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Frederick Douglass Impact On Education

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In today’s society, education is the key to becoming successful. Consequently, there are people who do not seem to realize the impact education has on their future. Education is the foundation upon which people build their futures on. Education is also been frowned upon, although it is a good thing. Education was a curse for African-Americans when slavery existed. In the book that Frederick Douglass wrote and published, “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass,” he talks about how life is growing up as a young African-American boy during slavery. The European settlers bought African-Americans to the United Stated because they were cheaper and more useful labor source. The European settlers thought it would be a bad idea if their slaves …show more content…

In addition, of Mr. Auld saying that to his wife, he also told her, “If you give a (slave) an inch, he will take an ell. A (slave) should know nothing but to obey his master-to do as he is told to do. Learning would spoil the best (slave) in the world. Now, if you teach that (boy) how to read, there would be no keeping him. It would be forever unfit him to be a slave. He would at once become unmanageable, and of no value to his master. As to himself, it could do him no good, but much harm. It would make him discontented and unhappy.” When Mr. Auld said that to his wife about Frederick Douglass heard what Mr. Auld said about him it hurt Frederick's’ feelings however it gave him an understanding of being educated. Frederick Douglass now understood what had been to him the most perplexing difficulty to with, the white man’s power and to enslave the black man. Frederick Douglass now instead of seeing education as a curse he saw it as a blessing. Frederick saw that is was a great achievement that he made in becoming educated. From that moment that he saw education as a blessing, he knew what he had to do to become free from slavery. He got just what he wanted, when he least expected

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539 Words | 3 Pages

In the autobiography The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass the author, Frederick Douglass, was born into a plantation in Maryland as a slave in the early 1800’s. He then moved to Baltimore where he was taught to read and this has a great effect on him. Douglass continues to gain more and more knowledge as he is passed on to different masters, until he gets his freedom. Douglass’s use of juxtaposition, characterization and tone conveys his constant faith that education is the key to freedom.

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Auld’s misinterpretation of the passage emphasizes slave owners use of religion to reinforce their power over their slaves. Christianity rationalized the concept of buying and selling human beings, and that God approved this too. In addition, Douglass used religion as a way to fuel his abolition movement. Under Master Hugh’s, Douglass began to learn how to read and write. Once

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The two central ideas in “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass” is what produces a complex account of Frederick Douglass’s experiences in Baltimore. Let’s further explain these two central ideas in order to better understand how they do this. The first central idea is slavery can have a horrific effect on both slaves and slave owners. Douglass gives two reasons behind this idea in the text.

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Douglass points to the vast unwillingness from the group of whites that refuses to fully perceive and accept African-Americans as deserving and equal citizens of the nation. Based on his personal experiences as a slave, Douglass is abundantly aware that the battle to abolish slavery is not an easy task. For the first twenty years of his life, he witnessed firsthand the abject cruelty of that institution in our country. Tactfully, Douglass seizes this opportunity to publicly highlight the unmerited and coarse differences in the treatment between the whites as opposed to the blacks living in the United States during this time period. He makes a “powerful testaments to the hypocrisy, bigotry and inhumanity of slavery” (Bunch 1).

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498 Words | 2 Pages

The Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass shows the imbalance of power between slaves and their masters. In his book, Douglass proves that slavery is a destructive force not only to the slaves, but also for the slaveholders. “Poison of the irresponsible power” that masters have upon their slaves that are dehumanizing and shameless, have changed the masters themselves and their morality(Douglass 39). This amount of power and control in contact with one man breaks the kindest heart and the purest thoughts turning the person evil and corrupt. Douglass uses flashbacks that illustrate the emotions that declare the negative effects of slavery.

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793 Words | 4 Pages

Education Determines Your Destination Education is the light at the end of the tunnel, when Frederick uses it he discovers hope. In the story the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Frederick goes through many struggles on his path to freedom, showing us the road from slavery to freedom. At the beginning of the book, Douglass is a slave in both body and mind. When the book ends, he gets both his legal freedom and frees his mind. The path to freedom was not easy, but it got clearer when he got an education.

