The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s <i>Wide Sargasso Sea</i>

Xue Shi

doi:doi:10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14

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The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea

Xue Shi

Published in Humanities and Social Sciences (Volume 10, Issue 6)

Received: 10 November 2022 Accepted: 2 December 2022 Published: 8 December 2022

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Abstract

As an anti-colonial rewriting of Jane Eyre, the Wide Sargasso Sea is recognized as Caribbean writer Jean Rhys’s masterpiece. It tells the narrative of the Cosway family, mixed-race descendants of British colonists in Jamaica, West Indies around 1834. Current studies of this book have mostly focused on the white Creole protagonist, Antoinette; however, the black nanny, Christophine, and her obeah are integral to the plot and have received little attention from scholars. In response to the fact that both obeah and Christophine are controversial, this paper examines the history and disputes about Obeah, and gives a suitable answer from two points of view in terms of Christophine’s role and her retreat in the novel. Besides, for Christophine, obeah is a subversive weapon against postcolonial European dominance, whereas for Antoinette, its failure exposes the persistent cultural prejudices of Eurocentric ideology and the fundamental contradictions of colonial culture. By analyzing the symbolic connotations of Obeah and Christophine, this reading could offer readers insights into authentic “Caribbeanness” and the ways in which oppressed people reject the legacy of colonialism, white privilege, and Western hegemony. It also suggests that Rhys’s inclusive views on culture and ethnicity, which reveal her true writing intention and the work’s realistic significance. This paper concludes that her treatment of Christophine is neither authoritarian nor racist but rather a reflection of the author’s appreciation and respect for the black community. Most of all, her contribution to the dismantling of social barriers that are rooted in racial inequalities can be seen most clearly in the all-encompassing and inclusive perspective of a variety of ethnic and cultures that is portrayed in her treatment of Obeah and Christophine.

Published in	Humanities and Social Sciences (Volume 10, Issue 6)
DOI	10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14
Page(s)	378-385
Creative Commons	This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright	Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Jean Rhys, Wide Sargasso Sea, Obeah, Christophine, Caribbean Culture

References

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[2]	Crosson, J. B. (2020). Experiments with Power: Obeah and the Remaking of Religion in Trinidad. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
[3]	Emery, M L. (1968). Jean Rhys at “World’s End”: Novels of Colonial and Sexual Exile. Austin: University of Texas Press.
[4]	Gregg, V M. (1995). Jean Rhys’s Historical Imagination: Reading and Writing the Creole. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
[5]	Harris, W. (1980). Carnival of Psyche: Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea. Kunapipi, 2 (2): 42-150.
[6]	Henry, F. (2003). Reclaiming African Religions in Trinidad: The Socio-Political Legitimation of the Orisha and Spiritual Baptist Faiths. Jamaica: University of West Indies Press.
[7]	Mondragon, B. (2021). A Comparative Review: Obeah, Race and Racism: Caribbean Witchcraft in the English Imagination and Experiments with Power: Obeah and the Remaking of Religion in Trinidad. History in the Making, 14 (1), 20.
[8]	O’Neal, E. (2020). Obeah, Race and Racism: Caribbean Witchcraft in the English Imagination. Jamaica: University of the West Indies Press.
[9]	Paton, D. (2009). Obeah Acts: Producing and Policing the Boundaries of Religion in the Caribbean. Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism, 13 (1), 1–18. Doi: 10.1215/07990537-2008-002
[10]	Paton, D. (2019). The Racist History of Jamaica’s Obeah Laws. In Historians’s Watch, July 4, 2019. Accessed on 11-08-2022. https://www.historyworkshop.org.uk/the-racist-history-of-jamaicas-obeah-laws/
[11]	Rasbury, M. M. (1994). Protestantism in the Obeah and Rastafarian Doctrines: Afro-Caribbean Religion in Wide Sargasso Sea and Brother Man. Caribbean Studies, 458-460.
[12]	Rhys, J. (1981). Smile Please: An Unfinished Autobiography. London: Penguin Group.
[13]	Rhys, J. (2000). Wide Sargasso Sea. London: Penguin Group.
[14]	Savory, E. (1999). Jean Rhys. London: Cambridge University Press.
[15]	Shi, X., & Peiai, L. (2021). “The Crown of Thorns” and “The Thorn Bird”: Interpreting the Madness Images of Bertha Mason and Antoinette. Journal of Zhejiang International Studies University, (05), 102-109.
[16]	Staley, T F. (1979). Jean Rhys: A Critical Study. Berlin: Springer.
[17]	Scott, D. (1996). Religion in Colonial Civil Society: Buddhism and Modernity in 19th-Century Sri Lanka. Cultural Dynamics, 8 (1), 7-23. https://doi.org/10.1177/092137409600800102
[18]	Spivak, G. C. (2014). Three Women’s Texts and a Critique of Imperialism. In Postcolonial Criticism (pp. 145-165). London: Routledge.
[19]	Spivak, G. C. (1999). A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
[20]	Thomas, S. (1999). The Worlding of Jean Rhys. Westport: Greenwood.
[21]	Wilson, L. (1989). European or Caribbean: Jean Rhys and the Language of Exile. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, 68-72.
[22]	Zhang, D. (2006). Canon Rewriting and Identity Narrating: On Wide Sargasso Sea. Foreign Literature Studies, 03, 77-83.
[23]	Zhang, F. (2009). A postcolonial reading of Wide Sargasso Sea. Contemporary Foreign Literature, (01), 125-132.

