Historical tragedies that happen to certain groups and cultures might not be what those people want to identify with. Walcott describes the African slaves that have died overseas \u201cwith eyes heavy as anchors, who sank without tombs\u2026\u201d (Stanza 8, Line 26-7). He\u2019s using metaphors to demonstrate the sadness and deprivation of those onboard and how some died a death without any acknowledgement. Because they had no tombs, they essentially had no names. Not only were they robbed of their lives, they were robbed of individuality.\u00a0 Walcott illustrates that the violence the slaves faces were \u201c…just Lamentations\u2014that was just Lamentations, it was not History\u2026\u201d (Stanza 15 & 16, Lines 47-51). Rather than saying the line once, Walcott is repeating to the reader of the \u201cLamentations\u201d twice to emphasize the devastating past the Africans experienced. However, he follows that repetition by bluntly stating those traumatic events weren\u2019t even history. He is reminding us of his voice and opinion on the definition of history and what it means for African people. Walcott\u2019s point is the troubles African ancestors have faced are valid, and the trauma, violence, and deaths of those individuals at sea need to be acknowledged. But, because it has been inflicted on them by another race, it should not be considered part of African history. They were taken away from their homeland and the opportunity to have a peaceful backstory was lost.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Sea is History Historical tragedies that happen to certain groups and cultures might not be what those people want to identify with. Walcott describes the African slaves that have died overseas \u201cwith eyes heavy as anchors, who sank without tombs\u2026\u201d (Stanza 8, Line 26-7). He\u2019s using metaphors to demonstrate the sadness and deprivation of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9754,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-85","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eportfolios.capilanou.ca\/rahanamdari\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/85","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eportfolios.capilanou.ca\/rahanamdari\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eportfolios.capilanou.ca\/rahanamdari\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eportfolios.capilanou.ca\/rahanamdari\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9754"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eportfolios.capilanou.ca\/rahanamdari\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/eportfolios.capilanou.ca\/rahanamdari\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/85\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":131,"href":"https:\/\/eportfolios.capilanou.ca\/rahanamdari\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/85\/revisions\/131"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eportfolios.capilanou.ca\/rahanamdari\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}