Picking Cotton and Mixing Labor

(PROMPT AT BOTTOM)

Let's assume a Lockean theory of property for this exercise, in particular his theory of appropriation through mixing your labor with the land, and including the provisos to 'leave enough and as good' and non-spoilage.  It is likely that Locke himself, and certainly other colonial aspirants , sought to justify the colonization of what is now called North America with this theory of natural property rights.  One clear response is that appropriation through labor mixing only applies to unowned land, and of course an Indigenous people had been living throughout this continent for a long time.  With a prior owner, colonial labor mixing on the territory is not a mechanism for appropriation.  In response, the defender of colonial territory rights might argue that in this particular case we have an indigenous population that did not have a recognized right of ownership of land, did not cultivate agriculture and largely left the land in an unmodified state as great as is possible.  Thus, while Native Americans clearly occupied the territory, they did not have a natural property right in it because they were opposed to such property rights.  It was thus unowned at the time of colonization.  This might sound like a strong move, however a number of criticisms have argued that it suffers from a very impoverished understanding of Native American life and community.  This is detailed below.  A second point is that nothing in the Lockean account claims that a person must intend to appropriate land in order to do so.

So...we have a nicely iterated philosophical debate.   Let's say the colonialist loses the debate, Native Americans actually have a Lockean claim to this territory.  But, now what do we say about the slaves and sharecroppers that had been mixing (forced) labor from the very beginning? This is NOT a point about rectification for slavery.  The point here is that the laboring in the fields now looks like mixing labor with unowned land, since we now voided the colonialist's claim to it.  That would give a claim for African American ownership of some portion of the territory.  We now seem to have competing claims of ownership.  Complicated.


Time for some blues.    Lightnin' is not making an argument in "Cotton" (above) in any obvious way, but he's laying out some real experiences related to physical toll of picking cotton, as with most of the work available to emancipated slaves facing Jim Crow.  Lightnin' refused a life of laboring in fields or on the railroads, and since he ain't but 90 pounds, he can't pull that kind of load.

Work Songs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTkxHboqRR8&list=PL54E770A8819377A3&index=90&feature=plpp_video

From the amazing Mr. Mingus....Freedom!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVoR985G8ng

Check the Sandel link below for a nice presentation on Lockean natural rights, with special emphasis on Indigenous claims to the territory of North America.
http://www.justiceharvard.org/2011/02/episode-04/#watch

PROMPT:  Drawing upon the material on this page, and from the Blues volume, Winsby's "cultural theft" discussion and the essays from Neuman and Bombardi , analyze and evaluate the argument below.  Specifically, explain whether or not Neuman and Bombardi effectively refute this argument, or whether the 'cultural theft' argument stands.

"White blues and rock is cultural theft"
1. Due to its unique history and cultural importance, the blues belongs to blacks (collectively). Blues is the cultural property of the black community.
2. Whites playing the blues amounts to a (mis)appropriation of the cultural property of blacks.
3. Thus, "white blues" is cultural theft.
4. Cultural theft is unjust and must be prevented.
5. Thus, white people should not play the blues.
6. Because white people have already been playing blues, this cultural theft must be rectified through some adequate composition for wrongs done.