African Folklore: An Encyclopedia - Marshalls University

African Americans 181
designs in silk and cotton, respectively; the construction of baskets through the use of
natural materials and methods of manufacture; women’s modes of hair tying; cookery;
the “knitting” of fishnets; and the practice of fishing, in which the nets are cast, dropped,
and dragged. African influence persists, too, in the Sea Islanders’ insurance and burial
societies, praying bands, and community social groups, called “lodges,” for which the
African secret societies are the analogues. The Sea Island Creole language (also known as
Gullah or Geechee) is part of an African-English Creole continuum (called Afrish by
Baird), which includes the Creole languages of the Caribbean, such as Jamaican and
Barbadian. The Africanity of Gullah has been demonstrated by Lorenzo Dow Turner in
an epochal study of folklore and naming customs, some of which are still practiced today.
Children’s games of the Sea Islands often involve English language game songs such
as “Little Sally Walker (or Waters),” but the accompanying movement, dance, and game
interaction is typically African in social emphasis. Children’s toys are put together from
used cans, wire hangers, and natural substances (sand, wood, etc.). Joint grass dolls are a
popular toy. Women also make “dollbabies” out of salvaged scraps from quilt making or
other domestic sewing. These dolls may can be dressed in plantation-era costumes or in
the typical, layered look of the independent African Sea Island working woman.
Several books, mostly by outsiders, have been written about the area and include
travel accounts, novels, folklore collections, explorers’ journals, educational and religious
missionaries’ diaries, military records, and studies in history, language, and sociology.
Charlotte Forten Grimke, W.F.Allen, Lucy McKim Garrison, Thomas Wentworth
Higginson, William Gilmore Simms, Abigail Christensen, Charles Colcock Jones, Elsie
Clews Parsons, Julia Peterkin, Guy B. and Guion Griffis Johnson, and Guy and Candie
Carawan were all European Americans who wrote about the island people. Many others,
including recent arrivals such as Tina McElroy Ansa and Eugenia Price, who produced
books from African American and European American perspectives, respectively, have
written with fascination about the area and its people, whose traditional life has
commanded attention and respect.
The formerly high population concentration of African American residents has
changed in recent years for two main reasons: northward migration of the African
American islanders in search of better economic opportunity and the influx of European
Americans through suburban, resort, and commercial developments. Unconscionable
taking of African American-owned land for back taxes and seemingly large premiums
paid for shore land on Kiawah, Hilton Head, and Daufuskie Islands (S.C.) have benefitted
the developers and threatened the serene beauty, cultural integrity, sacred burial places,
and general access to some of these islands.
References
Carawan, Guy, and Candie Carawan. 1989. Ain’t you Got a Right to the Tree of Life? Athens:
University of Georgia Press.
Creel, Margaret Washington. 1988. A Peculiar People. New York: New York University Press.
Dabbs, Edith McBride. 1971. Face of an Island. New York: Grossman Publishers.
——. 1985. Sea Island Diary. Spartanburg, S.C.: The Reprint Company.
Jones, Bessie, and Bess Lomax Hawes. 1986. Step it Down. Athens: University of Georgia Press.
Jones-Jackson, Patricia. 1987. When Roots Die. Athens: University of Georgia Press.