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ethe could positively identify her mother if something were to happen to her. She said, “This is your ma'am. This, and she pointed, “If something happens to me and you can't tell me by my face, you can know me by this mark,” Scars are therefore a significant means of communication in Beloved by the people of the “minority” as well, largely because they function as a means of identification. People know the identity of someone by knowing their scars. At the same time, Sethe did not understand the negative meaning of the brand and saw it as a potential means of positive identification. She wanted to know that if something happened to her she could also be identified. “But how will you know me? How will you know me?” Sethe also saw the brand as a possible means of connection with her mother. Sethe who had been isolated from her mother since birth, wanted a way in which she could feel a part of someone else, someone who could give her love and attention. Sethe felt she could be linked with her mother if she had a similar mark as well. “Mark the mark on me too,” she told her mother, but was answered only with a slap on the face reaffirming the negative connotations of the branding as enforced by the majority. Undoubtedly, this is a confusing and ironic moment in the story. Sethe as a child is punished at the very moment she accomplishes the kind of re-visioning that the book Beloved itself supports. However, this paradox would make sense in the context of the story. Sethe’s mother is an adult at this point; she has been socialized with all of the negative connotations her branding implies. When Sethe says that she would like a similar mark, her mother can only scorn this desire, associating it with her pain and suppression, rather than the more innocent and outreaching yearning for love and connection 1.3 The connection between Sethe and Paul D through her scars As we have mentioned above, scars have become the means of communication for Sethe, what is more, people recognize the identity of someone by knowing their scars. Accordingly, between Sethe and Paul D, who is the only man left from Sweet Home, they connect with each other also by means of Sethe’s scars. Paul D learns more about Sethe and is able to get contact with her through her scars. For example, when Sethe first attempts to explain to Paul D what had happened to her on pages 16-7, he has trouble understanding the true impacts of what she has been through. To her, the biggest violation was to have her milk (the milk she needed for her baby) stolen from her. To Paul D, the biggest violation is that they beat Sethe while she was pregnant. However, through physical contact he is able to learn her story and further understand what she has been through. “...He held his breasts in the palms of his hands. He rubbed his cheek on her back and learned that way her sorrow, the roots of it; its wide truck and intricate branches.” Paul D found a way to learn what she had been through, and feel what she has felt, by physical connection with parts of her that had been damaged, and more specifically, her scars. In this way, scars fulfill not only a storytelling role, but also serve as a means of connection. In the passion of the moment, Paul D sees her scars as a beautiful part of Sethe’s body. On page 20 he refers to her scars as a “wrought-iron maze” which he wants to explore and to know. “He saw the sculpture her back had become, like the decorative work of an ironsmith too passionate