         the most prominent of black abolitionists, included an account of hoodoo         in his antebellum Narrative, spreading knowledge of the practice         to northern readers. Nevertheless, few observers commented on the practice         beyond pointing it out as a sign of slaves’ intellectual backwardness.         Slaves were to be either worked or freed, not studied for their culture.

      

Immediately following         the war southern whites were too busy restoring Democratic control of         their states to devote increased attention to sectional identity and certainly         to black folk religion. After all, their recent experience of military         defeat and occupation had left no room to doubt their distinctiveness.         One of the few whites to address black folk religions was Thaddeus Norris,         who bluntly wrote that “the more refined a people, the more interesting         its mythical legends. Those of the Caucasian race are attractive; while         those of the negroes are repulsive, especially when connected with their         heathenish religions.” Literate blacks generally felt the same way.         A selection of letters on conjure published in the Southern Workman         provides evidence. This newspaper was associated with Virginia’s         Hampton Institute, one of the nation’s oldest black schools. In         1878 the school solicited reports from its students and graduates on the         level of superstition among the freedmen. The response was more than one         hundred letters, only six of which saw print. Most of the responders frankly         stated that conjure was a negative but common feature of black society.         One author, referred to as “L.” in the printed version of         his letter, was particularly harsh in his denunciation of hoodoo, asserting,         “Conjure doctors are not so numerous now as they were before our         race became so enlightened, but still they are too numerous. They are         a curse to their race.” Overcoming racist oppression and abject         poverty through education was much more important to blacks than questions         of culture. With both whites and blacks disgusted by Negro ignorance,         few were interested in doing more than denounce conjure.

      

Since Reconstruction,         interest in conjure has generally followed a wavelike pattern of increasing         and decreasing interest. Since the end of Republican rule in the South,         interest in conjure has crested three times. The first of these upturns         began in the mid-1880s and persisted until shortly after 1900. Following         the turn of the century, writings on conjure appeared less and less frequently         until the 1920s, when a new wave of interest began. It had passed by the         early 1940s, when conjure once again faded from public view. The second         trough was much deeper than the first. With occasional exceptions, few         works on hoodoo appeared until the 1970s. At that point, a new respect         for black folk beliefs, including conjure, arose.

      

As local distinctions         seemed threatened by industrial homogenization following the Civil War,         whites searched for regional peculiarities in order to construct a distinct         identity. Corporatism, national advertising, and consumerism threatened         to transform the South into a carbon copy of the North. It is no coincidence         that articles on conjure peaked in the 1890s, when a generation that had         never owned slaves or fought in the Civil War came to prominence.

      

In addition to ending         the most important distinction between the North and the South, emancipation         had begun a process that would cause blacks and whites to grow more and         more foreign to each other. Under the peculiar institution, members of         both races had lived and sometimes worked side by side, occupying the         same geographic space. Whites inevitably learned much about blacks’         culture, including their supernatural beliefs, from simple observation         and conversation, and the same was true for blacks. Though convict leasing,         sharecropping, and other forms of “free” labor that replaced         slavery resembled it in many ways, they were a first step in a growing         physical separation between the races. When the temporary political entitlement         and citizenship rights that blacks had gained during Reconstruction faded         during the last two decades of the nineteenth century, African Americans         became increasingly vulnerable to racism. By the turn of the twentieth         century a rigid system of economic and social segregation had developed         throughout the states of the former Confederacy. During the first half         of the 1890s the white Democrats’ “Solid South” had         begun to crack in the face of the Populists’ agrarian radicalism.         In part, the implementation of Jim Crow was the work of white politicians         seeking to reunite their race under the banner of white supremacy. Whatever         the cause, blacks and whites lived their lives ever more separately, and         each culture became less familiar to the other.

      

Whites had long         considered blacks a primitive and superstitious people. With African Americans         safely cut off from political and economic power, their folk beliefs could         now be used to bolster white superiority and regional distinctiveness.         To white authors, the hoodoo doctor became a powerful image of the southern         past, conjuring up images of aristocratic planters and their happy but         dependent “servants.” Moreover, by describing blacks as a         backward people, whites defined what their race was not. At the same time,         African Americans began to develop a class system. As members of the small         but growing middle class became educated and quickly adopted the scientific         outlook and social Darwinism of the larger American society, they confidently         expected conjure to disappear. In fact, according to many blacks’         ideology of racial uplift, such backward features of black society would         have to give way before the race could hope to advance. Thus, while whites         used black folk beliefs as a point of contrast to display their own glories,         African Americans rejected whites’ self-serving characterization         of blacks as superstitious.

