L'esclavage constitue le chronotope de "Tituba" de M. Condé et de "Beloved" de T. Morrison. Il est un héritage paradigmatique dans les autres œuvres de ces auteures, ainsi que chez Alice Walker et Gisèle Pineau, déterminant les rapports raciaux contemporains. La fragmentation du corps esclave convoque le motif de la couture, entre tissage conteur, re-membrement du corps social, et reconfiguration d'une tâche traditionnellement féminine. La mise en exergue du pouvoir performatif des mots des maîtres rappelle l’historicité et la dimension politique de l'invention du racisme dans le régime plantocratique. L'exemple de la beauté féminine et de sa racialisation illustre l'intrication complexe de la construction du genre et de la race. Mais le récit du passé esclavagiste, s'il peut éclairer et expliquer le présent, n'est fait qu'au prix d'un combat douloureux contre divers processus de refoulements, individuels et collectifs. Si "Beloved" et "La couleur Pourpre" rappellent le rôle essentiel de la réminiscence, "Paradis", "Morne Câpresse" et "Heremakhonon" mettent en scène des hypertrophies mémorielles problématiques ou drolatiques. La critique de la prétention historienne à l'objectivité y participe d'une remise en cause globale de la scientificité et de l'héritage des Lumières. Les ambivalences de la postmémoire s'opposent à la sacralisation contemporaine de la littérature mémorielle ou testimoniale, et la hantise postcoloniale se donne à voir sous un jour nouveau, ironique. L'analyse des maternités dialectiques dans "Beloved", "Tituba" ou "Rosie Carpe" permet de réfléchir le lien entre narration de la nation, racialisation de la maternité et contrôle du corps des femmes. Une lecture des œuvres du corpus à l'aune du concept d'intersectionnalité permet d'envisager une déconstruction globale de la féminité libérée de l'injonction à la sexualité reproductive. Au croisement du pouvoir de donner la vie et de son refus, le personnage de la sage-femme est récurrent. Souvent accusée de sorcellerie, elle nourrit une mythologie féminine qui peut retourner le stigmate magique. Fruit de rivalités dans les champs médicaux et religieux, la figure de la sorcière chez Toni Morrison, Maryse Condé ou Marie NDiaye est une invention interculturelle dont la force performative et parodique ébranle les catégories littéraires. Issus du traumatisme de l'esclavage, les romans étudiés esquissent les contours d'utopies concrètes. Leur dimension totalitaire et séparatiste cependant se révèle dans le visage grimaçant de l'espérance eschatologie contemporaine : la secte. Si la projection dans le futur semble ainsi dérisoire, le retour en un espace premier, refuge utérin et remontée dans le temps, s'abîme dans l'impossibilité du retour en Afrique. La Négritude césairienne est ainsi mise à distance, tandis que les espoirs de la Créolité semblent battus en brèche par une littérature récusant l'utopie post-raciale. Les migrations contemporaines et les douleurs de la condition exilique sont narrées sans idéalisation de la mobilité, tandis que les stratégies narratives des auteures diffèrent, tout en se retrouvant dans un désir de révéler en même temps que de dépasser la ligne de couleur. / Slavery is the chronotope of "Tituba" by M. Condé and "Beloved" by T. Morrison. Slavery is a paradigmatic heritage in other novels by these authors, as well as in Alice Walker's and Gisèle Pineau's art ; it determines the contemporary racial relationships. The splitting up of the slave's body calls to mind the pattern of sewing, narrative weaving, re-membering of the social body, and reinventing a traditionally feminine work. The highlighting of performative power of the master's words reminds us the historicity and the politic aspect of the invention of racism in the plantation system. The example of women's beauty and its racialization illustrates the complicated co-construction of gender and race. The writing of past history of slavery points out and explains the present time, but it requires a painful fight against various processes of individual and collective repression. "Beloved" and "The Color Purple" remind us of the importance of rememory, while "Paradise", "Morne Câpresse" and "Heremakhonon" tell about memory in excess. The criticism of historian claim for objectivity belongs to a global questioning of science on the one hand, and of the heritage of Enlightenment on the other. The ambivalences of postmemory confront the contemporary sacralization of memorial and testimonial literature. Postcolonial haunting is seen in a nex light, quite ironic. The analysis of dialectic motherhood in "Beloved", "Tituba" or "Rosie Carpe" allows us to conceptualise the link between national storytelling, racialization of motherhood and political control of women's bodies. Reading and analysing the novels with the concept of intersectionality shows a global deconstruction of womanhood, freed from the stress of reproductive sexuality. At the crossroad of women's power to give birth and death, the midwife is a recurring character. The midwife is often accused of being a witch, and she belongs to a feminine mythology that can turn the stigma around. The witch is born from rivalry in both religious and medical fields. In Toni Morrison's, Maryse Condé's or Marie Ndiaye's novels, the witch is an intercultural invention ; her parodic and performative strength undermines literary categories. Born from the trauma of slavery, the novels outline the pattern of concrete utopias. The totalitarian and separatist aspect of these utopias appears in the grinning face of the contemporary eschatological hope: the sect. Therefore any hope of a better future seems to be ridiculous ; when the return to a primary space, turning back in time, is dying in the impossible way back to Africa. The "Négritude" of Aimé Césaire is dismissed, and so are the hopes of "Créolité", by a literature that rejects post-racial utopia. There is not any idealization of movement in these novels, which tell contemporary migrations and pains of exile condition. Although the narrative strategies are different, they all intend to expose and overcome the color line.

