How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
It was easy for Kunta to understand why plantation-owning massas and even their slaves scorned and sneered at them as "lazy, shiftless, no-count white trash." (59.7)
It's understandable why Kunta dislikes poor white people so much—they're the ones who cut off his foot, after all—but his personal experiences prevent him from seeing how they too are affect by the imbalanced power structure in America. Nothing excuses such abuse, but it begins to explain it.
Quote #8
"You can't be nobody's frien' an' slave both."
"How come, Pappy?"
"'Cause frien's don't own one 'nother." (74.71-73)
Kunta might as well drop the mic after this one. Although Kizzy doesn't understand it now, she'll learn this lesson the hard way when Missy Anne abandons her when she is being sold, despite her being the one to teach her how to read in the first place.
Quote #9
He was thinking that [...] he would even somehow indirectly remind the massa whose father he was, which should curb his anger, at least. (91.5)
Here, Chicken George naively believes that his biological relationship to Massa Lea will somehow change the power dynamic between them. Does he have any reason to believe this? Not really. Still, it's something that George struggles with throughout the novel.