CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study African American culture in the United States refers to the cultural contributions of Americans of African descent to the culture of the United States, either as part of or distinct from American culture. The distinct identity of African American culture is rooted in the historical experience of the African American people through their experience during the development of American history. From the earliest days of American slavery in the 17th century, slave owners sought to exercise control over their slaves by attempting to strip them of their African culture. The physical isolation and societal marginalization of African slaves and, later, of their free descendants, however, facilitated the retention of significant elements of traditional culture among Africans in the New World generally, and in the U.S. in particular. Slave owners deliberately tried to repress independent political or cultural organization in order to deal with the many slave rebellions or acts of resistance that took place in the southern United States, Brazil, Haiti, and the Dutch Guyanas (Robert, 1998). African cultures, slavery, slave rebellions, and the civil rights movements have shaped African American religious, familial, political, and economic behaviors. The imprint of Africa is evident in so many ways, in politics, economics, language, music, hairstyles, fashion, dance, religion, cuisine, and worldview.

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From its early origins in slave communities, through the end of the 20th century, African American folk art has made a vital contribution to the art of the United States. During the period between the 17th century and the early 19th century, art took the form of small drums, quilts, wrought-iron figures, and ceramic vessels in the southern United States. These artifacts have similarities with comparable crafts in West and Central Africa. Since this thesis is going to talk more about quilts, the writer would narrow down the topic to be more focused. During the 19th century, Harriet Powers, an African American slave, folk artist and quilt maker, made quilts in rural Georgia, United States that are now considered among the finest examples of 19th-century Southern quilting. Later in the 20th century, the women of Gee's Bend developed a distinctive, bold, and sophisticated quilting style based on traditional African American quilts with a geometric simplicity that developed separately but was like that of Amish quilts and modern art (Robert, 1998). African American quilting is almost as old as the history of America. Black slave women were needed for spinning, weaving, sewing and quilting on plantations and in other wealthy households to create Quilts with their own story or life history pictured on the fabric. Quilt historians have found that, for the most part, black women made their quilts in the same styles that were popular with the general population did during any given period. As quilters draw from a common history one cannot look at a quilt and easily identify the cultural background of the artist. There has

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always been a great deal of overlapping in quilting styles among different communities and cultures (Benberry, 1992). Still it is hard to imagine that heritage has not had an impact on African American Quilts. Surely their common experiences affected the taste of early African American quilters and there is no doubt that black women today are making striking quilts that reflect African culture. African American quilt historian, Cuesta Benberry, points out, “Quilters are making conscious and deliberate efforts to incorporate African themes in their works. Some persons begin by using African textiles in their quilts; others take courses in art history or engage in ambitious projects such a researching design tradition in a specific African tribes” (Benberry, 1992). Quilts are made as one community’s identity, so there is a high posibility that the African American descendants are willing to have their ancestor characters or symbols on their Quilts to make them typical. Quilting is a unique American tradition because it has been developed from personal belonging as a union of different ethnic and folk cultural traditions. Developed as a “houseware” and as an art form along with the development of our country, quilting has been preserved as a symbol in its tradition as a country1. Quilting has come to symbolize the African and European traditions in a unique manner as union, rather than a separation, of two, often contrasting or forcibly separated cultures and traditions. The symbol can be seen in the ways that Quilts and Quilting are used to convey certain themes of self-expression, union of opposite values or people, the formation of close bonds among women and kin, 1

