The life of an American slave: by Frederick Douglass
Frederick Douglass is the author of the book that will be analyzed below, but why do Douglass be carefully examined? Recall that during this class it has been learned from the beginning of the United States and how slavery was poorly inherited to these territories. Knowing this, it can be remembered that African Americans were considered inferior and were not "worthy" of an education. That Frederick Douglass, an American slave was able to write and publish a book was a great advance in the history of African Americans, because finally their stories were going to be related as they passed, without the edition of the white Americans for theControl of your image. As will comment later, the author of this book had to spend too many situations for the text to reach our hands.
To keep entering, it is important to know who will talk in this report. Frederick Douglass was born in Tuckhoe near Maryland County (P.twenty-one). He had no knowledge of his age or his date of birth because "thanks" to discrimination and disinterest in his masters, African Americans had no documentation to talk about his birth (P.twenty-one). You will think how can this be if they are human beings? At that time, if these situations could happen because it was not considered as people, the American ideology was quite rotten. White people enjoyed privileges that were denied to African -American people, so privileged were that in Maryland they had the habit of separating slave families, many times enslaved women were abused by the same master and had to do the role ofsingle mother. Only an infrahuman person would do these vile acts, the masters did not tempt their hearts and exchanged slaves so that mother-son ties were not formed (P.twenty-one)
The life of a slave
During his life, Douglass had multiple masters, which were very different from each other. I could spend all the text talking about their differences and similarities, but the stories behind each place where he lived have more relevance. The conditions in which slaves lived were quite deplorable, no sane human being would be able to remain there for their own will. The author mentions that every month the slaves received food and per year they were "winners" of new clothing (P.25). The one that they rebel against their masters is totally justified, because they are people, not animals or much less owned by someone just because a few people put it that way. However, well, the fight for their rights would be celebrated. The masters, being unable to be able to submit to rebel slaves, sent them to a place called New Desing which was under the command of Mr. Towsend (P.25) This place served as a warning for others, implying that "silent looked prettier".
Douglass on page 26 mentions Colonel Lloyd plantation. This was very longed for among the slaves, which called her the farm of the big house, this farm was seen as a sample of the "trust" that the masters had to the slave, but why did slaves compete to go to thisplace? It was a better way of their quality of life, they saw them as a place where greatness could be achieved and flee from a little more about the precarious conditions in which they lived. During the walks they made to get to the farm of the Casa Grande they began to sing, in the texts of the White Americans they told that African Americans were happy because they sang and they took them as songs of joy, however, manySometimes reality was another, for slaves, songs were their form of hope or relief depending on the lyrics and tones. The songs are subjective, everyone sings them according to their mood.
In this history Douglass says that “every tone was a testimony against slavery, and a prayer to God for the liberation of chains."The more afflicted they were more sang, it was their ways to hold on to hope. We never know that other people are happening, as long as these situations are seen, there are comments such as "the poor is poor because he wants". How much manipulation should there be so that we have that ideology, people would never want to be in those conditions, much less being whipped and hurt.
Returning to what was said in the previous paragraph, when Douglass was transported to Lloyd’s plantation he considers it as "the most interesting event of his life" because that march takes him to Baltimore with Mr. Auld. Why is it important to mention them? Douglass mentions us that Mrs. Auld taught her the alphabet (P.37) This led to Frederick could spell, making him more interest in knowing and not living in ignorance, this learning taught by Mrs. Auld hard very little because her husband scolds her saying that by teaching the slave she would lose her valueAnd there would be no way to control it and I was not wrong, Douglass with what I learned achieved magnificent things, because knowledge is the key against slavery.
Douglass on page 38 shows us the difference between city slave and field slave. The second, as we mentioned lived in mediocre and precarious conditions, while the city slave was almost a "free man" because they were a little more privileged, this is because the appearance was all for white families, sothat their slaves should be in optimal conditions to show their social status, however, there are exceptions of masters who did not touch their hearts and let their most racist side come out. Unfortunately, this has happened until our time, they still do not receive decent treatment and continue to be abused both physically and emotionally, leaving that feeling of pain in people by being discriminated against by their skin color. How to explain to a child the reason why he is discriminated against? This question is an important pillar because children do not have that critical thinking to see the evil of the people, they thought they should belong there because that was their destiny, however, it should not be so, the children should be free toDiscover the world and be able to assert for themselves, bringing a feeling of joy not a feeling of suffering.
