Mama’s Baby, Papa’s Slavery? The Problem and Promise of Mothering in Octavia E. Butler’s “Bloodchild”

Abstract

This essay examines the mother as the primary agent of social change in Octavia E. Butler’s short story, “Bloodchild” (1984). Drawing on the theory of maternal inheritance that Hortense J. Spillers introduces in her essay, “Mama’s Baby, Papa’s Maybe: An American Grammar Book” (1987), I argue that Butler presents mothering as a progressive force, allowing her marginalized characters—regardless of their sex—to destroy familial and communal hierarchies. I contend that a history of reproductive oppression gives Butler’s male protagonist access to the power of motherly love, what Spillers situates as a tradition of nonphallic maternal authority developed out of black women’s experiences during slavery. Positioning Butler’s male protagonist as an inheritor of this maternal authority gives prominence to Butler’s philosophy of motherly love, which situates the father as an equal progenitor of maternal power and advances the larger scholarly project of putting psychoanalytic theories of psychosexual development in dialogue with critical race and postcolonial theories.