Kindred Discussion Questions

Name: _____________________________________
Date: ____________
Period: _____
Kindred
Discussion Questions
Directions: You will be expected to answer these discussion questions from the book. I suggest that you
complete a few each day as you read. However, I understand that you each have other classes and
extracurricular commitments. Therefore, you can manage your time and complete them as you wish. However,
they will be collected at the end of our unit. If you have questions or do not understand something, please ask. It
will save your time and your grade. USE COMPLETE SENTENCES & A SEPARATE
SHEET OF PAPER TO RECORD YOUR RESPONSES.

1. Both Kevin and Dana know that they cannot change history. They say, Were in the middle of history. We surely
cant change it (Butler 100). Then again, they remark, Its over Theres nothing you can do to change any of it
now (Butler 264). What, then, is the purpose of Danas travels back to the antebellum South? Why must you, the
reader, experience this journey with Dana?
2. How would the story have been different with a third person narrator rather than a first person narrator?
3. Many of the chapters in Kindred resist classification. In what ways does Dana explode the slave stereotypes of the
mammy, the handkerchief-head, and the female Uncle Tom (Butler 154)? In what ways does she transcend them?
4. Despite Danas determination to refuse the mammy role in the Weylin household, she finds herself caught by it. She
states, I felt like Sarah, cautioning (Butler 156). Others see her as the mammy as well. They state, You sound just
like Sarah (Butler 156). How, if at all, does Dana reconcile her conscious efforts with her behavior? How would you
reconcile them?
5. I never realized how easily people could be trained to accept slavery. Dana says this to Kevin when they have
returned to the present and are discussing their experiences in the antebellum South. Do we also in the twenty-first
century still have conditioned responses to slavery?
6. How do you think Butler confronts us with issues of difference in Kindred? How does she challenge us to consider
boundaries of black/white, master/slave, husband/wife, past/present? What other differences does she convolute? Do
you think such dichotomies are flexible? Artificial? Pragmatic?
7. Compare Tom Weylin and Rufus Weylin. Is Rufus Weylin an improvement over his father? How is Danas influence
evident on the adult Rufus evident? Give a specific example from the text.
8. Of the slaves attitude toward Rufus, Dana, observes, Strangely, they seemed to like him, hold him in contempt, and
fear him all at the same time (Butler 229). How can they feel these contradictory emotions? How would you feel
toward Rufus if you were in their situation?
9. Compare Danas professional life (when she met Kevin) to her life as a slave on the Weylin plantation. What are the
similarities? What are the differences?
10. When Dana and Kevin return from the past together, she thinks, I felt as though I were losing my past here in my
own time. Rufus time was a sharper, stronger reality (Butler 191). Why would the twentieth century seem less vivid,
less real to Dana than the nineteenth century?
11. Dana loses her left arm as she emerges- for the last time in the novel- from the past. Why is this significant?
12. Kevin is stranded in the past for five years, while Dana is there for less than one year. Why did Butler feel Kevin
needed to stay in the past so much longer than Dana? How have their experiences affected their relationship to each
other and to the world around them?
13. A common trend in the time travels of science fiction assumes that one should not tamper with the past, lest you
disrupt the present. Butler obviously ignores this theory and her characters continue to invade each others lives. How
does this influence the movement of the narrative? How does it convolute the idea of cause and effect?
14. Dana finds herself caught in the middle of a relationship between Rufus and Alice. Why does Rufus use Dana to get
to Alice? Does Alice also use Dana?
15. The needs and well-being of other residents of the plantation create a web of obligation that is difficult to navigate.
Choose a specific incident and determine who holds power over whom; assess how it affects the situation.
16. Dana states: It was that destructive single-minded love of his. He loved me. Not the way he loved Alice, thank God.
He didnt seem to want to sleep with me. But he wanted me around- someone to talk to, someone who would listen to
him and care about what he said (Butler 180). How does the relationship between Dana and Rufus develop? How
does it change? What are the different levels of love portrayed in Kindred?
17. Discuss the ways in which the title encapsulates the relationships within the novel. Is it ironic? Literal? Metaphorical?
What emphasis do we place on our won kinship? How does it compare with that of the novel?
18. Do you believe that Dana and Kevins story actually happened, or do they simply get caught up in the nostalgia of
examining old papers and books? How would their situations significance have changed in Danas and Kevins lives
if it had been imaginary? If it were merely nostalgia or an imagined situation, how would that change your perception
of the antebellum South and the treatment of slaves? Would that make the events less significant?
19. Butler opens up the novel with the conclusion of Danas time travels. The final pages of the book, however, make up
an epilogue that once again demonstrates a linearly progressive moment of time. How does the epilogue serve to
disrupt the rhythm of the narrative?
20. After returning from his years in the nineteenth century, Kevin had attained a slight accent. Is this alteration
symbolic of greater changes to come? How do you imagine Kevin and Danas relationship will progress upon reentrance into 1976?
21. Here are the titles of each section of the novel: Prologue / The River / The Fire / The Fall / The Fight / The Storm /
The Rope / Epilogue. How do these titles weave into the theme of science fiction?

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SHEET OF PAPER TO RECORD YOUR RESPONSES.

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