Cited from http://xroads.virginia.edu/~ug97/quilt/cult.html

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heritage, history, family, comfort, love, commitment, even as a struggle for a community’s freedom and human right in certain historical events. Quilting in America has become a type of symbol used not only for individual artists or authors, but symbol for a country. Quilting is thus a symbol that provides a medium which allows for expression that is representative of its original beginnings as a houseware and art form—an inclusive and intermixed tradition comprised of varied backgrounds and cultures and histories. Quilting is a medium that can bring contrasting backgrounds together to create a new meaning from the intermixture of its contrasting influences. The words and symbols stitched in to the patterns are sacred and protective in that they convey the knowledge, power, and intelligence of the quilt creator and wearer. During slavery years, members of the Underground Railroad would use Quilts to send messages. In order to keep their escapes secret, slaves used many other ways to talk with others before and during their escapes. In 1989, folklorist Gladys-Marie Fry curated an exhibit of African American quilts, Stiched from the Soul: Slave Quilts of the Ante-Bellum South. She elaborates on the claim in Pat Ferrero’s book Hearts and Hands: Quilts were used to send messages. On the Underground Railroad, those with the color black were hung on the line to indicate a place of refuge (safe house)...Triangles in quilt design signified prayer messages or prayer badge, a way of offering prayer. Colors were very important to slave Quilt makers. The color black indicated that someone might die. A blue color was believed to protect the maker. (Fellner, 2006)

Fry made her point to emphasis what Ferrero along with the two coauthors Elaine Hedges and Julie Silber writes in their book, about how women

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used quilts not only as bedcoverings, but as mementos of their friends, artistic expressions in bleak lives, political commentary when they didn't have the vote, fundraising, slogan flags in more ways than imagined. Quilts were even considered a symbol of women's repression at one time. Jacqueline Tobin and Raymond Dobard in their book Hidden in Plain View – A Secret Story of Quilts and the Underground Railroad mentioned that according to Ozella Williams, as an African American Woman who lives in South Carolina, tells the story that her mother told her about the Quilt Code of the history above. It is said that apparently, there were ten Quilts used to direct slaves to take particular actions during their journey to freedom. Each Quilt featured one of the ten patterns, and those were placed one at time on a fence to signal a specific action for the slave to take at particular time so their master would not be suspicious since it is common for the quilts to be aired out (Tobin and Dobard, 2000). This way, the slave could nonverbally alert those who were escaping made their journey to the accomplishment. The previous explanation are the reasons why the writer has chosen Quilt Code on Underground Railroad as the object selected for this thesis. It is the compelling story of resistance and struggle of slaves in their quest for freedom by incorporating every route, every person, every place and every act taken by or on behalf of the enslaved (educ.queensu.ca, May 2004). By virtue of its covert nature, the Underground Railroad becomes the story of codes and secrets involving intelligent system of visual and oral communication, which is known only to those who were involved (Tobin and

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Dobard, 2000). It is reflecting the tenacious spirit of people’s resistance to slavery and desire to be free. The history is spread and told to the very descendants while codes are still remained and discussed. From the previous facts and descriptions about African American Quilt code on Underground Railroad journey, therefore this study is going to figure out the language of the code interpretation through the patterns mentioned above. To analyze that matter, it is necessary to see pattern interpretations from the historical perspective of the African American slaves themselves in terms of Quilt making and compare them to Quilt patterns from the other areas at the same era. In this case comparable pattern would be derived from the original African symbols, Amish Quilt tradition and also Pioneer Quilts, as the state’s major contribution to this body of work. And in the end, it is expected to get how the Quilt code language of the Underground Railroad slaves is made for their communication medium.

1.2 Statements of Problem 1. What codes are depicted through the patterns from the Underground Railroad Quilts and how is its interpretation divered as it is compared to the Quilts from the other areas at the time in 1850s? 2. What messages are portrayed through the Quilt codes of the slaves’ escape during the Underground Railroad?

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1.3 Objectives of the Study In order to figure out Quilt patterns as the language of communication among the Underground Railroad slave members, this study tries to analyze the interpreting codes depicted on the Quilt’ patterns. The codes that the slaves made to tell among themselves, also what messages that are portrayed through the Quilt codes during the Underground Railroad. Moreover, to obtain more profound factors for the process of interpretation, comparing the meaning of the patterns to the same ones from other Quilt’ areas is also necessary to be examined in the analysis of this study.

1.4 Scope of the Study The are many elements that can support the analysis in this study. However, not all of these elements will be examined. The scope of the study covers the Quilt patterns used by the slaves during their escapement on Underground Railroad journey in 1850s. There are eight patterns to be analyzed, ones with general patterns that are used by Quiltmakers in some other areas. This also includes the history of the African American slaves during the Underground Railroad as well as the African tribes’ symbols as comparison.