      

The local color         literary movement typified whites’ construction of identity. In         the South, this impulse often found expression in collections of black         folklore, relayed in the dialect of the plantation “darkie.”         Most prominent among these works was Joel Chandler Harris’s 1880         book Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings, a collection of         African American animal stories ostensibly related by an elderly former         slave to a child whom he had befriended. Over the next twenty-five years         numerous authors sought to duplicate Harris’s success, with the         result that black folklore became staple reading for white American youths         until well into the twentieth century. In practice, local color works         provided a bridge between the romanticism of the early nineteenth century         and the realism that came to characterize the twentieth. As such, it was         the perfect vehicle for whites to record the exoticism of the plantation         past, dovetailing nicely with the chivalric tales of Thomas Nelson Page.         At the same time, it allowed authors to glorify the region’s race         relations by providing “records” of friendly interaction between         superior whites and dependent blacks through the medium of African American         stories told in dialect. In an age when white southerners sought sectional         reconciliation while maintaining their distinctiveness, local colorism         helped them write their past and present racial systems in a way that         made their acceptance by the rest of the nation more palatable.

      

The growth of the         social sciences, especially professionalized folklore, provided another         vehicle for white southerners’ search for identity. Brought to prominence         in Europe by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm during the early and middle nineteenth         century, folklore quickly became a popular pursuit. By the late 1870s,         folklorists had begun to professionalize their field. One of the earliest         signs of this development was the founding of the English Folklore Society         in 1878. Ten years later, American folklorists created their own national         organization, the American Folklore Society. The international expositions         of 1889, 1891, and 1893, which stressed the importance of progress, hosted         folklore congresses in order to emphasize the backwardness of primitive         societies, while preserving their beliefs for future generations. During         the 1891 exposition, Mary Alicia Owen helped bring conjure to scholarly         attention by presenting a paper entitled “Among the Voodoos,”         which described the magical practices of Missouri’s blacks. The         newly founded Journal of American Folk-Lore (later the Journal         of American Folklore), an organ of the American Folklore Society,         published numerous articles on conjure and related practices throughout         its early volumes. Following an article on Haitian Vodou in its 1888 inaugural         issue, the journal published W. W. Newell’s “Reports of Voodoo         Worship in Hayti and Louisiana” in its second volume. The journal         did not confine itself to Voodoo proper, however, and over the next decade         and a half numerous brief notes and full-length articles appeared. Typically         they resemble Roland Steiner’s “Observations on the Practice         of Conjuring in Georgia,” an essay that combines conjure stories         with instructions for using particular magical materials.

      

After 1893 southern         African Americans had their own folklore society, based at Virginia’s         Hampton Normal School, later to be known as the Hampton Institute. In         a notice to students announcing the founding of the Hampton Folk-Lore         Society, an anonymous author stated, “The American Negroes are rising         so rapidly from the condition of ignorance and poverty . . . that the         time seems not far distant when they shall have cast off their past entirely.”         If a record of conjure was not preserved, blacks would become a people         without a history beyond what whites chose to give them. Progress, destined         to wipe out folk beliefs like conjure, would nevertheless preserve knowledge         of such “savagery” for future generations through the work         of professional folklorists. To this end the Southern Workman,         the school newspaper, published numerous articles on black folklore during         the late nineteenth century.

      

Throughout the 1890s         and the early years of the twentieth century the Southern Workman         frequently included a column entitled “Folk-Lore and Ethnology,”         which regularly addressed conjure. Like the articles appearing in the         Journal of American Folklore, these accounts tended to be simple         descriptions of hoodoo beliefs. Nevertheless, a few accounts display a         high degree of analytical sophistication. The most important example is         A. M. Bacon’s “Conjuring and Conjure-Doctors,” published         in 1895. Bacon divided conjuration into two types, those involving charms         and those involving poisons, and argued that conjurers provided five primary         services to their clients, roughly summarized as follows: diagnosis of         afflictions caused by magic, discovery of those who had cast spells, searching         out and destroying tricks, curing those who had been conjured, and turning         spells back on those who had cast them.

