Response Paper on Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl According to the encyclopedia Merriam Webster, slavery is a condition in which one human being is owned by another. However, we can define slavery as an institution and holocaust that has been set in place by insecure and greedy individuals with inhuman desire to physically and morally use and abuse other human beings to acquire wealth and status in the society. In her book Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Harriet Jacobs autobiographically writes about her family and friends’ slavery journeys as well as hers in the South of America. Going through Jacobs’s memoir helped me see slavery from a slave’s perspective, but it made me question religion and the capacity of slaves to measure immorality. It is more than pleasant and cheerful to read the story of a slave girl written by the slave girl in question.
The morality of women, and the sympathy of mothers for other mothers, such as slave mothers, is essential to Stowe’s anti-slavery approach. Throughout Uncle Tom's Cabin there is an underlying theme of the importance of the role of women in the mid-nineteenth century plantation culture. Instead of encouraging the belief that women are less than that of men she promotes the idea that they are more than a homemaker. This idea is that, as wives and mothers, women have the ability to shape the morals, values and actions of the men around them, and the power to influence the world as they know it. During the nineteenth century women were considered inferior and expected to be submissive to men; their place is meant to be in the home raising the children and managing the plantation.
Domestic occupations ranged from cook, servant, washerwoman, laundress, seamstress, nurse, midwife, and doctress. Cooks especially were held in high regard because food was such a powerful weapon on the plantation since it was so scarce and regulated. The females basically managed the household while men were found to be cooks. Nurses and midwives were especially admired and coveted, even by the owner, because they were crucial to maintaining the slave population. Further, midwives were considered to increase the number of live births so they were highly regarded because this too increased the slave population.
When she heard about soldiers in the Crimea were not being treated very well, she sought to find a way to the Crimean in order to put her nursing skills to good use. One way in which she had thought that would get her to the Crimea was to go to the British War office and plead to be sent there. However, the war office rejected her request; Mary Seacole thought that her rejection was down to racism, and that the American racist society was also being reflected in Britain. Despite being rejected a passage to the Crimea, she funded her own way there with the help of Thomas Day. On the other hand Florence Nightingale was born to a wealthy family with no nursing history.
Also from the book Natural Rebels Hilary MCD Beckles says “Some women were already accustomed to resisting certain forms of oppression in traditional societies, and acts of insurrection and defiance were part of their social behavioural patterns.” In the mid-18th century the price of enslaved Africans had a major increase in the British Caribbean. Hence this situation caused the enslavers to implement a policy that would enable them to breed African slaves on the plantation. This breeding policy was the social reform of the “age of amelioration” the main objective of amelioration was to encourage enslaved Caribbean women to have babies. Enslaved Caribbean women who reproduced were entitled to better treatment these included less work, better nutrition, monetary funds(for having healthy
The purpose of N’golo was to win the right to choose a virgin woman for marriage (Origins of the fight). The custom of N’golo was to play music during the ceremony (Moura 15). These traditions where embedded in the lives of Africans. By the 1500’s Europe had laid their hand on Africa and had started exporting Africans into slavery (Austen 127). Portugal needed labor to work sugar fields in Brazil, during the 1530s.
Narrated by a British woman, who later flees during a revolt continues to tell of the account she has received first hand of how the prince and his wife were separated by slavery but yet, were brought back together as a result of it. Because of its sympathetic light towards Africans in slavery, the book was described as "Oroonoko is the first humanitarian novel in English. "( Cross) by Wilbur L. Cross in 1899. Cross also respects the short story’s writer Aphra Behn on his opposition of slavery. Although the book is primarily about slavery, it is also linked to kingship which was highly popular at the time of its release, as Othello was the only other massively popular novel, and also the theme of race.
When Clifford disclosed his thoughts of one day marrying Ojebeta he simply told her what would transpire in a fairly non demanding way. Slave girls were already functioning as wives since they would cook, clean, nurse children, and have sexual relations with their masters. The ambiguity of enslavement fostered a way for some slave girls to elevate their status. The class distinctions within the African culture were defined in the following order: males, wives, and then slaves. Many slaves eventually became wives during their bondage to
Some historians may argue that Florence Nightingale was the ‘angel of mercy’ because of her influential systems that she inputted in healthcare, however, it is clear to me that Mary Seacole is the real ‘angel of mercy’ because of the kind acts she did. Mary Seacole was a Jamaican healer who set up a boarding house for the British troops. Seacole was denied the role of a nurse for the British troops, but it is not certain why. Some historians argue that it was because she was a creole so experienced racial prejudice and some claim that it was purely because she had no real medical training. It is important to remember that Seacole went to the Crimea at her own expense as it emphasises her role as the ‘angel of mercy’ because she went there to help others in spite of the racial prejudices she face.
African societies were affected greatly by both the Atlantic and Trans-Saharan networks. Slavery existed in Africa long before the formation of these slave trading networks. The most common slaves were prisoners of war and sometimes criminals. Slaves were purchased by fellow Africans; they were greatly valued in African societies, because they were used to measure wealth. The slave trades benefited the African societies that had control over the slave trades, because they maintained the merchandise (slaves) in their possession.