Making Gullah by Melissa L. Cooper

Author:Melissa L. Cooper [Cooper, Melissa L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781469632681
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
Published: 2017-04-17T00:00:00+00:00

Katie Brown in Drums and Shadows. Courtesy Muriel and Malcolm Bell Jr.

Shad Hall in Drums and Shadows. Courtesy Muriel and Malcolm Bell Jr.

While Katie Brown and Shad Hall had given Savannah unit researchers a few supernatural tales, one elderly Sapelo Islander refused to fuel their fantasies about superstitious blacks. Julia Grovernor snubbed Granger’s voodoo questions and refused the pipe tobacco she offered. Granger described Grovernor: “Julia, very black, tall, and gaunt, was slightly hostile and suspicious and disinclined to talk.”210 Grovernor told Granger, “No’m, I ain know nuttun. Ise feeble-minded. I bin weak in head sence I small chile. No’m, I ain know nuttun bout witches. I ain know nuttn bout root doctuhs. No’m, I ain nebuh heah uh cunjuh. No’m, I ain know nuttun bout spells.”211 Julia Grovernor eventually gave in to Granger’s inquiries when she stumbled upon a topic that she liked—her Muslim “Ibo” grandparents.212 Grovernor had decided that talking about her ancestors was acceptable and told Granger about the two old Ibos, Hannah and Calina, and she repeated the story that her grandmother told about being abducted by slave catchers while digging peanuts with her aunt in Africa when she was a little girl.213 Grovernor’s cousin Phoebe Gilbert told Granger and her team a story about how Calina was trapped by slave catchers when he was a boy. He told his granddaughter that he was playing on the beach when he and a group of children were lured to a boat because they were curious about a piece of red flannel that the men on the boat displayed to attract their attention: “Den duh mens comes off boat an ketch um.”214

On Sapelo Island, Granger expanded her inquiry to include questions about Muslim slaves. Mary Granger could have easily learned about the Islanders’ Muslim ancestry from the National Geographic Magazine article. However she learned about the island’s Muslim past, it captured her attention. And Herskovits had told Granger how important Mohammed’s journal translation would be, because it would likely serve as a “demonstration of how much an educated slave knew and retained of certain formal aspects of one of the complex West African civilizations.”215 But Granger did not include this sort of analysis in Drums and Shadows. She asked Katie Brown and Shad Hall about Bilali Mohammed and recorded what Katie Brown and Shad Hall told her about their Muslim ancestor. They told her about Bilali’s seven daughters and about his wives.216 They described his prayer rituals: “Dey wuz bery puticuluh bout duh time dey pray an dey bery reguluh bout dey hour. Wen duh sun come up, wen it straight obuh head an wen it set.”217 Shad also shared with Granger their ancestors’ borrowed memories from Africa: “Muh Gran Hestuh say she kin membuh duh house she lib in in Africa.”218 Mohammed’s descendants were not the only Islanders who told the Savannah unit about the island’s Muslim past. Nero Jones also shared memories of Hannah and Calina’s prayers made “on duh bead.”219

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