      

Meanwhile, other         authors began to tentatively introduce new interpretations. For instance,         Leonora Herron, in her essay “Conjuring and Conjure-Doctors”         (not to be confused with Bacon’s article of the same title), argued         that conjure functioned as a means of redressing wrongs, for which slavery         had provided no other mechanism. In addition, Herron proposed that conjure         was not solely of African origin but had also been influenced by “association         with the white race . . . till it became a curious conglomerate of fetichism,         divination, quackery, incantation and demonology.” Despite the growing         volume and analytical rigor of such articles, few authors saw conjure         as a positive aspect of the black past. Instead, African Americans followed         the lead of whites, condemning hoodoo as a sign of backwardness. While         whites used conjure to bolster their supremacist assumptions, however,         blacks saw its supposed decline as a symbol of advancement.

      

Southerners’         attempts to build a new identity brought hoodoo to national attention.         Knowledge of conjure ceased to be the purview of southerners who had experienced         it firsthand. Instead, a growing number of books intended for popular         consumption began to treat hoodoo as an important part of black culture.         Publications reporting on the progress of the black race, such as Bruce’s         Plantation Negro as a Freedman, increasingly came to address         the backwardness of conjure. Likewise, autobiographies of ex-slaves often         pointed to antebellum conjure to demonstrate how far blacks had risen         from bondage. Such was the case with Jacob Stoyer, a former South Carolina         slave, who made much of slaves’ belief in magic, recording their         use of red pepper and salt to repel witches. Another former slave, William         Wells Brown, author of My Southern Home, used the semihumorous         character Uncle Dinkie, a conjurer, to demonstrate the “ignorant         days of slavery.” In addition to being a fraud who earned his reputation         by fortunetelling, love potions, and “medicine,” Uncle Dinkie         had learned to serve the devil instead of God “kase de white folks         don’t fear de Lord.”

      

Another class of         publication that usually addressed conjure comprised the collections of         black folklore that appeared during the years around 1900. Harris’s         Uncle Remus refers to conjure only briefly, but some of his imitators         dealt with it in greater depth. For instance, in Charles Colcock Jones         Jr.’s Gullah Folktales from the Georgia Coast, “Buh         Rabbit” must contend with conjure doctors as well as wolves and         tar babies. Two works appeared that were entirely devoted to stories of         hoodoo. The earliest of these was Mary Alicia Owen’s Voodoo         Tales as Told among the Negroes of the Southwest, first published         in 1893. As its alternate title, Old Rabbit, the Voodoo, and Other         Sorcerers, suggests, Owen’s work was a collection of animal         stories in which magic was the driving force. Rabbit, Woodpecker, and         the Bee-King appear as the animal kingdom’s principal conjurers.         Another work from the period that centers on hoodoo was Virginia Frazier         Boyle’s Devil Tales. Unlike Harris, Colcock, and Owen,         Boyle recorded stories of human hoodooists, usually locked in combat with         the devil. Nevertheless, her underlying aim was the same: glorification         of the southern past. Describing her sense of loss at the death of her         storytelling black “Mammy,” she wrote, “The swaying         form, crooning in low rich voice, like some bronze Homer blind to letters,         a weird primeval lore into the ears of future orators, is shut within         the feudal past of the old plantation days.”

      

A final group of         books that began to appear during this era were fictional works built         around the workings of African American magic. The most remarkable of         these was black author Charles W. Chesnutt’s Conjure Woman,         which recounts a series of tales told by Uncle Julius, an ex-slave, to         white Ohioan immigrants to North Carolina. Though the tales are ostensibly         a collection of conjure stories from plantation days, Chesnutt’s         Julius uses them to persuade his white acquaintances to favor him with         gifts and other considerations. For example, in the story “Po’         Sandy” he persuades the Ohioan narrator and his wife not to tear         down an old building because it had been built from a person whom a conjure         woman had changed into a tree. Shortly after, Julius himself asks for         the building, which he uses for a church. Chesnutt, who was only marginally         interested in the practice of conjure, used stories of the occult to demonstrate         the overriding power of whites. Only by preying on whites’ sense         of sentiment did Julius succeed in achieving his goals. Nevertheless,         white readers used The Conjure Woman to bolster their own version         of the pre–Civil War South, including the primitive superstitiousness         of blacks