# data[].attributes.body
Beloved Final Project

The free black community in Cincinnati was a major part and setting in the story of Beloved, as during the time before emancipation, Ohio, was the furthest west of the westward expansion, it was considered a free state between two enslaved states (Kentucky and Virginia) and many freedom seekers would go there to find protection and sanctuary. It was also usually a state where most would use it as another transitional state to head further north specifically Canada, although the sate was considered a free state so much upheaval would be in the young state from abolitionst and antislavery societies being burndown by enslaver sympithizers to school walkouts and the the making of the first integrated and Co-ed school of Oberlin College. Finally, to the story that would inspire the book, the case of Margaret Garner herself, this project would be a digital exhibit with a story map component.

Research Questions:

How did the free black community in Cincinnati shape or reflect the life experiences of Morrison's character, particularly Sethe and Baby Suggs?

In what ways does Morrison use historical Cincinnati to explain the themes of freedom, trauma,  memory, and community resilience within the story?

What historical events, spaces, and figures from Cincinnati's real-life free black community parallel or contrast with the fictional portals in Beloved?

# data[].attributes.headline
Visualizing the legacies of enslavement through art

# data[].attributes.subject
Visualizing the legacies of enslavement through art

# data[].attributes.body
For my final project I would like to focus on a digital exhibit or curation, whose objective is to explore and visualize the enduring legacies of enslavement, the middle passage and Black resilience through the lens of Toni Morrison's Beloved, complemented by artworks from contemporary Black artists inspired by similar themes. My thoughts are to break it down into several categories. For example, depictions of trauma and dehumanization in images like Kerry James Marshall's Great America (1994), which reimagines an amusement park ride as a metaphor for the middle passage, blending historical horror with contemporary imagery. Or, the legacies of systemic oppression. Howardena Pindell's, American, Born 1943 (1988) a mixed media piece that addresses racism, feminism, and exploitation through abstract forms and textures. And, resilience and reclamation. Through stories of Black empowerment, community building and cultural preservation artists like Tomashi Jackson have created spaces of self-determination and empowerment. I would like to use the artist's works to draw parallels between these artworks and Morrison's narrative, particularly Denver's journey. How do these works tie back? How do they push the narrative and instruct the present?

# data[].attributes.body
The characters in Toni Morrison's novel Beloved have an awareness and familiarity with the supernatural that informs their understandings of memory, forgiveness and love. My final project will be a digital exhibit (Padlet) which will examine how Toni Morrison’s Beloved uses supernatural elements—including the haunted house at 124, the reincarnated Beloved, and Sethe’s scarred “tree”— as well as biblical - "Baby Suggs, holy"- to confront the psychological and cultural trauma of slavery and the alternative forms of belief that sustained black Americans at the time. Paying close attention to African spiritual traditions, African-American Christian practice and magical realism, the analysis will explore how Morrison reimagines ghosts, resurrection, and bodily marks as avenues for repressed memory and collective healing.

Guiding Questions include:

1. How does Morrison’s use of water in Beloved’s resurrection reflect diasporic spiritual practices?

2. In what ways does the haunted house act as metaphor for the pyschological aftermath of slavery?

3. Why did Morrison use magical realism instead of strict historical realism to depict trauma?

4. How does Morrison’s declaration and repetition of "Baby Suggs, holy" redefine traditional religious sanctity?

# data[].attributes.headline
The Natural World and Black Female Self-determination 

# data[].attributes.subject
The Natural World and Black Female Self-determination 

# data[].attributes.body
I want to further explore how nature operates as more than just a backdrop in Beloved. Specifically, how it becomes a vital space where Black women like Sethe, Denver, and Baby Suggs navigate selfhood, healing, and survival. I'm curious about the ways these characters turn to the natural world not only as a refuge from violence, but as a place to reclaim their bodies, build community, and imagine new possibilities for freedom. I’m interested in how Morrison links Black female self-determination to the land, and how each woman’s relationship with nature becomes a quiet or radical act of resistance. Nature serves as a constant witness to their moments of care, transformation, and autonomy, marking the reconstruction of Black womanhood across generations. Each character’s journey unfolds differently, shaped by her context and time, yet all of them find something vital in nature: a sense of power, a path to recovery, or a glimpse of something freer. I want to explore why the natural world is so central to the Black female experience in Beloved, and how Morrison’s rich visual language, especially her use of color, helps us access the emotional depth, memory, and personhood of each woman. Below I listed some themes I’m interested in.