Racism is not natural, that is instilling and can still be changed if you want, everyone chooses who wants to be and how they want to practice. We can check this on page 40 when Douglass mentions that he became friends with all the banks he was and some even helped him to read, if the racist being from birth, they would never have dared to give him his helpTo an African -American slave, due to the gratitude that Douglass had with them, he took bread because his friends were poor whites. Where does the idea of racism come from? The Christian Church made it very clear about the manifest destiny which has a position about slavery. The idea of religion was to love and respect the neighbor, however, for them the neighbor was someone of their own social class, the other were simple animals that had to serve them and yet they also had to adapt to these beliefs.
Douglass on page 41 says that many times he envied the ignorance of his companions and that he would prefer to be an animal before living like him. This situation is unfortunate, the cattle were often treated better than slaves. It is sad to read how many times the author wanted to be dead, however, he continued his fight based on the hope of being one day free. He, even without knowing the word abolitionist, was already being one of them because he was more advanced than the other slaves and fought for his freedom.
How did Frederick learned to write if no one overwhelmed him? He learned based on effort and wanting to overcome himself, he used the previous notebooks of his master Thomas and copied his writing, managing him to do the most similar thing he could, that was how after years he managed to dominate writing (P.43). During his stay in that house, many things were denied to slaves, that is where the author of the American slave was truly born.
The whites wanted to have so much control over the slaves that the money they earned in their jobs, only some cents of the total amount were returned, so with that little money they would stop them a little more because without money they had no chance of fleeing. This situation achieved that Douglass would rent his time to continue improving his chances of fleeing (P.75). Despite being a heavy job, Douglass preferred that because I felt that I was one step closer to freedom, slave work and free man’s jobs and that was already a profit.
By September 1838 the American slave leaves his chains and arrives in New York (P.75) He does not explain the way I became a free person in that city because if he mentioned the names of the people and the ways for which I managed to escape prevent them from continuing to help, it could also cause them a punishment that he did not wantto touch them. Despite being a free man, he mentions that he was followed by a feeling of insecurity and loneliness (p.76) How not to be? It was a completely different care from what was used to and had never been a free person, there was no one to know him and who could help him. "Do not trust anyone" (P.76) It was the motto that he used after I run away, he was intelligent when using it because as we mentioned it was a new city and did not know the tricks that people could have, nor did he know if they were racist as in the citywhere he lived.
In September 1838 Frederick and Anna get tired, with the help of Mr. Ruggles who held his hand to Douglass when he was in his difficult situation decided to go to New Bedford. In New Bedford they were sent to the house of Mr. Johnson which were called abolitionists. (p.77) Douglass was so lucky to meet these people on the way they were to help and guide him to his desired freedom, without them we do not know what situations would have happened.
Four months after arriving at New Bedford they offered the Liberator newspaper, to which Douglass ended up being a subscriber. (p. 80) Thanks to this newspaper, the desire to contribute to the cause, in August 1841 in the city of Nantucket, were the first time that I participate as a abolitionist speaker. With the passage of time he wrapped more in the struggles for rights, becoming the most prominent African American, because very few people had the courage to flee and seek knowledge.
To conclude Frederick Douglass was an African -American who looked for his rights and that I do not let the ignorance overcome him in his search, after enduring such cruel situations he managed to reach his goal and did not become a slave person as people used to do itfree to appear social class. This book and its other writings must be valued as they deserve because I achieve that African -American stories were heard, I also manage to open their eyes to different people of what really happened in the plantations. The author reflects all his feelings in writing, he manages to move to his experiences and recreate the moments in your mind, we often believe that this is science fiction because times change and governments claim that we forget where we come fromcontinue in the shadow of ignorance. We must analyze our history so that they are not able to deceive us.
References
- Douglass, f. (2016). Life of an American slave: life of an American slave written by the same. Scotts Valley, United States:
- Createspace Independent Publishing Platform.
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