1.5 Significance of the Study The significances of this study are, generally, to give a widespread overview about the Quilt codes, especially ones made for the media of

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Underground Railroad slaves to create their freedom. It is expected to get a result that the readers can fully understand about how these codes are made in relation to their history since interpreting codes relates to one’s history backgrounds and can be only understood by people related to it (Fiske, 2002). Specifically, this study tries to give understanding and guidance for students who will work on the same issues. Moreover, for those who will take the same subject, the Quilt patterns code, hopefully this study will be an example that can be used effectively.

1.6 Literature Review Many studies about Quilts can be found as people put a lot of interests in Quilts as a historical artwork because it has a big contribution to American culture’s heritage. This is the source for many researchers to focus their research on Quilts. In this section, the writer puts some of studies related to American Quilts. The first research is a dissertation by Karen E. Smith entitled “Framing Quilts/Framing Culture: Women’s Work and the Politics of Display”. This study elaborates the individuals and intitutions’ investments in how quilts are classified, judged and valued (p.17). They shape public culture through debates about quilts’ utility, workmanship, and aesthetics; they create and display quilts to further their cultural heritage, manifest their faith, delineate aesthetic values, reinforce disciplinary boundaries, and elevate their artistic status. This study uses four representative case studies to demonstrate the cultural work that women and institutions conduct using quilts and to explore what is at stake in that work.

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Through research into the Iowa State Fair quilt competition and the Michiana Mennonite Relief Sale Quilt Auction, Smith reveals how women employ their quilts and quilt displays to promulgate their values and shape their communities (p.151). The second thesis entitled “Makna Simbolik Quilt Tradisional Masyarakat Amish di Lancaster County, Pennsylvania” is written by Titisari Handayani. This study discusses about the Amish traditional Quilts in Lancaster County which uses simple colors and patterns and are reflection of their character as plain people. Historical, cultural and sociological approaches are used in this study. All the data used are written text, library research methodology, books, journals, and many written materials, including internet-based materials are applied. The study indicates that the quilt made Amish women in Lancaster County, more often use the brighter colors as light blue, light green, beige, yellow, red and pastel colors because most of the Amish in Lancaster County Amish people are New Order Amish who are more moderate and more open to new knowledge, new innovations and new ideas. Quilts produced by the Amish women in Lancaster County are a symbol of the patchwork combination of beliefs and values, namely, humility, modesty, loyalty, obedience and companionship in their life. Quilts have rich symbolic as a family heirloom and expression of the values of family and faith (Handayani, 2009). This study conducts diverse analysis from those two researchers. Althought the object is the same which is about Quilts, however the writer will

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examine the interpretation of code and message on Underground Railroad Quilt patterns.

1.7 Theoretical Framework In understanding the African American slaves code languange in Underground Railroad Quilt patterns, this study, as expected, is examined through American Studies approach. This means that it is studied not only through literature study, but also through other disciplines such as history and folklore studies, as Jay Gurian (n.d: 84) has stated that American Studies as a discipline which “begins where most disciplines end—open up further as they close around their discoveries.” In accordance with the aim of American Studies that “are designed to modify a persistent characteristic of mankind” which is “the tendency of men to live predominantly in one of the three tenses, past, present, or future, and to forget the other two” (McDowell, 1948: v), Quilt as an artwork also a part of American past, present and future because it contributes in the cultural structure construction of America. Quilt is also the part of American folklore, it comprises the unrecorded traditions of a people. The study of folklore records and analyzes the traditions because they reveal the common life of the mind below the level high of formal culture, which is recorded by civilization of the learned heritage of their times. Only by turning to the folklore of peoples, probing into its meanings and functions, and searching for links between different bodies of tradition man we hope to

