디아스포라 역사에서 희생자로 남지 않기 ―카릴 필립스의 『강을 건너며』와 대서양 노예서사

This paper aims to analyze the importance and the consequences of the Transatlantic Slave Trade and the diaspora history through Caryl Phillips’s novel, Crossing the River. Phillips has focused on the legacy of the Atlantic slave trade and the problem for the African Diaspora in his narratives because he is African British author from the Caribbean island of St Kitts. In other words, his several layers of identity consisted of the Africa ancestry, the Caribbean birth, upbringing in Britain, and life in America made him cover slave trade and its aftermath. The reason why is that the main thesis embodied in Crossing the River has connection with slave history and diaspora. Phillips''s main interest, most of all, is about how black people survived in the Atlantic slave trade and became to have independent voices in the center of the tragic diaspora history. Crossing the River weaves together four narratives and four characters of forced displacement related with the Atlantic slave trade. For this thematic development, Phillips portrays the slave trade in Africa in the 18th century, the journey back to Africa of emancipated slaves in the 19th century, the ordeal of a former slave woman in America and the alienation of an Englishwoman and an African-American soldier in England in the 20th century. This paper treats that Phillips illuminates relations between black and white, master and servant, survivor and victims to describe a diaspora history through this development.