Summary Of Walter Johnson's Soul By Soul

Martin Luther King once said: “We are not makers of history, we are made of history.” We all can connect with this quote to a certain degree. A lot has happened in our history and as a result of that we are who we are today, even though sometimes history is not in our own hands to chose. The book, Soul by Soul by Walter Johnson tells the readers story of slavery that's took place on nineteenth-century, before the civil war on America by going away from the cotton plantations into the slave market itself which was the heart of the domestic slave trade. The story takes place on New Orleans. The New Orleans slave market was the largest in the nation, where thousands of men, women, and children were priced an sold. Walter Johnson incorporates

The slaves were dressed up well, oiled on their bodies and feed up good . The traders relied on the slaves to act their part as valuable commodities. When a slave was bought by a master, they would be stripped and asked for their past, aspecting honest answers from the traders. The masters would use the information against the traders asking for a sale to their own advantage. A lot of Southern Whites were effected by slavery and this market to the point that a lot of them identify themselves based on their ownership of slaves. This market culture was maybe a form of entertainment for many slave owners. Johnson’s argument was stated clearly throughout the entire text. Southern Whites would show off to one another their wealth and power based on how many slaves they bought from slave sellers. That was the only way to consider themselves as ‘white’ wealthy people in the Old South. Johnson provides enough evidence to support his argument by using several primary sources. Slavery was absolutely very tough on slaves, but it also had an impact on its owners because they were very dependent on slavery. Everything revolved around slavery when it came to the slave