ipl-logo

Summary Of Ar 'N' T I A Women By Deborah Grey White

880 Words4 Pages

In the book Ar’n’t I a women the author, Deborah Gray White, explains how the life was for the slave women in the Southern plantations. She reveals to us how the slave women had to deal with difficulties of racism as well as dealing with sexism. Slave women in these plantations assumed roles within the family as well as the community; these roles were completely different to the roles given to a traditional white female. Deborah Gray White shows us how black women had a different experience from the black men and the struggle they had to maintain their sense of womanhood against all odds, resist sexual oppression, and keep their families together. In the book the author describes two different types of women, “Jezebel” and “Mammy” they …show more content…

On page 29 the author describes it as “a person governed almost entirely by her libido”. When we think of slaves we think of how they were forced to work without pay or respect but one never really wants concentrates on the idea of how African American women were sexually exploited. Some of the African American slaves were actually aiming to be a “fancy women” to use that to their advantage for the simple fact that they had better treatment. While others were forced into this position. White explains the character on page 38, stating that if the black women made themselves available, it only lend to the acceptance of the whites theory of Jezebel, but if black women remained refused to this idea, they faced the fear of being sold or whipped. Although some of the masters mistress were well taken cared of, there were times were the African American women was forced into having sexual relations with the master or his children and were still forced to work outside with the others. The role of an African American women compared to the role of a white women were very different. In antebellum because of their sex most women were assumed to be weaker, and believed to be intellectually and physically suited for only domestic work. But most black women did as much work as black men, and “endured the brutal punishment meted out by slaveholders and their overseers,” they were also required to fulfill their jobs as mothers. As slaves, they struggled against the double discrimination having to take the maltreat given to all African-Americans as well as the one given to women in

Show More
Related
1414 Words | 6 Pages

In contrast, woman of Spelman did not have it so easy. Even though the young girls had also learned values in morality and respectability, in addition to domesticity, their challenge was much more difficult. Black women were labeled in a stereotype "black Jezebel" which dated back to slavery and "served to excuse sexual mistreatment by white male slaveholders" (pg

Read More
1444 Words | 6 Pages

The women were treated very cruelly on their boat ride to America and at the slave auction. “The women’s dehumanization and abuse started before they even got to America. A soldier grabbed Amari roughly and pushed her towards that door. He forced her to the ground and then kicked her in the direction of the passageway” (Draper 30). Draper wants the reader to understand how the soldiers treated the slaves.

Read More
1656 Words | 7 Pages

she received the larger share of the confidence of her master, and many small favors that were by them unattainable”. Sojourner had strenuous work, yet managed to get it done and be efficient with it because her master would give her favors. The institutionalized racism within slavery came with economic oppression which meant slaves were being paid very little to nothing at all.

Read More
180 Words | 1 Pages

On the strength of her research, the conclusions that White reaches about female slaves seem quite reasonable. She sets straight the mythology of the Jezebel and Mammy stereotypes, explaining how and why these images were created in white minds and exposing the reality of who these women were and what the stereotypes meant for them. She also lays out, in detail, the various roles that slave women either embraced or were forced into. She describes the particular hardships of women, especially in regard to bearing and raising children and the unique difficulties that arose from this. She gives attention to the expectations placed upon women of all ages in their roles as workers on the plantations, in their relationships with men, and in other

Read More
872 Words | 4 Pages

In his experience, enslaved people were treated like animals and were not given fair work. The South believed that conditions for slaves were better than for hired workers in the North. They relied on slaves for free labor. She didn’t

Read More
1303 Words | 6 Pages

Of course that’s the theory slaveholders held strong to but how could that possibly be factual. Being a woman in slavery was more mentally, emotionally, and physically straining then being a man. Women were talked down upon, verbally abused as well as physically. Imagine giving birth to a new born baby and having him ripped from your breast so that you could nourish your owners newborn baby. What happens to your baby when you have none to give him by time it’s his turn to eat?

Read More
1078 Words | 5 Pages

For a long time, “the Negro women have been alone and unprotected, not only socially but psychologically as well… It is not the frigidity; it is the rigidity” (Wallace, 1979, p. 153). Black women are thought to have strength, resilience, intolerance with no fears and insecurities like any other woman. They are not allowed to be soft and dainty like White women. She is strong, she is fierce, she is Mother Africa.

Read More
1359 Words | 6 Pages

adhered women’s rights to racial equality and social injustice by using her experiences of injustice and brutality as a slave, to connect with her audience. She pursued the idea of separation between the North and the South, insisting that women should join forces to fight for their rights, speaking up to be heard. She goes further to refute the common assumption that women are were delicate beings, created solely for beauty; women are transformed into feminine and fragile beings because of their size, strength, and stature compared to men’s, which deems them weaker than men. She does so by comparing the life of a slave woman to women in society, and men. “Look at me!

Read More
1843 Words | 8 Pages

The white people viewed slaves as sub-human, and a black woman who was mentally superior was not something they would have encountered before. Dana explains what Margaret, Tom’s wife, may have been feeling; “I don’t think Margaret likes educated slaves any better than her husband does…. He can barely read and write. And she’s not much better” (Butler 82).

Read More
1019 Words | 5 Pages

Overtime women have been depicted in a variety of ways. Films and books have shown women as caregivers, as someone who solely gives birth to children that’s it, rebels, one who caters to their husband and among a variety of other stereotypes. When looking at the progression of women, we can look in the following films and books; Mandingo, God’s Little Acre, Birth of a Nation, Gone with the Wind, The Littlest Rebel, Cat in a Hot Tin Roof, and Jezebel. The books and films mentioned before will certainly help with the picture of women of the south in the past, present and future. African American women and Caucasian women have progressed greatly from roles that today would be unordinary.

Read More
504 Words | 3 Pages

Just like what we are learning now in the class, women who were slave didn’t have any choice over anything whatsoever, they have to work extra for better food and clothing and better care of their kids. Sometimes they even have to conduct sexual activity with slave

Read More
937 Words | 4 Pages

The way African American female slaves were treated the way Harriet Jacobs describes in her novel is they were property. Her master would whisper foul words into her ears. (Gates, 231) Harriet Jacobs and other female slaves were looked upon as sexual objects that existed for their masters. Her master stalked her and her master made her a little home for to live in. Harriet Jacobs discusses how women at this time were subjected to rape and were forced to bare children with their masters.

Read More
683 Words | 3 Pages

Life for black women was not much better, even if they were sheltered inside the homes of their employers. Black women who worked as

Read More
1394 Words | 6 Pages

Mallory Bruns Prof. Wall English 2327-001 21 November 2014 The Fight for Freedom Harriet Jacobs was born into slavery. While her youth contained “six years of happy childhood,” a few tragedies and mistresses later, Jacobs spent many years in pain under the possession of her cruel five-year-old mistress, Emily Flint, and her father, Dr. Flint. Once able to obtain freedom, Jacobs spent most of her life working for the Anti-Slavery office in New York, in hope that one day she could make a difference in the world. “She sought to win the respect and admiration of her readers for the courage with which she forestalled abuse and for the independence with which she chose a lover rather than having one forced on her” (Jacobs 921).

Read More
956 Words | 4 Pages

We must make a change because history can repeat itself, and I refuse to stay quite. In not just African American but “Aint I women” (Sojourner Truth). In this paper I will be answering the unanswered questions that I feel is extremely important. First how does race, sex and class dictate rather women should have rights? Second, how have black women grown from this?

Read More

More about Summary Of Ar 'N' T I A Women By Deborah Grey White

Open Document