1) In what ways does the use of color, texture, and spatial imagery complicate the boundary between internal and external worlds, allowing nature to become an extension of Black female experience?

2) How do intergenerational relationships to land in the book reflect varying strategies of self-determination, and what tensions emerge between rootedness, flight, and return in Sethe, Baby Suggs, and Denvers experiences of nature?

3)How does Morrison blend ideas about nature and spirituality to offer a different way of understanding healing. One that is not straightforward or individual, but instead cyclical, shared, and deeply connected to place and community, especially through the experiences of Black women?

# data[].attributes.headline
Black Women’s Sexuality: Violence, Pleasure, and Liberation

# data[].attributes.subject
Black Women’s Sexuality: Violence, Pleasure, and Liberation

# data[].attributes.body
Research questions:

1. How does Beloved reveal both the historical sexual violation and the enduring erotic sovereignty of Black women’s bodies and desires—from slavery through its aftermath to contemporary times?

2. How does Beloved represent the Black female body as an archive that holds the trauma of slavery’s sexual violence, while also serving as a site of erotic freedom and self-possession?

Throughout reading Beloved, I became very interested in the role of sex, sexual assault, and sexual desire and what they represent in the novel. Sethe is the victim of violent sexual assault and has her sexual autonomy taken away several times. But Sethe (along with Beloved) also experiences sexual liberation and freedom; something long denied Black women. In my digital exhibit, I want to explore how Toni Morrison presents Black women as both a site of sexual oppression and a site of sexual freedom and desire. I want to explore how Morison uses sex and intimacy to acknowledge the full humanity and inner lives of enslaved Black people. Yes, they endured terrible conditions, but they were still people with full interior lives, complete with sex, desire, and pleasure; and this includes Black women.

Additionally, I want to explore how Morrison uses literature to convey imagery of both sexual violence and liberation on Black women’s bodies. Morrison inserts violation and resistance in bodily markers and employs the body as a sort of archive (scars, milk, pregnancy, and haunting) that holds the trauma of slavery. Yet those same bodily markers also become sites of resistance and reclamation. Sethe’s “chokecherry‑tree” scars illustrates this duality perfectly: the whipping is a brutal reminder of Sethe’s sexual assault, but the scars also represent a beautiful map of survival when Amy and Paul D regard her scars with reverence. I want the exhibit to show that Black women’s erotic lives are not solely stories of violation but also of freedom. As the exhibit develops, I will explore three additional questions: (1) In what ways does Beloved visualize coerced reproduction and sexual assault? (2) Where do moments of chosen desire interrupt that narrative? (3) How might these moments inform present‑day conversations on Black women’s sexual sovereignty?

Tentative image ideas- if anyone has more suggestions please comment :)

Gordon’s 1863 “whipped back” photo (visualization of Sethe’s “chokecherry-tree)

Renée Cox’s Yo Mama’s Last Supper (sexually liberated perspective of the Black female body)

# data[].attributes.headline
Generational Trauma through the lens of Toni Morrison's Beloved 

# data[].attributes.subject
Generational Trauma through the lens of Toni Morrison's Beloved 

# data[].attributes.body
One of the core themes of the book Beloved was the power that slavery held over the main characters. This power could manifest itself in many ways throughout the novel, depending on which character. For Sethe, the violence of slavery caused her to act out of fear. Denver learned this violence from her mother, which led her to live most of her life in fear of the real world. This violence was also the reason why Paul D felt as if you could not give a person the amount of love, and that love could run out. I believe that throughout the book, Morrison gives us many more examples of how the horrors of slavery ruined the Black household and created problems that last to our day. For my final project, I would like to write a conference paper that investigates Beloved and how generational violence affects Black communities and the Black household structure.

