Slave Narratives as Protest Writing

1
Slave Narratives as Protest Writing

• 1.The Abolitionist Movement
• 2. Slave Narratives as Autobiography
• 3. Function of Narratives
• 4. Characteristics of Narratives
• 5. Gender and Slave Narratives

2
Abolitionist Movements

• British Caribbean
• 1770s-1830s
• British anti-slavery activists lobbying British
  Parliament
• Paternalistic Christianity

• United States
• 1830s-1870
• Evangelical religious movements of the 1830s
• Active participation of northern blacks and
  ex-slaves

3
Sojourner Truth (1851)

• . . . I think that 'twixt the negroes of the
  South and the women at
• the North, all talking about rights, the white
  men will be in a fix
• pretty soon. But what's all this here talking
  about?
• That man over there says that women need to be
  helped into
• carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have
  the best place
• everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages,
  or over mud-
• puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I
  a woman? Look
• at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and
  planted, and
• gathered into barns, and no man could head me!
  And ain't I a
• woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a
  man when
• I could get it and bear the lash as well! And
  ain't I a woman? I
• have borne thirteen children, and seen most all
  sold off to
• slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's
  grief, none but
• Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?

4
Minstrel Shows
5
Autobiography

• . . . autobiography must be understood as a
  recollective/narrative act in which the writer,
  from a certain point in his lifethe
  presentlooks back over the events of that life
  and recounts them in such a way as to show how
  history has led to this present state of being.
  (James Olney, Autobiography)

6
Olaudah Equiano

• By the horrors of that trade was I first torn
  away from
• all the tender connections that were naturally
  dear to
• my heart but these, through the mysterious ways
  of
• Providence, I ought to regard as infinitely more
  than
• compensated by the introduction I have thence
• obtained in the knowledge of the Christian
  religion,
• and of a nation which, by its liberal sentiments,
  its
• humanity, its glorious freedom of its government,
  and
• its proficiency in arts and sciences, has exalted
  the
• dignity of human nature (Classic Slave
  Narratives
• 17).

7
5 Functions of Slave Narratives

• 1. To document the conditions of or truth
• about slavery
• 2. To encourage the abolition of slavery
• 3. To provide religious inspiration
• 4. To assert the narrators personhood and
• 5. To challenge stereotypes about blacks.

8
Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

• . . . The black slaves narrative came to be a
  communal utterance, a collective tale, rather
  than merely an individuals autobiography. Each
  slave author, in writing about his or her
  personal lifes experiences, simultaneously wrote
  on behalf of millions of silent slaves still held
  captive . . . All blacks would be judgedon their
  character, integrity, intelligence, manners and
  morals and their claim to warrant emancipationon
  this published evidence produced by one of their
  number. (Classic Slave Narratives 2)

9
NARRATIVE

• OF THE
• LIFE
• OF
• FREDERICK DOUGLASS,
• AN
• AMERICAN SLAVE.
• WRITTEN BY HIMSELF.

10
Frederick Douglass

• The overseers name was Mr. Plummer. Mr.
• Plummer was a miserable drunkard, a profane
• swearer, and a savage monster . . . . No
• words, no tears, no prayers, from his gory
• victim, seemed to move his iron heart from its
• bloody purpose (Classic Slave Narratives
• 342-343).

11
Frederick Douglass

• This battle with Mr. Covey was the
• turning-point in my career as a slave. It
• rekindled the few expiring embers of
• freedom, and revived within me a sense
• of my own manhood (Classic Slave
• Narratives 394).

12
8 Characteristics of Slave Narratives

• 1. A preface as authenticating material/testimony
• 2. First sentence begins I was born . . .
• 3. Details of the first observed whipping
• 4. An account of a hardworking slave who refuses
  to
• be whipped
• 5. Details of the quest for literacy
• 6. Account of a slave auction
• 7. Description of attempts to escape
• 8. Appendix of documentary material

13
Mythological Pattern of Slave Narratives

• Loss of innocence
• Realization of alternatives to bondage and
  resolve to be free
• Escape
• Freedom obtained.

14
Frederick Douglass

• It was a new and special revelation, explaining
  dark
• and mysterious things, with which my youthful
• understanding had struggled in vain. I now
  understood
• what had been to me a most perplexing
  difficultyto
• wit, the white mans power to enslave the black
  man.
• It was a grand achievement, and I prized it
  highly.
• From that moment, I understood the pathway from
• slavery to freedom (Classic Slave Narratives
  364).