Narratives of Race and Resistance: A New Historicist Analysis of the Underground Railroad

Abstract

The paper deals with The Underground Railroad, a novel written by an American author, Colson Whitehead. The novel deals with the atrocities perpetrated on black slaves at the slave plantations of Southern States of America before the Civil War. The paper examines slave discourse from the commercial perspective. It questions the economic interests behind the institution of chattel enslavement at the time of transatlantic slave trade. It also highlights the suppressed narrative of transatlantic slave trade that the institution of slavery is not the product of racial prejudice rather economic interest of slave owners is the dominant factor. The critical practice of new historicism is used to explore the hidden narrative of chattel slavery. The researcher has sought guidance from the theorization of Stephen Greenblatt and Catherine Gallagher from their book Practicing New Historicism. The approaches of Preoccupation with Representation, recurrent use of anecdote and historical co-texting are used for the textual analysis of the primary text i.e. The Underground Railroad. This paper reveals the embedded hegemony of white community over the institution of chattel slavery. It also shows the settlement of Southern and Northern States of America to exploit the concept of race and regulate slavery as an institution. The study sets a dimension for readers to explore slave discourses from the multiple unaddressed perspectives of new historicism.