Potential Questions

1) Did the dehumanization methods, such as Paul D's bit, truly have an impact on his life going forward?

2) Is there a relationship between Sethe's boys running away and the black stereotype of the absentee father?

3) Is it necessary for a Black male for the household to be complete? ie, Paul D comes back at the end of the novel

4) What role does remembrance of violence have on generations to come?

5) Is it possible to forget such a violent history, or for that violence not to have an effect on generations to come?

6) Is there a normative model for what a Black household should be?

7) What effects did the violence of slavery have on future generations?

# data[].attributes.body
For my final paper, I am interested in putting Beloved—especially Sethe’s infanticide and the community’s negative reaction—in dialogue with contemporary abortion debates unfolding both online and in the wake of Dobbs v. Jackson. Anti‑abortion rhetoric often reduces complex circumstances to a single question of female culpability, framing women as morally suspect while ignoring the structural violence that produces their “choices.” Morrison refuses that simplification: Sethe’s act, born of the consequences of slavery, exposes how reproductive decisions can emerge from extreme coercion. Sethe’s desperate choice shows a clear link between slavery’s view of Black mothers and their children as property and today’s laws that restrict women’s control over their own bodies, reinforcing the notion that women’s—and especially Black women’s—reproduction is owned by the state. Placing Sethe’s experience alongside contemporary pro‑ and anti‑abortion rhetoric allows me to examine how both legal language and social‑media backlash continue to individualize blame while erasing systemic constraints. The novel’s community condemns Sethe yet glosses over the white terror that shaped her dilemma; today’s restrictive laws and viral shame campaigns replicate that dynamic. By reading Beloved as a lens on current debates, I want to show that both past and present systems that keep women down use the same tactic: first, they strip women of control over their own bodies, and then they punish them for choices they’re pushed into making.

Some guiding questions might include: How does Morrison’s narrative position Sethe’s infanticide as an act of resistance against a system that commodifies Black motherhood, and what parallels emerge with modern anti‑abortion statutes? In what ways does the community’s condemnation of Sethe echo the moralizing tone of contemporary shaming directed at women who seek abortions? What does Beloved teach us about the limits of “choice” under conditions of structural violence, and how might that lesson complicate current pro‑choice rhetoric that centers autonomy without addressing inequity? Can Morrison’s insistence on narrative empathy—her demand that we inhabit Sethe’s impossible position—offer a model for reframing public discourse around reproductive justice today?

# data[].attributes.headline
Radical Self Care as Seen Through Denver

# data[].attributes.subject
Radical Self Care as Seen Through Denver

# data[].attributes.body
I think that Denver offers a compelling lens through which to examine the concept of radical self-care. Although often overlooked in favor of Sethe or Beloved, Denver undergoes a quiet but powerful transformation, one rooted in a redefinition of care, not just for others, but for herself.

From the start, Denver is portrayed as deeply anxious, emotionally enmeshed with her mother, and consumed by the ghosts—literal and metaphorical—that haunt 124. Ghosts, in this regard referring to the ghost of her sister Beloved, but also the shadows of her family's past (this angle also highlights the intergenerational transmission themes). Her concern is always outward-facing: she worries about Sethe's mental state, worries about Beloved's love and attention for her, and isolates herself to maintain a fragile sense of safety. Her selfhood is shaped by the need to protect what remains of her family, a need that stems from both inherited and personal trauma. In this way, Denver’s anxiety is not unfounded—it is a survival mechanism in a world that has repeatedly demonstrated its violence and instability.

However, Denver’s most radical act is when she decides to step beyond the boundaries of 124. Realizing that Sethe is being consumed by Beloved and that their home has become unsustainable, Denver leaves, physically walking out the door and seeking help from the community. She goes to Lady Jones to ask for work and support, a moment that symbolizes both vulnerability and strength. This choice marks a turning point. For perhaps the first time, Denver prioritizes her own agency and development. She steps into the unknown not just for Sethe’s sake, but because she understands that survival now demands growth, connection, and self-determination.

