Homegoing: List 3

by Yaa Gyasi
This powerful book examines the legacy of the slave trade as it follows the divergent paths of two sisters and their descendants from Africa to the United States.

This list covers Part Two: H–Willie.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: List 1, List 2, List 3, List 4
35 words 29 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. spiteful
    showing malicious ill will and a desire to hurt
    “Boy, look atcha,” his cellmate said, his gaze so spiteful now that H grew suddenly, inexplicably afraid of the smaller, older man.
  2. quota
    a prescribed number
    More than once, a prison warden had whipped a miner for not reaching the ten-ton quota.
  3. snivel
    cry or whine with snuffling
    The pit boss had then kicked Thomas on the ground where he still sat, sniveling.
  4. fervently
    with strong emotion or zeal
    Joecy was a first-class man they all respected, working off year seven of his eight-year sentence as fervently as he had year one.
  5. hyperventilate
    breathe excessively hard and fast
    H had seen men wiggle into spaces that small and shake and hyperventilate so badly they needed to leave.
  6. uppity
    arrogant or self-important
    When they arrested him, they said he and my whole family was gettin' too uppity.
  7. sovereign
    not controlled by outside forces
    For years, King Prempeh I had been refusing to allow the British to take over the Kingdom of Asante, insisting that the Asante people would remain sovereign.
  8. pestle
    a hand tool for grinding and mixing substances in a mortar
    After she swept, Akua would help the other women cook. Abee was only four years old, but she liked to hold the giant pestle and pretend that she was helping. “Mama, look!” she would say, hugging the tall stick to her tiny body.
  9. scrutinize
    look at critically or searchingly, or in minute detail
    She could finally think, without the scrutinizing gaze of the women and elderly men, who stayed around the compound, making fun of her for all the time she spent staring at the same spot on a hut’s wall.
  10. feign
    make believe with the intent to deceive
    “Among the Akan he is wicked man, the one who harms. Among the Ewe of the Southeast his name is Cunning Dog, the one who feigns niceness and then bites you."
  11. mar
    cause to become imperfect
    Akua’s hands started to tremble in the pot, making a low rattling noise and marring the shape of the fufu.
  12. heathen
    a person who does not acknowledge your god
    “You are a sinner and a heathen,” he said.
  13. repent
    turn away from sin or do penitence
    After he told her to stand up and bend over, after he lashed her five times and commanded her to repent her sins and repeat “God bless the queen,” after she was permitted to leave, after she finally threw the fear up, the only word that popped into her head was “hungry.”
  14. slew
    a large number or amount or extent
    Akua’s toddler, Ama Serwah, sang the loudest and most off-key, her words a slew of gibberish until the song reached her favorite part, at which point she screamed more than sang, “CREATOR GOD, DEFEAT THE TROOPS!”
  15. embolden
    give encouragement to
    Now that she had a plan, a hope for a way out, she felt emboldened.
  16. turmoil
    violent agitation
    In the midst of all this turmoil, Akua was pregnant.
  17. stupor
    a state of being half-awake
    “I thought we had finished with your idleness. Are our people out fighting so that you can stare into the fire and scream at night for your children to hear?”
    “No, Ma,” Akua said, shaking herself out of her stupor.
  18. frenzied
    excessively agitated
    For Akua, prayer was a frenzied chant, a language for those desires of the heart that even the mind did not recognize were there.
  19. girth
    the distance around something, especially a person's body
    The Fat Man moved, his enormous girth a boulder rolling to reveal the door.
  20. fissure
    a long narrow opening
    Long fissures in the red clay formed about Akua’s compound, so dry was the season.
  21. contrived
    artificially formal
    If she convinced him, she would wait for his real breathing to match her contrived one, and then she would lie there, wishing the firewoman away.
  22. consign
    commit forever
    It was only Kofi Poku, the child who had pointed out the white man, the evil one, and so consigned him to burn, who saw the silent Akua and whispered “Crazy Woman.”
  23. torque
    a twisting force
    She wanted to spring to her feet, to look her daughter in the eye, but all she could manage was a gentle torque of her lower back, first to the left and then to the right, until she had gathered enough force to sit up, and see Abee, who was playing with the peeling bark.
  24. assent
    agreement with a statement or proposal to do something
    “Nyame willing, he is good,” she said, and Asamoah grunted his assent.
  25. diminish
    decrease in size, extent, or range
    Her old age had not diminished her swiftness, nor had it diminished her ear’s ability to distinguish the needy cry of her oldest son.
  26. torrent
    a violently fast stream of water or other liquid
    Until the torrent of tears began to put out the fire in Akua’s hands.
  27. undulate
    increase and decrease in volume or pitch
    His anger was echoed in the yells of the crowd, in the stomping feet and beating hands, the undulating tongues.
  28. marquee
    a structure, often with a signboard, over an entrance
    On Lenox, every other marquee said that Duke Ellington would be playing there: Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
  29. procession
    the action of a group moving ahead in regular formation
    Willie sang lead in the funeral procession, the weeping and wailing of all the mourners carrying sound down into the very mines themselves.
  30. drawl
    a slow speech pattern with prolonged vowels
    On the way in, Willie heard the distinct drawl of an Alabamian.
  31. ravenous
    extremely hungry
    Even on that first day she’d gone to play with him, even as she pushed him, even as he fell, Robert had always kept his eyes steadily, almost ravenously, on hers.
  32. resign
    accept as inevitable
    The family had not yet resigned themselves to their own blackness, so they crept as close to the white folks as the city would allow.
  33. skeptical
    marked by or given to doubt
    Carson crunched on his cone and looked up at her skeptically, and she just smiled back reassuringly, but she knew, and he knew, that they would have to turn soon.
  34. pulpit
    a platform raised to give prominence to the person on it
    The pastor went up to the pulpit and said, “Church, ain’t God great?”
  35. earful
    a severe scolding
    He would set them down on the porch and take his boots off before he came in because Ethe would give him an earful if he tracked coal dust into the house she kept so clean.
Created on Tue Jul 06 13:48:36 EDT 2021 (updated Mon Jul 12 12:26:38 EDT 2021)

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