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understand the intellectual and spiritual life of many in its broadest dimensions. Folklore provides expressive evidence of America’s pluralism at the grassroots (Dolby: 1996, 58). As such, area studies have inspired a number of interdisciplinary subject that have the potential to complement cultural area and national work and emphasize folkloristic perspectives: ethnic studies, regional studies, gender studies, cultural studies, religious studies, and cultural sustainability, among others. To focus on the subject discussed, particularly, this study is going to use theory of semiotic. Linguists develop historical linguistics which conceptualizes language as a complicated system, and language changes in a course of time. The structure of language thus is also necessary to understand the changes. This statement leads to the development of structural linguistics which was inspired by Ferdinand de Saussure’s concept about language as a system of signs. Language is a system of sign which relates the two sides of language, namely the signifier and the signified (Fiske, 1990). In other words, language is a system of sign showing the relationship of the linguistic sign unit or the signifier and the object refers to or the signified. Saussure believed that all of culture is made up of signs. That is to say, social life is characterized by the circulation and exchange of forms to which convention has given meaning. A sign for Saussure is simply any device to which human beings communicate to each other. To the extent that anything can have meaning attached to it, this could be taken to suggest that just about anything can be called a sign (Ward, 1997).

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Roland Barthes says that language is a system of sign in which reflects assumptions of a certain society in a certain of time. To make up enormous mass of literature we require an operation consequent upon the evaluation which has separated the texts based upon the appreciation of a certain quantity that is interpretation. It is not to give a text a meaning, but on the contrary to appreciate what plural constitutes it. The interpretation demanded by a specific text, in its plurality. It is not a question of asserting the very existence of plurality, which is not that of the true, the probable, or even the possible (Barthes, 1970). Semiotics can help to make us aware of what we take for granted in representing the world, reminding us that we are always dealing with signs, not with an unmediated objective reality, and that sign systems are involved in the construction of meaning. Semiotics can also help us to realise that whatever assertions seem to us to be obvious, natural, universal, given, permanent and incontrovertible are generated by the ways in which sign systems operate in our discourse communities. Art historian Keith Mosley comments that:

Semiotics makes us aware that the cultural values with which we make sense of the world are a tissue of conventions that have been handed down from generation to generation by the members of the culture of which we are a part. It reminds us that there is nothing ‘natural’ about our values; they are social constructs that not only vary enormously in the course of time but differ radically from culture to culture (cited in Schroeder, 1998: 225).

Whereas both ‘common-sense’ and positivist realism insist that reality is independent of the signs which refer to it, semiotics emphasizes the role of sign systems in the construction of reality. Although things may exist independently of

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signs we know them only through the mediation of signs. We see only what our sign systems allow us to see. Semiotics has the sign as the center of this study along with the way they work. At the basic concept, all the models of meaning share a broadly similar form which is concerned with three elements of (1) the sign, (2) that to which it refers, and (3) the users of the sign (Fiske, 1990:41). A sign is something physical, perceivable by our senses and it refers to something other that itself. It depends upon recongnition by its users. Semiotics sees communication as the generation of meaning in messages-whether the encoder or the decoder. Meaning is not an absolute, static concept to be found neatly parcelled up in the messages. Meaning is an active process: semioticians use verbs like create, generate, or negotiate to refer to this process (1990:46). Beyond its ‘literal’ meaning, a particular word or image may have connotation. In semiotics, denotation and connotation are terms describing the relationship between the signifier and its signified, and an analytic distinction is made between two types of signifieds: a denotative signified and a connotative signified. Meaning includes both denotation and connotation. For the art historian Erwin Panofsky, the denotation of a representational visual image is what all viewers from any culture and at any time would recognize the image as depicting (Panofsky, 1970: 51-53). But if it is already culture-spesific understanding, it takes us into the territory of connotation. Connotation and denotation are often described in terms of levels of representation or levels of meaning. Roland Barthes adopted from Louis