In choosing to engage with the world, Denver enacts a form of radical self-care. Not self-care in the commodified or individualistic sense, but as a political and emotional commitment to her own becoming. Her decision to seek education and employment, to ask for help, and to envision a life beyond 124, signifies her refusal to be trapped by the past. By imagining a future for herself, Denver disrupts the cycle of inherited trauma and asserts her right to well-being.

Through Denver, Morrison suggests that radical self-care is not about abandoning others, but about understanding that we cannot truly care for anyone else without first recognizing our own humanity. Denver’s evolution is quiet, but it is revolutionary. In choosing herself, she opens the door to possibility—for her family, and for herself.

For this project, it would be nice to take a more creative angle but it seems the best way to analyze this is through the research paper.

Research Questions:

How does Morrison use silence and interiority in Denver’s character to illustrate the emotional labor of care and the eventual necessity of self-liberation?

In what ways does Morrison use Denver’s character to challenge traditional narratives of self-sacrifice within Black familial structures?

What does Beloved reveal about the complexities of healing from generational trauma within Black families and communities?

# data[].attributes.body
I am going to be writing a conference paper as my final project. I want to explore the depiction of intergenerational trauma in "Beloved." Specifically, I want to focus on the following research question(s): How are the traumas and suffering of slavery and racism passed on from one generation to the next? And what literary techniques does Morrison use to depict this intergenerational trauma? My conference paper will focus a lot on the concept of Rememory, as this is one of the main ways Morrison depicts trauma. I think I will be able to analyze these questions from psychological, historical, and philosophical lenses. The topic of intergenerational trauma also connects to the legacies of enslavement/scenes of subjection topics, so I will be able to use those sources such as Nash, Sharpe, and Hartman in my paper. I would like to focus particularly on Baby Suggs, Sethe, and Denver. The relationship between Sethe and Denver should be the most replete with references to Rememory and the transmission of intergenerational trauma. Also, I will focus on how Denver was able to break the cycle of violence and suffering by relying on the community.

# data[].attributes.headline
Exploring the nuanced connection of Black women and water

# data[].attributes.subject
Exploring the nuanced connection of Black women and water

# data[].attributes.body
The present digital video project explores the ways in which Black women artists have utilized water as a consistent symbol of rebirth, resistance, and collective historical memory. This visual project was birthed  from Toni Morrison's seminal novel Beloved (1987), a work in which water holds moments of death, birth, and reentry central to its narrative. Continually the video hopes to compile clips from recent visual media, including Beyoncé's Lemonade (2016) and Janelle Monáe's "Water Slide" (2023),  and others, to analyze the role of water as a space of both mourning and transformation in the Black feminine imagination.

The work seeks to situate itself amongst  the expansive framework of the Black Atlantic in context to water and femininity. As well as its enduring impact on displacement and resilience. Through the historical circumstances of slavery, migration, and intergenerational trauma black women have developed an intricate connection to water. The video rejects  a linear narrative structure and instead creates a fluid assemblage of sound, corporeal movement ,emblematic of the wistfulness and fluidity of water. The artworks used in the video are created within a black diasporic context that continues to struggle with the aftermath of racial violence and the silencing of Black women's voices.

Drawing on Black diasporic theory as supplemented by feminist ecocriticism as its foundational framework, this project contends that water constitutes a space of Black feminine experience, which is marked by fluidity, maternalism, and resistance to erasure. Though historical accounts have often depicted water as a space of tragedy or violence, this project discerns its possibilities for transformation, as evident with the women who migrate through and emerge from its depths. These circumstances portend that Black women endure more than survival in water's depths; they instead reinvent themselves in relation to it.

The project's importance is in the way it combines historical literary study with modern-day visual narrative practice. By inserting Morrison's water poetics between the aesthetics of music videos and digital collage, the video presents an affective and experimental style of scholarship that prioritizes Black women's bodies, emotions, and artistic works as both witness and author of their own renewal.

Questions:

In a diasporic sense, what does water mean? --> How can we see continuities amongst various black cultures

How does popular media answer the previous questions and how can we see it in our daily lives.