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Xue Shi. (2022). The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea. Humanities and Social Sciences, 10(6), 378-385. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14

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Xue Shi. The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea. Humanit. Soc. Sci. 2022, 10(6), 378-385. doi: 10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14

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Xue Shi. The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea. Humanit Soc Sci. 2022;10(6):378-385. doi: 10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14

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@article{10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14,
  author = {Xue Shi},
  title = {The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea},
  journal = {Humanities and Social Sciences},
  volume = {10},
  number = {6},
  pages = {378-385},
  doi = {10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14},
  eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.hss.20221006.14},
  abstract = {As an anti-colonial rewriting of Jane Eyre, the Wide Sargasso Sea is recognized as Caribbean writer Jean Rhys’s masterpiece. It tells the narrative of the Cosway family, mixed-race descendants of British colonists in Jamaica, West Indies around 1834. Current studies of this book have mostly focused on the white Creole protagonist, Antoinette; however, the black nanny, Christophine, and her obeah are integral to the plot and have received little attention from scholars. In response to the fact that both obeah and Christophine are controversial, this paper examines the history and disputes about Obeah, and gives a suitable answer from two points of view in terms of Christophine’s role and her retreat in the novel. Besides, for Christophine, obeah is a subversive weapon against postcolonial European dominance, whereas for Antoinette, its failure exposes the persistent cultural prejudices of Eurocentric ideology and the fundamental contradictions of colonial culture. By analyzing the symbolic connotations of Obeah and Christophine, this reading could offer readers insights into authentic “Caribbeanness” and the ways in which oppressed people reject the legacy of colonialism, white privilege, and Western hegemony. It also suggests that Rhys’s inclusive views on culture and ethnicity, which reveal her true writing intention and the work’s realistic significance. This paper concludes that her treatment of Christophine is neither authoritarian nor racist but rather a reflection of the author’s appreciation and respect for the black community. Most of all, her contribution to the dismantling of social barriers that are rooted in racial inequalities can be seen most clearly in the all-encompassing and inclusive perspective of a variety of ethnic and cultures that is portrayed in her treatment of Obeah and Christophine.},
 year = {2022}
}

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Xue Shi

School of Foreign Languages, Tongji University, Shanghai, China

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Xue Shi. (2022). The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea. Humanities and Social Sciences, 10(6), 378-385. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14

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ACS Style

Xue Shi. The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea. Humanit. Soc. Sci. 2022, 10(6), 378-385. doi: 10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14

