William Wells Brown Clotel; Harriet. Wilson Our Nig Journal Essay 1 Topic: Compare and contrast the two slave narratives. In the book of Wilson Our Nig it is about a lady by the name of Mag Smith who was seduced and left with a child.
When reading Harriet Jacobs/Linda Brent’s autobiography addressing her life as a slave who grew up in the deep south and who later fled to the North, two important characters make an impact on her life. Like many people, Jacobs/Brent’s life actions are heavily impacted by the people and the atmosphere around her, driving her decisions, wants, and desires. Although Jacob/Brent’s grandmother makes an impact on her life, Dr. Flint makes a greater impact on her life. With his pushing, he helps determine whom she has children with, controls her life through the livelihood of her children, and even impacts her life after he has passed away through his surviving daughter and son-in-law.
Former ex slaves Charlie Smith and Samuel polite had to deal with similar experiences in their time of being a slave. For example, both were bid off to different slave masters and had to work. However Smith had little more freedom than Polite did. Even though Smith had to work he was also treated like family to his slave owner. Polite on the other hand didn’t have that much of a relationship with his owner.
In their respective narratives, both Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs expose slavery as a brutal and degrading institution. Though the tone and approach they incorporate in their individual narratives differ, both seek to renounce the romanticized view of plantation culture and reveal the harsh actualities. Jacobs also seeks to debunk the stereotypical notion that house slaves lived a more privileged life than plantation slaves. Furthermore, Jacobs goes on to explain the role of the slave-mistress and how that complicates the life of a slave girl growing up in a house with a licentious master and his jealous wife.
The extreme cruelty experienced by the victims of the South’s “peculiar institution” in Harriet Jacobs’ autobiography, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, reflect the inhumanity of the time period’s slave owners and the impact they had on their slaves both physically and mentally. Harriet’s transfer to the Flint’s household offers several examples of the malice the owners hold in quick succession. The Flint’s have their own ways of treating the cooks, both callous. Mrs. Flint spits into the pots and pans, rendering any food left within them .
Harriet Jacobs reveals specifics about the brutality that went on during these times: “...it is the torturing whip that lashes manhood out of him; it is the fierce bloodhounds of the South, and the scarcely less cruel human bloodhounds of the north, who enforce the fugitive slave law” (Harriet Jacobs 2). Her first hand experiences affect her negative view on slavery. She addresses the inhumanity happening in her past life. Unlike Harriet, Charity Anderson did not have the exact same type of experience, because she did not go through the the same type of barbarity. In her interview, Charity addresses that she knew about the beatings that others experienced, but she did not go through those type of incidents herself: “But honey chile, all white folks warn’t good to dere slaves, cause I’se seen poor niggers almos’ tore up by dogs, and whipped unmercifully, when dey didn’t do lack de white folks say.
“By degrees, a more tender feeling crept into my heart. He was an educated and eloquent gentleman; too eloquent, alas, for the poor slave girl who trusted in him.” In the early 1830’s, as a slave, you did what you were told and you weren’t supposed to ask questions or say no. That is just how things were back then and if you did otherwise you were beaten and punished for it by a white man. “Harriet Jacobs was born a slave in Edenton, North Carolina, in 1813.
To slave a person is the most inhumane act one can commit, and unfortunately was very popular during the 18th century. However, have you ever wondered the different impacts slavery caused between men and women? Both Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs showcase, through their writings, the horrors of slavery, and contrast the many similarities and import differences between the experience of slavery between genders. One of the similarities of slavery for both genders was their allowances. Both men and women were only allowed a certain amount of food and clothing to survive throughout a year.
To whom it may concern,/ Dear Sir or Madam, Subsequently reading documented lives of slaves whom have suffered, I have concluded that this was the dark and unethical time of America. In this literary composition I will discuss reasons why slavery is atrocious and America should feel ashamed. Not only taking people from their country and their families, they were sold and appraised for work. There is documented archives to show the cruelty that was being done. Frederick Douglass born in Talbot County, Maryland was born into slavery and wrote about his sufferings.
The work of this memoir is a record of experiences Jacobs faced in real life. That form of autobiography is indistinct with the truth because she is recollecting memories, which is refined through some creativity. There are multiple pieces of dialogue in the narrative that Jacobs could not have been secretive about; it is also not likely that her reminiscence was good enough to bring mind to the countless details included. A memoir 's virtue is often that it claims to speak for the defenseless and bears witness to a man 's lack of compassion. Harriet speaks on behalf of her sisters in slavery, and calls upon the women from the north to notice and take action against the distinguishing system known as slavery.
In Fredrick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs narrative they show how the institution of slavery dehumanizes an individual both physically and emotionally. In Jacobs narrative she talks about how women had it worse than men did in slavery. While men suffered, women had it worse due to sexual abuse. The emotional, physical, and sexual abuse was dehumanizing for anyone.
After having read both Frederick Douglass’s Narrative and Harriet Jacobs’s Incident 1. How were Douglass and Jacobs similar and different in their complaints against slavery? What accounts for these differences? In both the inspiring narratives of Narrative in the Life of Fredrick Douglass by Frederick Douglass’s and in Incidents in the life of a slave girl by Harriet Jacobs the respective authors demonstrate the horrors and disparity of slavery in there own ways.
Comparative Essay This two stories are about a girl that has been a victim of the Holocaust and a women that helped slaves runaway. Slavery lasted over three centuries and Harriet Tubman had a rebellious spirit and conducted hundreds of slaves threw the underground railroad in the story GO on or Die there's a detailed journal that explains what is it like to be in the underground railroad. The story A Heroine's Last Days tells how European jews used to hide because the Gestapo persecuted them and how was their life in concentration camps. This to stories relate because this young lady called Anne Frank and this slave woman called Harriet Tubman were both persecuted because of their race or their religion. Anne Frank stood in a secret place on somebody's house called the Secret Annex meanwhile Harriet Tubman was trying to go to Canada where there was no slavery.
Frederick Douglass’s narrative provides a first hand experience into the imbalance of power between a slave and a slaveholder and the negative effects it has on them both. Douglass proves that slavery destroys not only the slave, but the slaveholder as well by saying that this “poison of irresponsible power” has a dehumanizing effect on the slaveholder’s morals and beliefs (Douglass 40). This intense amount of power breaks the kindest heart and changes the slaveholder into a heartless demon (Douglass 40). Yet these are not the only ways that Douglass proves what ill effect slavery has on the slaveholder. Douglass also uses deep characterization, emotional appeal, and religion to present the negative effects of slavery.
These two books are compelling works of African American Slavery. Both authors have an autobiographical experience of two different formal slaves scenarios. Despite the fact we all have a concept of African American Slavery both narrators go into many aspects concerning the brutality of slavery in many feminist. Harriet’s acts shows the evils of slavery as being worse in a woman’s case by the gender. As to Twain’s fulfilling roles into the same category showing women prisoners of the slavery.