“I wished I could be as free as they would be when they got to be men.” Frederick Douglass said this because he is a slave for life and wants to be free. Abraham Lincoln has similar problems with slavery, the only difference is that Lincoln isn’t a slave. Narrative Life of Frederick Douglass and House Divided are two similar texts. Frederick Douglass has problems with being a slave and Lincoln has problems with slavery.
Douglass gives his account of what slavery was actually like for slaves, all of which is backed up with a testimony of authenticity. Through Douglass we can observe the harsh realities subjugations bring upon the enslaved and the slaveholders, serving only to degrade the integrity of both. We must work collectively as a society to rid ourselves of weak arguments and work towards an inclusive society that is beneficial to
Douglas fought against racism and slavery and furthermore he expressed his frustration against those, who did not allow and contributed with slaves ‘education. Douglas’ book has been written to the abolitionists and anyone else sympathetic to his movement. In this article, he provided his own prospective as a slave, his own experience
Frederick Douglass exposed the horrors and cruel of slavery in Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass. It definitely illustrated that slavery is dehumanizing for both of the slave owners and slaves. Under the oppression and exploitation of slave owners, the human nature of black slaves was constantly changing. At the same time, the humanity of slave holders also be destroyed.
Ladies and gentlemen, have you ever witnessed a slave being whipped? Have you seen the raw flesh of the back send a flood of blood down the body? Or have you seen the protruding bones through the almost translucent skin of the starved slaves? These people, or property as it is referred to, are treated beyond the bounds of what is humane; cattle may be treated better and as a result, Mr.Douglass was in a situation in which he was forced to defend himself or be killed. He has described his state under the supervision of Mr.Covey, “I was broken in body, soul, and spirit.
“Without a struggle, there is no progress” and “I didn't know I was a slave until I found out that I couldn't do the things I wanted.” These two quotes are by Fredrick Douglass. Frederick Douglass was a former slave who became an author and made many excerpts about his life and his experiences as a slave so he became an activist for slavery. During the 1920’s after slavery, many people went to the North, and then in Harlem, people who were discriminated against made art talking about it, from music to literature, this was when art bloomed, called the Harlem Renaissance. The two aspects of slavery that Douglass’ narrative ”Brings to Light” which is based on personal experience were his dehumanization and how his group got caught.
In “The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass”, Douglass narrates in detail the oppressions he went through as a slave before winning his freedom. In the narrative, Douglass gives a picture about the humiliation, brutality, and pain that slaves go through. We can evidently see that Douglass does not want to describe only his life, but he uses his personal experiences and life story as a tool to rise against slavery. He uses his personal life story to argue against common myths that were used to justify the act of slavery. Douglass invalidated common justification for slavery like religion, economic argument and color with his life story through his experiences torture, separation, and illiteracy, and he urged for the end of slavery.
Dehumanization is the process of making a human feel like they aren’t a human anymore, making them feel like they aren’t worthy. The Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass has a lot of dehumanization from one slave to all of them. Slaves are systematically dehumanized as a result of their treatment, their daily life, and their inability to have their basic needs met. Dehumanization is a very big factor in this book and this represents everyone in this book, mainly the slave masters. In the book, the slaves don’t get the privilege to learn how to read.
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).
The first theme that shows itself in The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass is dehumanization. Dehumanization is the degrading of a fellow human's status to that of a lower being. Frederick Douglass shows that thinking that others were below them was the prevailing idea of his time by stating, “by the law of the land, by the voice of the people, by the terms of the slave code, he was only a piece of property, a beast of burden.” The reason this topic ties into the book so well is because the question that Douglass struggles with internally and externally is, if he is not a human then what is he, what is his identity? As an institution, slavery reduced men, women, and children to a state less than human.
The most dehumanizing experience of a slave, as introduced by Douglass, includes: humiliation, emotional trauma, inequality, and physical abuse. Douglass, a man of wisdom, character, and determination; fought liberally and strategically, to surmount the odds of being deprived of his humanity while enslaved. Douglass, along with many other slaves, experienced the most gruesome epidemic that America was granted in history. Slaves were treated badly, and often seen as an epitome to society in the south. In the “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass” he foreshadows his experience as a slave, and explains some of the most dehumanizing experiences, from blood bashed beatings to intense emotional trauma.
he uses bold words and biting criticism to call attention to the gross injustices and hypocrisy of slavery in the United States. In the opening remarks of his speech, Douglas provides heart-wrenching descriptions to pull his audience into the lives of their fellow
In the 1800’s slavery was a major issue in the United States which was dealt with on a daily basis in the South. The “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass” Fedrick Douglass himself expresses the differences in the lives of black people in the North and in the South. The South was known to have some of the wealthiest white people in the states, that wealth and power they had was due to the many slaves they had working in their plantations. In the other hand, the North had black people getting paid for their labor, their black people were free. They were treated like human beings and even though they might still encounter problems with some of the whites these problems where nothing compared to the retched life blacks had in the South.
Douglass is a African American that was a slave and did a Narrative about his time being a slave and in his Narrative he “threw light” at the American slave system. African American slave Frederick Douglass lived through a time of racism and how slavery was a natural thing to do but was a very awful thing. And slavery is when families who had colored skin were separated and sold of to a person that can do anything to them, the slave is pretty much like the slaveholder’s property. And in this essay I will talk about how Douglass’s position differs from those who supported slavery and also I will be talking about How Douglass used his Narrative to share his position. How Douglass “throws light” on the American Slave system is by showing
In the book, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglass reveals his life as a slave and the valuable lessons he learned from his experience. Douglass wants the truth about slavery to be revealed and wants to eliminate the lies that portray slavery as beneficial. Douglass exposes the reality of slavery by criticizing the “romantic image” of slavery, showing the intellectual capabilities slaves had, and revealing the reasons why slaves were disloyal to each other. Douglass criticizes the southern, romantic image of slavery by exposing the harsh treatment and sadness that slaves endured. It was southerners who thought slavery as beneficial, because it benefited themselves and white society.