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AMA Style

Xue Shi. The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea. Humanit Soc Sci. 2022;10(6):378-385. doi: 10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14

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@article{10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14,
  author = {Xue Shi},
  title = {The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea},
  journal = {Humanities and Social Sciences},
  volume = {10},
  number = {6},
  pages = {378-385},
  doi = {10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14},
  eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.hss.20221006.14},
  abstract = {As an anti-colonial rewriting of Jane Eyre, the Wide Sargasso Sea is recognized as Caribbean writer Jean Rhys’s masterpiece. It tells the narrative of the Cosway family, mixed-race descendants of British colonists in Jamaica, West Indies around 1834. Current studies of this book have mostly focused on the white Creole protagonist, Antoinette; however, the black nanny, Christophine, and her obeah are integral to the plot and have received little attention from scholars. In response to the fact that both obeah and Christophine are controversial, this paper examines the history and disputes about Obeah, and gives a suitable answer from two points of view in terms of Christophine’s role and her retreat in the novel. Besides, for Christophine, obeah is a subversive weapon against postcolonial European dominance, whereas for Antoinette, its failure exposes the persistent cultural prejudices of Eurocentric ideology and the fundamental contradictions of colonial culture. By analyzing the symbolic connotations of Obeah and Christophine, this reading could offer readers insights into authentic “Caribbeanness” and the ways in which oppressed people reject the legacy of colonialism, white privilege, and Western hegemony. It also suggests that Rhys’s inclusive views on culture and ethnicity, which reveal her true writing intention and the work’s realistic significance. This paper concludes that her treatment of Christophine is neither authoritarian nor racist but rather a reflection of the author’s appreciation and respect for the black community. Most of all, her contribution to the dismantling of social barriers that are rooted in racial inequalities can be seen most clearly in the all-encompassing and inclusive perspective of a variety of ethnic and cultures that is portrayed in her treatment of Obeah and Christophine.},
 year = {2022}
}

Copy | Download

TY  - JOUR
T1  - The True “Caribbeanness”: Resistance and Inclusiveness - On the Symbolic Meanings of Obeah and Christophine in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea
AU  - Xue Shi
Y1  - 2022/12/08
PY  - 2022
N1  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14
DO  - 10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14
T2  - Humanities and Social Sciences
JF  - Humanities and Social Sciences
JO  - Humanities and Social Sciences
SP  - 378
EP  - 385
PB  - Science Publishing Group
SN  - 2330-8184
UR  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.hss.20221006.14
AB  - As an anti-colonial rewriting of Jane Eyre, the Wide Sargasso Sea is recognized as Caribbean writer Jean Rhys’s masterpiece. It tells the narrative of the Cosway family, mixed-race descendants of British colonists in Jamaica, West Indies around 1834. Current studies of this book have mostly focused on the white Creole protagonist, Antoinette; however, the black nanny, Christophine, and her obeah are integral to the plot and have received little attention from scholars. In response to the fact that both obeah and Christophine are controversial, this paper examines the history and disputes about Obeah, and gives a suitable answer from two points of view in terms of Christophine’s role and her retreat in the novel. Besides, for Christophine, obeah is a subversive weapon against postcolonial European dominance, whereas for Antoinette, its failure exposes the persistent cultural prejudices of Eurocentric ideology and the fundamental contradictions of colonial culture. By analyzing the symbolic connotations of Obeah and Christophine, this reading could offer readers insights into authentic “Caribbeanness” and the ways in which oppressed people reject the legacy of colonialism, white privilege, and Western hegemony. It also suggests that Rhys’s inclusive views on culture and ethnicity, which reveal her true writing intention and the work’s realistic significance. This paper concludes that her treatment of Christophine is neither authoritarian nor racist but rather a reflection of the author’s appreciation and respect for the black community. Most of all, her contribution to the dismantling of social barriers that are rooted in racial inequalities can be seen most clearly in the all-encompassing and inclusive perspective of a variety of ethnic and cultures that is portrayed in her treatment of Obeah and Christophine.
VL  - 10
IS  - 6
ER  -

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