I know how terrible this is so you don't have to point it out, but I didn't have enough time to write it. If someone could check for any mistakes, punctuation I'd be very thankful. Any advice and correction will be appreciated.
Slave Narratives
Slavery is a form of forced free labor in which one human being is the property of another. Close to two million slaves were brought to the American South from Africa and the west Indies during the centuries of Atlantic trade, and according to William L. Andrews, nine out of every ten African Americans lived in the south. Many slave owners though it is fair for slaves to work without a pay, because they believed that this particular group of people were sent by God for this sort of work. However, a lot of slaves who lived most of their life in this cruel and inhumane conditions, showed it in their narratives.
Slave narratives are valuable sources about life of fugitive or former slaves that help us understand their life experiences. Most of them were written to present the reality of slavery. Some of the narratives tell us how life of African Americans who had escaped from slavery to the safe North changed. Others intend to make clear to all readers the cruelty and immorality of slavery, describing the feeling of living life in constant fear and pain and not being able to do much about it.
First narratives by African Americans slaves were published in eighteens century in England and in nineteen century they became the main form of African-American literature. From 1760-1947, more than 200 book-length slave narratives were published in England and United states. According to Marlon Starling, more than six thousand are known to exist. From 1830 to the end of the slavery era, the fugitive slave narratives dominated the literary landscape of antebellum black America, outnumbering the autobiographies of free people of color.
Abolitionists, who often participated as editors and sometimes writers, publicized slave narratives. Since most of the slaves were illiterate, they dictated book-length accounts of their lives to them, usually revealing their struggles, sorrows, aspirations and triumphs in compellingly personal story-telling. Although many of the African Americans did not know handwriting, some of the slaves like Frederick Douglass were able to write narratives themselves. His antebellum publication called "The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass" is estimated to have sold at least thirty thousand copies in the first five years, making it one of the international best-sellers at that time.
Even though all the slave narratives may look almost the same, they are divided into groups. Experts broadly categorize slave narratives into three distinct forms: tales of religious redemption, tales to inspire the abolitionist struggle, and tales of progress.
Tales of religious redemption lasted from approximately 1770-1820 and generally gave an account of a spiritual journey leading to Christian redemption. These narratives show how slaves interpreted the Bible as promise of eventual liberation and as a metaphor for their own difficult lives. Although they were punished for that, many of the slaves persisted in religious practice. Also, since most of them were born in Africa, they usually characterized themselves as Africans and not slaves. Tales of religious redemption gave hope to many slaves. During that period the very first slave stories were written, and the end of the tales of religious redemption marked the beginning of the abolitionist movement.
The tales written to inspire the abolitionist struggle are the most famous and arouse in the mid-1820s and ended with the Civil war. Most of them were intended to serve a propagandistic purpose and tend to focus on slavery as an institution rather than on individual consciousness. To increase the effect of the narratives, some writers adopted literary techniques that included the use of fictionalized dialogues. Between 1835-1865 more than 80 such narratives were published. The plot of the most of pre-Civil war slave narratives generally centers on their rite passage from slavery in the South to freedom in the North. They tend to be the most successful because they had a strong autobiographical motif, such as in Frederick Douglass' autobiographies and "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" by Harriet Jacobs. Some of the motifs to write narratives include physical and emotional abuses such as whipping, sexual abuse, and starvation, especially of women or children. Writers tried to expose white owners' hypocrisy and inconstancy, sometimes satirically. Portraying slavery as a condition of extreme physical, intellectual and emotional deprivation made narratives of abolitionist movement very popular. They depicted the life in the South with lurid scenes of horror and violence. But white owners were aware of how these publications might affect them, and publicized their own. They were describing the life of a slave as a happy worker, who was satisfied with everything that they were provided with. Although it changed image of life in slavery of some people, majority still saw it as an issue, and the Civil war began.
End to the Civil war and defeat of the slave states created another type of narratives, tales of progress. The authors had less need to convey the evils of captivity and fight for redemption. From 1936 to 1938, over 2,300 slaves from across the American South were interviewed by the writers and journalists under the aegis of the Work Progress Administration. These former slaves were born in the last years of the slave regime and provided first-hand accounts of their experiences on plantations, farms, and small cities.
I think it is clear why these slave narratives were important during slavery era, but are they still important to us? In my opinion it is vital to keep slave narratives alive for many reasons. I think it is important to keep a record of our history no matter how horrible things are. By having narratives from former slaves humanity we're able to better understand why the system was considered to be cruel and inhumane and to learn from the errors made in the past that would allow one human to treat another human in such as despicable manner. The wise person will learn from the past. It is important to understand what slavery was like. Without first person accounts, there would be a big gap in our understanding of slavery. Slave narratives allow them to have a voice of their own. These were people who had been kept as powerless as possible. It is very important for them to have a voice and to be heard and acknowledged as people.
With that being said, I realized that these works were necessary for the destruction of a corrupt and foul system. Because racism weighed heavily in the U.S. at the time, protest against white slave owners and their business was difficult. These narratives had a big impact on the American literature, and the end of slavery also marked the end of slave narratives.
