The novel Soul By Soul, written by Walter Johnson includes many heart wrenching stories about the slave trade in the south during The Antebellum Period in America between the War of 1812 and the Civil War. Using many documentations from this time period that came from the slave holders, slave buyers, and the slaves themselves, Johnson shows the very interesting competition and shifts of power that the slave trade had to offer. Every sale that happened during this time period affected the lives of not only the slaves, but the buyers and traders as well. There is a very unique strategy that comes from each of the three parties throughout the novel. These strategies determined life changing decisions such as where the slave would spend the rest …show more content…
The slaves were their projects that they worked on and tried to perfect in order to grab the attention of a buyer. Slave owners used fear as a tactic to get their slaves to do what they wanted them to. Before the slave trade, when a slave would do something wrong, the owner would just whip them until they repeated the action and the process was just a giant circle. However, when the slave trade began, the owners began threatening their slaves and telling them that if they did not cooperate that they would be separated from their friends and families and sent to Louisiana which was compared to hell by several slaves throughout the novel. This was a tactic that was known as paternalism. When this new strategy was put into place, the slaves began to pay attention when buyers would stop by to look at their potential purchases. Slave children would run away and hide when they saw unfamiliar white men because they were afraid that they would be sent away from their loved ones. The owner’s creativity really shines through when their slaves are in the pens and they are making pitches to buyers and putting prices on their works of art. They have a different sales pitch for every slave they own and a different narrative to go with each of them. They payed attention to the supply and demand of certain types of slaves in order to come up with narratives that appealed to the buyers’ needs. One slave …show more content…
It was a little more stressful even though they were at the head of this triangular game of tug of war. The slave traders in my mind are like football coaches. They have open positions on their team, and they are searching for the best of the best to fill that certain slot during the preseason practices. Just like these coaches, the slave buyers are taking on this role but in a different way. The slave pens in New Orleans are their preseason practices. The buyers are looking for slaves that meet the criteria of the positions that they need around their house. For example, if a buyer needs more slaves to plow a new field for him, then he will look for a strong, athletic slave with lots of stamina that will not quit on the job or be physically unable to complete his or her task. On the other hand, if a buyer is looking for a slave to wash dishes and clean up inside the house, he would look for a slave that has small and steady hands, are intelligent enough to understand direction, and have good enough hygiene and cleanliness to be handling his personal belongings. This seems like an easy job for slave buyers. It seems like all they do is walk around like they are at a grocery store and pick what they want and go home, but it is so much more complicated than this. During a trade, the slave owner approaches the buyer