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Talking to the Dead
Religion, Music, and Lived Memory Among Gullah/Geechee Women
By LeRhonda S. Manigault-Bryant Duke University Press
Copyright © 2014 Duke University Press
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8223-7670-5
CHAPTER 1
Culture Keepers
A Modern Context
Driving into the South Carolina low country is certain to arouse a deep sense of nostalgia. Whether entering from Columbia via a southeastern route on I-26, through Savannah on I-95 north, or by way of a southern trek past Georgetown and Myrtle Beach on Highway 17, the meandering country roads, scenic patches of undeveloped forest, and small, sleepy, seemingly deserted towns give the distinct feeling of a slower pace. If you dare risk opening a car window—especially between the months of June and September!—prepare to be engulfed by a jarring humidity that makes clothes and hair cling. That hot, heavy, sticky dampness, combined with the potpourri of honeysuckle, ocean, fish, and salt marshes, evokes heartfelt appreciation for the luxury of air-conditioning. The ninety-two-mile drive between Beaufort, Charleston, and Moncks Corner includes at least an hour on two-lane highways, many of which are flanked by clusters of oak trees and palmettos. In the low country, the rich, lush green of grasses and tree leaves suggests exceedingly fertile soils. Stepping out onto a porch or the beach for a closer glimpse of the ocean reveals skies laden with hues akin to the azure-blue of the Caribbean. Make no mistake, once you enter the low country, you cannot help but relax—if only a bit—and to appreciate the meandering pace of time.
At first glance, this same sense of ease prevails in the towns of Cross and Moncks Corner, and the cities of Mt. Pleasant, James Island, and Beaufort. Yet a closer look reveals notable demographic differences. Cross and Moncks Corner are geographically the smallest and least populated of these areas. Although Cross's status as an unincorporated town limits the quantity and quality of available statistical data, the seemingly inverted ratio of white to black residents between Cross and Moncks Corner is noticeable. As part of Berkeley County, the largest in the state, these two towns have median annual incomes that are a representative average of broader county statistics, but below South Carolina's statewide income average of $45,000.
Lucille Gaillard, a fifty-nine-year-old resident of Moncks Corner, travels twice a week to attend Sunday worship service and Wednesday Bible Study at Poplar Hill Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Cross. The drive "is a straight shot up Highway 6" and takes about twenty minutes. However, Lucille spends a quarter of the year at her family home in Beaufort, a city ninety miles away whose greater metropolitan area boasts a total population of nearly fifty thousand residents. The contrast in geographic size and population has directly influenced Lucille's decision to keep her family in Moncks Corner and attend church in Cross. To her, "Beaufort jus' too big, too busy, and too white!" Lucille's social reading of Beaufort coincides with its demographics, as its nearly 70-percent white population contrasts strikingly with the racial makeup of Moncks Corner. Santee Cooper, a state utility company that was established during the New Deal, is Berkeley County's largest employer, and Lucille's husband Donald worked there until 2007, when he retired at the age of sixty-three. Increasingly, however, as more people recognize Moncks Corner's proximity to Charleston, local employment is shifting toward the primary industries of the city of Charleston: tourism and the rapid development of resorts and gated communities.
Lucille lives in the area of Moncks Corner known as Kittfield, a predominantly black community historically divided into "up top," where the smaller white population live, and "the bottom," where African Americans reside. Kittfield is the area where I grew up, but I did not know Lucille well as a youth because she lived "up top." I did know of her, however, and began cultivating a professional relationship with her during one of my visits to South Carolina in 2004. Lucille was posting flyers near the neighborhood baseball field advertising a "Gospel Sing" at her church in Cross. Given that most residents of the community attend local churches near town, I was surprised to learn that Lucille traveled "so far" to attend church, and that she did so multiple times per week. I soon discovered that Lucille spends a great deal of her life traveling throughout various areas of the low country. "... I [used to] go to Beaufort all the time, I'd go back and forth to see my family and to go to Mt. Sinai Baptist Church and New Hope Christian Church, which were my parents' churches. Then I found Poplar Hill and so I stayed in Cross and started going to church there." A curvaceous, dark-brown-skinned woman who "doesn't enjoy cooking as much, but loves to eat good food," Lucille sees Poplar Hill as instrumental to her survival during difficult times in her life. Lucille continued attending Poplar Hill, even after her first marriage failed and she moved to Moncks Corner. "Man, that was a hard time in my life and that church really supported me you know, it really did. So I just kept going."