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392 Words | 2 Pages

The legendary abolitionist and orator Frederick Douglass was one of the most important social reformers of the nineteenth century. Being born into slavery on a Maryland Eastern Shore plantation to his mother, Harriet Bailey, and a white man, most likely Douglass’s first master was the starting point of his rise against the enslavement of African-Americans. Nearly 200 years after Douglass’s birth and 122 years after his death, The social activist’s name and accomplishments continue to inspire the progression of African-American youth in modern society. Through his ability to overcome obstacles, his strive for a better life through education, and his success despite humble beginnings, Frederick Douglass’s aspirations stretched his influence through

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572 Words | 3 Pages

Education helps people improve completion of their tasks. For instance, education enables all mathematicians to solve for solutions and all great surgeons to perform their surgery because of their knowledge of the human body. However, in this autobiography, Douglass recounts that slaveowners did not want to educate their slaves. If education of slaves would enable them to be more helpful, why would slaveowners choose not to? This was because educating a slave was untraditional, and could cause a slave to rebel against their owner or commit suicide.

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Douglass states: “The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers. I could regard them in no other light than a band of successful robbers, who had left their homes, and gone to Africa, and stolen us from our homes, and in a strange land reduced us to slavery” (Douglass 51). Reading and writing opened Frederick Douglass’s eyes to the cause of the abolitionist. He became knowledgeable about a topic that white slave owners tried to keep hidden from their slaves. Literacy would eventually impact his life in more ways than what he could see while he was a young slave under Master Hugh’s

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973 Words | 4 Pages

Because of this, he successfully creates a contrast between what the slave owners think of and treat the slaves and how they are. Douglass says that slave’s minds were “starved by their cruel masters”(Douglass, 48) and that “they had been shut up in mental darkness” (Douglass, 48) and through education, something that they were deprived of, Frederick Douglass is able to open their minds and allow them to flourish into the complex people that they are. By showing a willingness to learn to read and write, the slaves prove that they were much more than what was forced upon them by their masters.

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1727 Words | 7 Pages

He became known as an inspirational person. Not many people are willing to go against what others believe, but Douglass was. His slave owner thought that it was “unlawful, as well as unsafe, to teach a slave to read” (Douglass 29), but that did not stop him from pursuing further knowledge. Education has a powerful effect that makes others fear that one has superiority over them one way or another. Slaves had their basic human rights taken away from them because slave owners wanted them to lack the ability to form an opinion on what was happening to them.

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836 Words | 4 Pages

Furthermore, Education opened Douglass’s eyes to the reality of his injustice as a slave; thus, compelling him to action as he recalls, “In moments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their stupidity. ”(Douglass, 2014, p.133) Education caused Douglass heartache. While attaining his education benefited Douglass, he could not relate to his fellow slaves. The fellow slaves had the ability to remain content with their current state of being since it was all they had ever known. Douglass knew otherwise and longed for the forbidden life as a free man, as it changed from an unattainable idea into an achievable

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1067 Words | 5 Pages

An education often opens new doors for people, but how does a lack of an education affect other people? What causes such a stark difference between people with knowledge and people no knowledge at all? In the Narrative of Frederick Douglass an American Slave we can see that Douglass is more intelligent than the other slaves on the plantation he is living on due to his hidden ability to read. With his level of education, he is able to see the brutal mistreatment of slaves and is unable to look at things the same way when he was an uneducated slave. The slaves on the plantation do not know how to read and therefore do not view being a slave the way Douglass views it.

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850 Words | 4 Pages

Education is the light at the end of the tunnel, when Frederick uses it he discovers hope. In the story the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Frederick goes through many struggles on his path to freedom, showing us the road from slavery to freedom. At the beginning of the book, Douglass is a slave in both body and mind. When the book ends, he gets both his legal freedom and frees his mind. The path to freedom was not easy, but it got clearer when he got an education.

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1673 Words | 7 Pages

Douglass is always curious and he never gives up even when he finds several obstacles in his way, because he perfectly knows what his goal is: he needs an education to get his freedom. He is determined to get it even though it requires a lot of hard work. Douglass is sure of the potential of education. As a matter of fact he knows well that knowlegde can change his life while leading him to freedom. Douglass has both the motivation and the determination because he is aware that owing to education he can get to great places in his life, and that education makes the world a better place

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