Book review #1: Biography of a Runaway Slave The book Biography of a Runaway Slave entails the captivating and surreal life of a young man in Cuba whose name is Esteban Mesa Montejo. This book is very unique in a way that it tells a true story in such a perfectly intertwined narrative. Though Miguel Barnet, the author, interviewed every word, the words feel so real and it gives a sense of true slavery and what it must have been like in 19th century Cuba. Miguel’s purpose of this book was to give people a realization and understanding of what slavery was like. Anyone who grabs this book and dives into its narrative will surely feel and understand what slavery must have been like.
However, not all African American families lived through these circumstances. In particular, Solomon Northup, born a free black man, grew up well educated for his ethnicity. While traveling he was drugged, kidnapped, and sold a slave. After his release twelve years later he sued for his peculiar situation and his case was ignored. The nature and effect of the enslavement of people of African descent in the United States constitutes the excuse amongst the white society to feel superior.
c. The overall tone of Douglass’s speech would be very pessimistic as he shared his personal history with factual knowledge. The tone he chose fit the event and the circumstances. Time had passed, yet nothing had changed significantly. Mr. Douglass begins his speech by addressing the audience as “fellow citizens,” indicating to that although he was a “Negro” he himself was also a citizen. He then gave acknowledgement and praise to the revolutionist for gaining freedom and independence for all men from the British in 1776 (the past).
It impacted us in a very good way. Kings speech was to hope that black and whites could live amongst each other on peace, and for every American to have the same amount of equal rights The Pound Cake Speech was given by Bill Cosby in May 2004, at an event to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision. The speech was a very interesting speech. Not just because of the topic of the speech, but because of how he presented it. For the most part it was him expressing his feeling and telling stories of how the young black people were wasting their lives and not actually bothering to learn how to be real people or learn how to speak properly.
In 1852, July the 4th speech by Frederick Douglass was presented in Rochester New York. Many years later Frederick Douglass is praised and his speech read. James Earle Jones and Danny Glover on separate occasions performed a reading of Douglass’s speech. Nervously Douglass begins to speak and wonders aloud at the purpose for which he is speaking this day. On a day of independence celebrated by white people while enslaving the blacks of this American nation, there is no gratitude in which he can express and speaks this sarcastically.
Tiffany Spencer Spencertd3@my.palmbeachstate.edu February 23, 2012 ENC 1101, Sec.13 The Civil War Isn’t Tragic Objective Summary In the article, “The Civil War Isn’t Tragic” the author argues that the Civil War wasn’t tragic. We as people don’t look at the other important wars in U.S history as tragic. He states that “Twenty-two thousand people died in the Revolutionary War, and we celebrate with hotdogs and hamburgers every year”. People also don’t realize that it took courage, hope and fight to overcome the horrible WWII/Holocaust. The Revolutionary War and the Holocaust were both seen as wars of liberation.
Rhetorical Analysis: Barak Obama’s Inaugural Address President Barak Obama gave a very impressing speech at his Inaugural Address. It is obvious that this speech is addressed to the American people. President Obama’s speech was about the problems that this country is facing right now, and what we must do in order to solve these problems. President Obama, did not have to create any exigence in his speech because, the American people wanted to hear what he had to say because he had just made history by being the first African American President. But he did start of his speech by saying that the oath has been taken by a lot of the presidents, but some of those presidents have come into office, when this country was in need of some change and new solutions.
U.S. History to 1870 Argumentative Essay Solomon Northup Solomon Northup’s narrative, Twelve Years as a Slave, provides great insight into the daily life of a slave to appropriately show that slavery was inhuman. The slave narrative was written to describe the life of Northup which included all the trials and tribulations that he endured in order for him to regain freedom. Even though in the early 19th century the life of a slave was insignificant and in turn not well documented. Twelve Years as a Slave opened the eyes of many white men, who were not aware of the pain and anguish African-Americans had to undergo as slaves. Therefore Northup’s book played a great deal in the abolition movement of slavery, because it simply provided an account of the true and complete tragedy of slavery.
Response to Slavery and The Making of America The first episode of Slavery and the Making of America discussed the beginnings of African enslavement in America and how it slowly became a “downward spiral.” In the beginning, the Dutch West India company was very dependant on the labor of their slaves, so the slaves did have room to negotiate for things like better wages and were treated much better and had more rights than we would typically imagine slaves back then to have. Many of the first eleven slave men that came to “Dutch New Amsterdam” were Christian, had mixed European and African ansestry, were Christian, literate, and spoke many different languages. It was surprising to me how such educated and literate people could have been enslaved and made to work from dawn to dusk like that. I feel that since there were so few slaves at that time, the company was always very afraid that they would loose all the fruits that came from these slave's hard labor so they had to make sure the slaves were content and had to let them negotiate. The hard work of these slaves made the early infrastructure of America.
King dreams of a day when “little Black boys and Black girls [are] able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers” (535). (CX) It is an equal nation where citizens are not judged by the color of their skin, their religion or origin. (CP) The Lincoln Memorial refers to a new birth of freedom, and it brings true justice to all citizens. The date 1693 is also important for King’s speech because it is a symbol for the Emancipation Proclamation. It “[comes] as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slave who [are] seared in the flames of withering injustice” (King 533).