Kittfield is also home to Lucinda Pinckney, who lives down the road from Lucille but admits they are not well acquainted. Their unfamiliarity is in part due to their age difference. At eighty-nine, Lucinda is a spry, lean woman who could easily pass for sixty. Standing over six feet tall, she has maintained relatively good health and has outlived her husband, seven younger siblings, and one of her four children. The daughter of a local itinerant Baptist preacher and a well-known seamstress, Lucinda has long been retired from her job as caretaker, and spends the bulk of her time "in the service of the Lord" and "checking in on [her] kids." Lucinda—or Ms. Cinda, as she is known within the community—has a commanding presence that makes many community members uncomfortable. She is not belligerent or mean, but also does not exude the traditional conviviality associated with southern women. Her very dark skin, prominent cheekbones, jutting chin, onyx-colored eyes, silver eyebrows, and jet-black hair contribute to her striking appearance. When combined with her imposing height, Ms. Cinda's arresting facial features—which are often couched in a stern expression—give her a no-nonsense persona. Lucinda is well aware of the community's perception of her, and she shrugs it off, "I don't pay these folks no mind, me and God got our own thing."
Moncks Corner is also where close friends Faye Terry and Roberta Kelly reside. Roberta lives in a small, brown, tin-roofed, three-bedroom house with yellow vinyl siding. As a resident of the historically African American section of town called the West End, Roberta is within walking distance from Wesley United Methodist Church (hereafter Wesley UMC), the church that she, Faye, and Lucinda regularly attend. Roberta and Faye, who met shortly after each moved to Moncks Corner when they were newly married, have a great deal in common. Faye owned a home and lived a few streets over from Roberta in the West End before moving to the mostly white area of Pinopolis, closer to her husband's job. After his death, Faye relocated in 2005 to an apartment in the predominantly black neighborhood of Haynesville. In addition to being members of Wesley UMC, being born at the brink of the Great Depression, and having children and grandchildren close in age, both women contributed to their families' income by working as maids, cooks, and caregivers for white families, and both women's husbands worked for the Berkeley County public school system.
I first met Yenenga Wheeler in 2003 at her residence on James Island, which is forty-five miles from Moncks Corner. After driving fifty minutes, crossing the James Island connector that links the island with the city of Charleston, traveling down Folly Road and onto several unpaved side roads, I reached the driveway of her blue, single-story, ranch-style house with a white awning and a matching porch. Her house was the only one on what appeared to be at least an acre of land, and a blue and white sign that read "Storytelling in the Gullah Language" welcomed me onto the porch. A slender, fair-skinned woman with shoulder-length dreadlocks, Yenenga came to the screen door and greeted me warmly with a hug and memorable words of welcome, "God's good." Casually dressed in green slacks, a tan blouse with lace sleeves, white socks, and brown, open-toed sandals, she sat down with me for our initial conversation only after I accepted a glass of water and declined (multiple times) her offer of food. Yenenga's home is large and spacious, comfortable and roomy, but not flashy or extravagant in any way. The room I became most familiar with, the sitting room, has cherry hardwood floors that accentuate walls decorated in muted pinks. The interior has an island feel to it, with soft pinks complemented with varied shades of green, including numerous live plants. The large, soft chairs were not merely showpieces, but received many guests.
Yenenga did not introduce to me to Ruth Kelly, but she had a direct hand in our meeting as she sent me to the church they both attend. It was there, at St. James Presbyterian, where I first met Ruth, a young, spirited woman in her late forties. I was sent to Ruth by their pastor, who believed she would be a good person for me to talk to in order to gain an understanding of the church and the role it played in the community. St. James was our ongoing meeting location, which is significant because of what it reveals about how much time Ruth actually spends there, doing what she calls "church work." When I first met her, Ruth embodied the style, dress, and persona of the consummate church professional, yet she has an infectious laugh that belies her professionalism. She wore her relaxed hair in an upswept bun with bangs and was dressed in dark slacks and a blouse. She was hospitable and punctual, and provided in-depth explanations about her personal experiences while placing them within the spectrum of church activities. It was clear from our meetings that Ruth was an effective communicator who had an air of maturity that seemingly surpassed her literal age—a trait she attributed to the fact that she "always used to hang out with the old folks."