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Hjelmslev the notion that there are different orders of signification (Barthes, 1957; Hjelmslev, 1961: 114). The first order of signification is that of denotation: at this level there is a sign consisting of a signifier and a signified. Connotation is a second-order of signification which uses the denotative sign (signifier and signified) as its signifier and attaches to it an additional signified. In this framework connotation is a sign which derives from the signifier of a denotative sign (so denotation leads to a chain of connotations). This tends to suggest that denotation is an underlying and primary meaning—a notion which many other commentators have challenged. Barthes himself later gave priority to connotation, and in 1971 noted that it was no longer easy to separate the signifier from the signified, the ideological from the ‘literal’ (Barthes, 1977: 166). In passing, we may note that this formulation underlines the point that ‘what is a signifier or a signified depends entirely on the level at which the analysis operates: a signified on one level can become a signifier on another level’ (Willemen, 1994: 105). This is the mechanism by which signs may seem to signify one thing but are loaded with multiple meanings. In addition, this thesis also underlines the significance of Quilt codes meaning in Underground Railroad Quilt and also to convey the message behind the all codes given. The concept of the ‘code’ is fundamental in semiotics. While Saussure dealt only with the overall code of language, he stressed that signs are not meaningful in isolation, but only when they are interpreted in relation to each other. It was another linguistic structuralist, Roman Jakobson, who emphasized that the production and interpretation of texts depends upon the existence of codes

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or conventions for communication (Jakobson, 1971). Since the meaning of a sign depends on the code within which it is situated, codes provide a framework within which signs make sense. The conventions of codes represent a social dimension in semiotics: a code is a set of practices familiar to users of the medium operating within a broad cultural framework. Indeed, as Stuart Hall puts it, ‘there is no intelligible discourse without the operation of a code’ (Hall, 1980: 131). Society itself depends on the existence of such signifying systems. Codes are not simply ‘conventions’ of communication but rather procedural systems of related conventions which operate in certain domains. Codes organize signs into meaningful systems which correlate signifiers and signifieds. Codes transcend single texts or images, linking them together in an interpretative framework. Stephen Heath notes that ‘while every code is a system, not every system is a code’ (Heath, 1981: 130). He adds that ‘a code is distinguished by its coherence, its homogeneity, its systematicity, in the face of the heterogeneity of the message, articulated across several codes’ (129). By understanding the concept on semiology and codes, it is expected to be able to use it as reference to read the code and figure out the message through the pattern of Underground Railroad Quilt the slave used to communicate.

1.8 Methods of the Study This study uses the library research method, taking texts or works of arts as the objects of the study. The primary data is taken from the main source which

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is the Quilt patterns used in the journey of Underground Railroad as the sources available in some internet sites discussing about the subject mentioned above. To support this, the secondary data are taken from works comprising critical essay and theoretical writing which are related to the subject of the study and also books, journals, and articles on Underground Railroad history and Quilts to help the process of analyzing.

1.9 Presentation This thesis is presented in five chapters. Chapter One is an introduction consisting background of choosing subject of analysis which is about African American history and their art contribution to American culture, included also a brief explanation about the topic of Underground Railroad and its Quilt codes as the object of this study. It also contains objectives of the study which will analyze about the interpreting codes on Underground Railtoad and some other areas’ Quilt patterns. To achieve those objectives, the writer uses interdisciplinary theoretical approach. Moreover, this chapter also presents scope of the study, literature review, theoretical framework and method of research. Chapter Two serves a brief description of African American Societies. It consists of a brief discussion about African American Slaves in America, history of the Underground Railroad, as well as a discussion about the concept of human right. Chapter Three contains discussion of Making Quilt in American Tradition. This chapter talks about short history and the role of Quilt in American society. It

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consists of discussion about African Traditional Quilt and Symbols, the Pioneer’s Quilt and also the Amish Quilts. Chapter Four explores an analysis of the Underground Railroad Quilt codes as the media of communication among the slave members to their journey of freedom. In this matter, it will focus on the comparison of meaning between the Underground Railroad’s Quilt patterns with the same Quilt’s patterns used in Pioneer’s Quilt, as well as the Amish’ Quilt. Moreover, this chapter will elaborate the meaning of all Quilt patterns in Underground Railroad to seek for a message the slaves uphold to their struggle. Chapter Five as the last chapter is presented as a conclusion of the whole discussion of this study.

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