On The Black Extended Family In American Slavery

Under the institution of Northern American slavery,black family was an organization of central importance to slave-holding class for its social significance.Black family could function as a vital unit for social control and management among the enslaved community.More significantly,the black family was the main instrument for the increase of owners' labor inventory.Despite the social significance of its existence,black family life could never be characterized stable.Under slavery,there were considerable instances of family separations.Few slaves could escape the broken family experience imposed by owners' structural interference.Frequent incidences of family separations forced the enslaved to extend their kin connections to help maintain the integrity of family life.Uprooted from homeland and transported to a remote and hostile white world,nevertheless,the black population maintained their African cultural heritage.When offered chances to develop a family,African slaves made good use of the opportunities provided.They first established among themselves a family organization which borrowed heavily from traditional African familial beliefs.Then with the natural increase of black population,they gradually developed their slave quarters into communities,within which slaves,tied by sympathy,frequently included their black fellows into kin networks.The recreation of quasi-kin network made community an extension of family unit.Gradually,typical African extended family was recreated and reorganized in a new way among the African-American slaves.The centrality of black extended family organization,for the most part,was manifested in both its cooperative and communal spirit.The bonds of kinship was made beyond the boundaries of individual households.Within the extended family,domestic responsibilities were shared among the constituent households and familial roles were flexibly played by members from individual households.And also cooperative and communal spirit was manifested in many respects in their community life.Extended family organization under slavery was the best domestic arrangements for the enslaved in that it not only extended their supporting institutions,but more significantly its existence successfully helped the population in bondage survive the destructive power of slavery.The development of family was not a static but a dynamic process.Black extended family was black population's adjustment and adaption to the peculiar institution of slavery.