Yenenga and Ruth are both members of St. James Presbyterian and lifelong residents of James Island, a Sea Island community that, like the city of Mt. Pleasant, has a complicated relationship with the city of Charleston because of its proximity. One half of James Island lies within Charleston's city limits, while the remainder is either part of the Town of James Island or is unincorporated. All that separates James Island from Charleston is the James Island connector. Similarly, the Cooper River and the historic Arthur Ravenel Bridge distinguish Mt. Pleasant from Charleston. Their respective locations place both towns within the Charleston–North Charleston Metropolitan Statistical Area, and people often buy residences on one of these two islands to avoid the higher costs associated with living in downtown Charleston. James Island and Mt. Pleasant also share hospitality, tourism, and urban development as their primary industries.
This is where the obvious similarities end, however, for Mt. Pleasant has almost double the population and median income of James Island; in addition, the contrast in the racial makeup of the cities is striking, especially when one compares the percentage of residents in each town living below the poverty line. Beatrice "Ms. Bea" Dixon, a nearly seventy-year-old woman who has lived all of her life in Mt. Pleasant, is well aware of the implications of racial and economic disparities in her town: "There ain't nothing but gated communities 'round yeh [here]. It used to be so that we could get together and maybe even get a little piece of land if you didn't inherit any. Now I can barely afford to pay the tax on my property since these white folks done come in an take over so." Ms. Bea feels the stress that the economic disparities of the tourist industry can induce, as her primary income derives from making baskets out of the natural warm-season sweetgrass found in coastal dune areas. Lulls in the tourist season, the natural ebb and flow of the market economy, and periods of poor weather mean that there are times when the money from making baskets does not meet her family's needs. In addition to providing food for her husband, four adult sons, and adult daughter, Ms. Bea also prepares enough food for her six grandchildren and fourteen great-grandchildren, who come to her house after school several days a week, as well as every Sunday. As a result, twice a week she travels forty minutes south to Beaufort where she cleans the home of and runs errands for a more elderly white woman.
It is noteworthy that Faye, Roberta, Lucinda, Lucille, and Beatrice have worked or continue to work as in-home domestics for white families, and all have a high-school-level education. It is therefore not merely coincidence that the five of them did not achieve a class status beyond the positions of poor and working-class domestics; as Angela Davis has noted, there are historically explicit connections between black women's level of education and their level of class attainment. According to Patricia Hill Collins, "Black women domestic workers remained poor because they were economically exploited workers in a capitalist political economy.... [H]istorically, many White families in both the middle and working class were able to maintain their class position because they used Black women domestic workers as a source of cheap labor. Ruth is exceptional in that she has worked as an office manager, and she attended a four-year college after graduating from high school. After college, she returned home and went into church ministry. She counts herself as "lucky to be able to work for the church full time now," and she has been a paid employee of the church since shortly after completing college.
That Faye, Roberta, Lucille, Beatrice, and Lucinda have worked as domestics coincides with the historical treatment of black women as mammies, cooks, and other domestic figures within white households and communities. It is even more striking that well into retirement age Beatrice and Lucille both continue to be employed by white families as domestics. If these women hold a seeming sense of disdain for white people—or "buckra," as the Gullah/Geechee often call them—it is because they are well acquainted with what Roberta calls "the wills and ways of 'dem white folks." All five of the women are well aware of the stigma associated with their positions as servants. Faye noted that white people frequently referred to her as "Mammy" or "Mauma" for as long as she could remember, even after she retired as an in-home caretaker for a white family. That these women continue to be relegated to these positions speaks to the lasting implications of their particular positions as black women with limited education in the South, and supports contemporary examinations that note modern reinscriptions of these historical forms. These women's class status is especially important to consider because of the ways it also affects their religious lives, where women continue to dominate positions within the religious sphere such as church mothers, hospitality committee members, and nursery providers—positions that are frequently deemed as "caretaker" in nature.
At best, Lucinda, Faye, and Roberta can be viewed as examples of the poorest levels of working-class women. Although the subject of their specific incomes was never broached, their frequent references to their economic struggles and to their stated trust in God to help them "get through," the material items within their homes, and the homes themselves—while well kept, inviting, and comfortable—reflect a borderline impoverished lifestyle. Lucille and Beatrice, on the other hand, could be characterized as working class because they are property owners, have larger (though not bountiful) homes and land, have cars (both, coincidentally, own Ford vehicles), and have appeared to retire with some level of economic comfort. Yet they both "come out of retirement" to "clean house" or run errands for white people to supplement their income as necessary, which occurs in Lucille's case from time to time even though she has a debilitating heart condition; she is a skilled seamstress. Their current positions reflect the perpetuation of the black servant-class culture common to southern cities and communities.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Talking to the Dead by LeRhonda S. Manigault-Bryant. Copyright © 2014 Duke University Press. Excerpted by permission of Duke University Press.
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