Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl Analysis

Since the very beginning of the nation, The United States, has been victim of the issue of slavery and its side effects. The practice of taking all human dignity and freedom from a person has shaped an important part of this nation’s history. Harriet Jacobs, a former mulatto slave from the 19th century, wrote a memoir under the alias of Linda Brent describing the atrocities of slavery in America. Her autobiography, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written By Herself, acts as an immortal example of the struggles in the life of a slave, and the difficulties in her relentless pursuit of freedom.

In nineteenth century America, the issue of slavery was one of the main factors for the division between the northern and the southern states. (woodbridge). Moreover, the North’s “substantial

In order to prevent uprising and rebellions, laws prohibiting slave education were created in several of the slave states. An example of this is an Act passed by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina in 1830. The act prohibited any white or black person to teach a slave to read or write. Failure to follow this rule led to a fine of “not less than one hundred dollars, nor more than two hundred dollars, or imprisoned” for a white person. Conversely, if a free black failed to obey this law “shall be fined, imprisoned, or whipped, at the discretion of the court, not exceeding thirty nine lashes, nor less than twenty lashes.”(North Carolina act). Of course there were slaves who refused to follow this mandate. The late eighteen hundreds became a period where several former slaves narrated their experiences in the form of memoirs. Their narrations became a tool to promote freedom and the abolition of slavery (encyclopedia). Harriet Jacobs’ autobiography narrates the hardships the colored people had to endure in this period of American