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Narrative Of Frederick Douglass Rhetorical Analysis

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The “Narrative of Frederick Douglass” is an autobiography written by Frederick Douglass. In this excerpt, he recounts how he struggled to learn to read and write while he was a slave. While living with Master Hugh, the mistress started to teach Douglass how to read until she took on the views of her husband: it was dangerous for slaves to have access to knowledge. Douglass found teachers among the white children he would meet in the neighborhood. When he was sent on errands, Douglass would trade bread in return for lessons. At twelve years old, he found a life-changing book that depicted a conversation between a slave and his master in which the slave convinced the master to set him free. Douglass explained that the book voiced feelings that …show more content…

The main reason Douglass includes information in paragraphs 3-5 is to give us more insight on how he was able to strategically plan his way to literacy. This is important because it helps us to understand the amount of work and dedication he had to put into his life to be able to escape his mastery. I know this because in paragraph 3, he says “From this time I was most narrowly watched”. If I was in a separate room any considerable length of time, I was sure to be suspected of having a book, and was at once called to give an account of myself,” proving that his already difficult journey had just been made even harder once the mistress became stone hearted. In paragraph 4, he says “The plan which I adopted, and the one by which I was most successful, was that of making friends with all the little white boys whom I met in the street. As many of these as I could, I converted into teachers. With their kind aid, obtained at different times and in different places, I finally succeeded in learning to read. When I was sent off errands, I always took my book with me, and by going through one part of my errand quickly, I found time to get a lesson before my

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Later in his writing, Douglass states, “As I writhed under it, I would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without remedy. It opened my eyes to the horrible pit, but no ladder upon which to get out” (Douglass 2). This is another instance where Douglass exhibits his use of narration in his writing

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In the article, “Learning to Read and Write” by Frederick Douglass, he achieved to learn how to read and write in the time of slavery in Maryland. At a young age he learned how to be literate. But then he was a slave that not only thought about being free but wanted to learn how to read and write. His mistress only helped him to learn the alphabet, but he was also accused of reading, so she never trusted him to be near a newspaper, book or anything that had to do with reading. Sometimes he would get sent to run errands and he tries to finish it fast so he can read a part in a book that he found or get some lessons.

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The Slavery movement has no foundations at this time, so he has no other strategy than obeying to his mistress who suddenly turns to a fierce woman who uses her power and control to savagely suppress him. Then, the author starts analyzing logically his surrounding which leads him to understand the fact that being a slave doesn’t mean being as stupid or unintelligent as the mistress or her husband thinks. Taking advantage of the little he knows, Douglass ends up adapting a strategy that allows him to reach his goal, learning to read. By turning her back to him, the author refuses to be exploited by the enslaver and proceeds to the execution of his plan that allows him to take his freedom for good. Consciously or unconsciously the few white boy with whom the author becomes friend help him to success, as well.by his emotional and affecting tone, he played these kids with whom he becomes friends in order to reach his goal of becoming a free educated man.

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Lastly, the slaves were not supposed to be able to read or write, they were denied an education. However, in the city the slaves were able to trick white boys into teaching them or mistresses would secretly educate them. Douglass used this strategy to learn how to read and write while living in the city, “I lived in Master Hugh’s family about seven years. During this time, I succeeded in learning to read and write” (Douglass 79). It took Douglass a while to learn basic human necessities, such as reading and writing.

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Kyla Valentine DiCiaula AP Lang III 2/24/23 Frederick Douglass Rhetorical Analysis Slavery in the United States was truly a horrific time to be a “negro”; beatings almost every day, scarcity of food and clothing, constant demeaning, belittling, hypocrisy, and much more unfathomable circumstances. In both Frederick Douglass’s self-written narrative and his speech titled, “What is Your Fourth of July to Me?” , he explains, in depth, the negative effects of these aspects of slavery, by using metaphors and biblical/religious allusions. However, while Douglass discusses his own experiences with slavery in his narrative, he acts as a representative for his people and discusses the universal Black experience in his speech, separating himself

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In his article, Douglass first explains where he lived and gave acknowledgement to the women who helped him succeed in reading and writing. He says “I had no regular teacher. My mistress, who had kindly commenced to instruct me, had in compliance with advice and direction of her husband, not only ceased to instruct,