This thesis is about the self-identity of antebellum New Orleans's free people of color. The emphasis of this work is that French culture, mixed Gallic and African ancestry, and freedom from slavery served as the three keys to the identity of this class of people. Taken together, these three factors separated the free people of color from the other major groups residing in New Orleans - Anglo-Americans, white Creoles and black slaves. The introduction provides an overview of the topic and states the need for this study. Chapter 1 provides a look at New Orleans from the perspective of the free people of color. Chapter 2 investigates the slaveownership of these people. Chapter 3 examines the published literature of the free people of color. The conclusion summarizes the significance found in the preceding three chapters and puts their findings into a broader interpretive framework.

Sex-education in Canada has predominantly been informed by an abstinence-based content, leaving the sexual literacy of adolescents hanging in the balance. As public health statistics indicate, sexually transmitted infection, early and unwanted pregnancy, and rates of HIV/ AIDS are staggeringly high. At the center of these statistics is the young Black female, as they are disproportionately over-represented in negative public health statistics. Many factors have been theorized to be the cause; from socioeconomic factors to educational limitations, it has been historically concluded that the individual failings and class issues of Black women are the root cause of sexual decision making that causes negative health implications. However, adopting a critical perspective may lead to a different conclusion. This qualitative study sought to explore if the lack of comprehensive, racially attentive, and reflective sex-education as well as the influential societal discourse that shapes Black women and their sexuality in stereotypical lights, may have an impact on the sexual decision making of Black women. Through centering and highlighting the lived experiences, perspectives, and insights of a diverse pool of Black women, the stereotypes and scripts of Black femininity and sexuality, their root causes, and the impacts on young Black girl’s sexual decision making were captured to collaboratively redefine and reclaim Black femininity and sexuality while capturing what would be helpful to include in sex-education, specific to Black girls and women. This study’s theoretical underpinnings are Black Feminist Theory, Critical Race Theory, and Hip-Hop Feminism, which has been coined by me as “the trifecta”. A focus group with Black female-identified participants was conducted and facilitated through open-ended question and discussion based processes. Thematic analysis was adopted to explore themes, meanings and to gain a better understanding of the participant’s collective perspectives regarding sex-education and Black femininity and sexuality. The main finding of this study, based in the lived experiences and insights of the participants, were that harmful societal scripts and stereotypes about Black femininity and sexuality historically and as they are presented in popular media, coupled with inconsistent and bare sex education, has the ability to affect the sexual decision making of young Black girls in a way that feeds participation in unsafe sexual practices. This study fills gaps in literature because it contributes to the limited critical body of research that paramount the voices and insight of Black women in regards to sexual practice. This study also fills gaps by extending the conversation of Black women and sexual decision making, by suggesting tangible solutions of how the participant’s insights can be injected into larger policy and practice as well as social work research. The information supplied by the participants of this study will help social workers, policy makers, and educators create racially attentive, comprehensive, and accessible sex-education. / Thesis / Master of Social Work (MSW) / Sex-education in Canada has predominantly been informed by an abstinence-based content, leaving the sexual literacy of adolescents hanging in the balance. As public health statistics indicate, sexually transmitted infection, early and unwanted pregnancy, and rates of HIV/ AIDS are staggeringly high. At the center of these statistics is the young Black female, as they are disproportionately over-represented in negative public health statistics. Many factors have been theorized to be the cause; from socioeconomic factors to educational limitations, it has been historically concluded that the individual failings and class issues of Black women are the root cause of sexual decision making that causes negative health implications. However, adopting a critical perspective may lead to a different conclusion. This qualitative study sought to explore if the lack of comprehensive, racially attentive, and reflective sex-education as well as the influential societal discourse that shapes Black women and their sexuality in stereotypical lights, may have an impact on the sexual decision making of Black women. Through centering and highlighting the lived experiences, perspectives, and insights of a diverse pool of Black women, the stereotypes and scripts of Black femininity and sexuality, their root causes, and the impacts on young Black girl’s sexual decision making were captured to collaboratively redefine and reclaim Black femininity and sexuality while capturing what would be helpful to include in sex-education, specific to Black girls and women. This study’s theoretical underpinnings are Black Feminist Theory, Critical Race Theory, and Hip-Hop Feminism, which has been coined by me as “the trifecta”. A focus group with Black female-identified participants was conducted and facilitated through open-ended question and discussion based processes. Thematic analysis was adopted to explore themes, meanings and to gain a better understanding of the participant’s collective perspectives regarding sex-education and Black femininity and sexuality. The main finding of this study, based in the lived experiences and insights of the participants, were that harmful societal scripts and stereotypes about Black femininity and sexuality historically and as they are presented in popular media, coupled with inconsistent and bare sex education, has the ability to affect the sexual decision making of young Black girls in a way that feeds participation in unsafe sexual practices. This study fills gaps in literature because it contributes to the limited critical body of research that paramount the voices and insight of Black women in regards to sexual practice. This study also fills gaps by extending the conversation of Black women and sexual decision making, by suggesting tangible solutions of how the participant’s insights can be injected into larger policy and practice as well as social work research. The information supplied by the participants of this study will help social workers, policy makers, and educators create racially attentive, comprehensive, and accessible sex-education.