Slave Narratives
Slavery is a form of forced free labor in which one human being is the property of another. Close to two million slaves were brought to the American South from Africa and the west Indies during the centuries of Atlantic trade, and according to William L. Andrews, nine out of every ten African Americans lived in the south. Many slave owners though it is fair for slaves to work without a pay, because they believed that this particular group of people were sent by God for this sort of work. However, a lot of slaves who lived most of their life in this cruel and inhumane conditions, showed it in their narratives.
Slave narratives are valuable sources about life of fugitive or former slaves that help us understand their life experiences. Most of them were written to present the reality of slavery. Some of the narratives tell us how life of African Americans who had escaped from slavery to the safe North changed. Others intend to make clear to all readers the cruelty and immorality of slavery, describing the feeling of living life in constant fear and pain and not being able to do much about it.
First narratives by African Americans slaves were published in eighteens century in England and in nineteen century they became the main form of African-American literature. From 1760-1947, more than 200 book-length slave narratives were published in England and United states. According to Marlon Starling, more than six thousand are known to exist. From 1830 to the end of the slavery era, the fugitive slave narratives dominated the literary landscape of antebellum black America, outnumbering the autobiographies of free people of color.
Abolitionists, who often participated as editors and sometimes writers, publicized slave narratives. Since most of the slaves were illiterate, they dictated book-length accounts of their lives to them, usually revealing their struggles, sorrows, aspirations and triumphs in compellingly personal story-telling. Although many of the African Americans did not know handwriting, some of the slaves like Frederick Douglass were able to write narratives themselves. His antebellum publication called "The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass" is estimated to have sold at least thirty thousand copies in the first five years, making it one of the international best-sellers at that time.
Even though all the slave narratives may look almost the same, they are divided into groups. Experts broadly categorize slave narratives into three distinct forms: tales of religious redemption, tales to inspire the abolitionist struggle, and tales of progress.
Tales of religious redemption lasted from approximately 1770-1820 and generally gave an account of a spiritual journey leading to Christian redemption. These narratives show how slaves interpreted the Bible as promise of eventual liberation and as a metaphor for their own difficult lives. Although they were punished for that, many of the slaves persisted in religious practice. Also, since most of them were born in Africa, they usually characterized themselves as Africans and not slaves. Tales of religious redemption gave hope to many slaves. During that period the very first slave stories were written, and the end of the tales of religious redemption marked the beginning of the abolitionist movement.
The tales written to inspire the abolitionist struggle are the most famous and arouse in the mid-1820s and ended with the Civil war. Most of them were intended to serve a propagandistic purpose and tend to focus on slavery as an institution rather than on individual consciousness. To increase the effect of the narratives, some writers adopted literary techniques that included the use of fictionalized dialogues. Between 1835-1865 more than 80 such narratives were published. The plot of the most of pre-Civil war slave narratives generally centers on their rite passage from slavery in the South to freedom in the North. They tend to be the most successful because they had a strong autobiographical motif, such as in Frederick Douglass' autobiographies and "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" by Harriet Jacobs. Some of the motifs to write narratives include physical and emotional abuses such as whipping, sexual abuse, and starvation, especially of women or children. Writers tried to expose white owners' hypocrisy and inconstancy, sometimes satirically. Portraying slavery as a condition of extreme physical, intellectual and emotional deprivation made narratives of abolitionist movement very popular. They depicted the life in the South with lurid scenes of horror and violence. But white owners were aware of how these publications might affect them, and publicized their own. They were describing the life of a slave as a happy worker, who was satisfied with everything that they were provided with. Although it changed image of life in slavery of some people, majority still saw it as an issue, and the Civil war began.
End to the Civil war and defeat of the slave states created another type of narratives, tales of progress. The authors had less need to convey the evils of captivity and fight for redemption. From 1936 to 1938, over 2,300 slaves from across the American South were interviewed by the writers and journalists under the aegis of the Work Progress Administration. These former slaves were born in the last years of the slave regime and provided first-hand accounts of their experiences on plantations, farms, and small cities.
I think it is clear why these slave narratives were important during slavery era, but are they still important to us? In my opinion it is vital to keep slave narratives alive for many reasons. I think it is important to keep a record of our history no matter how horrible things are. By having narratives from former slaves humanity we're able to better understand why the system was considered to be cruel and inhumane and to learn from the errors made in the past that would allow one human to treat another human in such as despicable manner. The wise person will learn from the past. It is important to understand what slavery was like. Without first person accounts, there would be a big gap in our understanding of slavery. Slave narratives allow them to have a voice of their own. These were people who had been kept as powerless as possible. It is very important for them to have a voice and to be heard and acknowledged as people.
With that being said, I realized that these works were necessary for the destruction of a corrupt and foul system. Because racism weighed heavily in the U.S. at the time, protest against white slave owners and their business was difficult. These narratives had a big impact on the American literature, and the end of slavery also marked the end of slave narratives.