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In the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglass uses a juxtaposition of bread and education and through ethos and metaphor in that comparison Douglass reflects on the fundamental base of slavery of denying mental and physical freedom to an individual and also furthers his abolitionist argument. Frederick tells of when he was a young boy, his master’s wife stopped teaching him how to read and write, so he traded young boys on the street bread for reading lessons, which was how he learned how to read. In this passage, he uses a myriad of literary and rhetorical techniques, including an example of ethos. In the pages before, Douglass discussed the harsh treatment of him by his new masters in Baltimore, but still gives credibility

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Frederick Douglass, born a slave and later the most influential African American leader of the 1800s, addresses the hypocrisy of the US of maintaining slavery with its upheld ideals being freedom and independence on July 4th, 1852. Douglass builds his argument by using surprising contrasts, plain facts, and provocative antithesis. Introducing his subject, Douglass reminds his audience about the dark side of America for slaves, in sharp, surprising contrasts with the apparent progressivity within the nation. He first notices “the disparity,” that “the sunlight that brought life and healing to you, has brought stripes and deaths to me,” as an African-American former slave. It is surprising for the audience to hear that the Sun does not bring him any prosperity, that the Sun, the source of life on earth, brings him destruction.

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Frederick Douglass Frederick Douglass was born a slave and later went down to become known as an anti-slavery activist, author, and one of the most important black American leaders of the nineteenth century. Throughout the span of his life, his three biographies help shape the minds of Americans and open the eyes of those unable to see the cruelty and injustice of slavery. Often unable to state directly what he means, Douglass incorporates rhetoric and metaphor to intensify the difficulties of being a slave. For example, in Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, he says "I suppose I looked like a man who had escaped a den of wild beasts, and barely escaped them" (Beers and Odell 467); this sentence is a metaphor, stating that Mr.

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Fredrick Douglass was an American social reformer, writer, and abolitionist who was a slave for all of his childhood. He was one of the most important leaders during the movement of the African-American civil rights. Douglass wrote the narrative, "The life of Fredrick Douglass", to describe life in the perspective of a slave. Throughout Douglass's writing, the readers are able to see his feelings change throughout the narrative. For example, when Douglass escaped slavery, the readers saw the initial excitement that followed his escape, in which that excitement shortly disappeared.

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In it, Douglass describes his infancy separation beside his mother, his battle to educate himself in conformity with examine or write, the beastly whippings that witnessed then received, then his determination to keep free, wholethe while stressing his own humanity, or the inhumanity of the dictation so much saved him a slave. Douglass’s autobiography was once an

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Natalee Kesel Mr. Nations World Literature 1818 3 April 2023 Frederick Douglass Rhetorical Analysis Frederick Douglass, on the Fourth of July in 1852 gave an address to the Rochester Ladies’ Anti Slavery Society. Douglass was invited to give a celebratory speech to commemorate the birth of the United States, however, what he said instead was much more thought-provoking. Frederick Douglass was an escaped slave who grew to become a prominent figure and activist for the abolitionist movement. In his address, Frederick Douglass seeks to illustrate the ironic and faulty thought that he should be celebrating the Fourth of July with the anti-slavery society by dramatizing the parallels and hypocrisy of the current race relations in America.

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He caught the president’s eye about how his life changed many people. When the president mentions him Twittersphere quickly lit up. Douglass was listening that such education would “spoil” his boy’s education, “forever unfit him to be a slave.” The words sank into Douglass’s heart and says that it stirred up sentiments within that lay slumbering and called into existence an entirely new train of thought (Charles 1). He divided his book into five chapters corresponding to periods in life as a writer (Mezurek 1).

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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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The level of education of the slaves on the plantation allow them to be manipulated by their masters. In many situations during the 1800s when slavery was prominent we can see that education holds power in society. Slave masters were educated and due to this, they were able to exert control over the slaves on the plantation. Douglass was self-educated and was able to analyze slave behavior and see slavery occur firsthand as a slave himself. In the book, we can see how the slave’s ignorance is actually bliss from the perspective of Douglass, how information like knowing how to read was withheld from the slaves and why and why slave-owners preferred non-educated slaves to educated ones.

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