Limbo – page 5. African culture About the shameful time of the slave trade White Europeans captured Africans & took them on slave ships to America They were sold to work as slaves on the plantations This is a period in history when white people believed they were superior, blacks were lesser beings & simply property!

Limbo poem tells about them doing this dance, the limbo, on the ship The poem is written as someone performing the dance, going down to the ground, the drum beating & then coming back up again they took this dance with them 2 their new lives, it became a traditional dance Conditions were on board ship were terrible, hard, cramped, many died on the way the dance symbolises & remembers this terrible time in their culture.

‘limbo, limbo like me’ There is repetition of the singing of the limbo song as they danced the drums were beating the rhythm ‘stick is the whip, and the dark deck is slavery’. the stick was the stick they were beaten with The poem has a strong beat & rhythm, like the dance. It is written as a single sentence, reflecting flow of movement & a life aboard which is never-ending, only ending the poem’s sentence, & the journey, when they arrive in America Line length is unusual, making & keeping the rhythm of the poem which is symbolising the limbo dance

The poem is about how they were beaten & taken into slavery but still they had spirit They kept their own culture alive what happened 2 them should not b forgotten.

Limbo- means? A place between heaven & hell So- the slaves were in the dark hold of the ships, not knowing what would happen to them – it was their Limbo They did not know if at the end of their journey they would find heaven or hell- what would the future hold for them? In the poem the voice of the poem goes through the dance, going down & them coming back up, this represents what happened to them- they were taken down into the ships hold from the sunshine of Africa Then they lived down below, only to emerge, rise up, come out of the ship- but what to?

Look for references to coming out of the ship Emerging from the ship is like coming up from being low to the ground in the dance moves When they get up into the new world will it be a bright heaven or a dark hell?

‘up & the music is saving me’ The dance, their music has kept them going ‘hot slow step On the burning ground.’ Why does the voice of the poem describe the first steps in America like this?

Limbo Look at the use of words relating to darkness, sun & heat ‘burning ground’ When they get up into the new world will it be a bright heaven or a dark hell? Why is the ground ‘burning’?