Often in debt or longing for passage to America would bring people to this kind of agreement. After their time of service was settled, indentured servants were free to continue their lives. The difference between slavery and indentured servants were often unclear. Some masters treated their servants as slaves, beating and threating them, and forcing them to work long horrendous hours. Other masters held up their agreement excellently and treated their servants well.
I have so much empathy for the struggles and strive that they have endured for freedom, something many Americans take for granted. I found myself reading Red Summer and getting teary eyed because I had no idea about most of the events that occurred in 1919. It, in a sense, was a war that went on for blacks - a war that had to be fought in order for them to have the simple rights that whites enjoyed. I truly believe that the men and women who suffered and fought for their place in society are heroes. I found myself wondering what I would have done if I had lived in this time.
| As an American, I appreciate and sometimes take for granted the rights and freedoms I am given every day. Reading this novel just reminds me that people have not always been treated equally. This situation shows hypocrisy in slave owners. They are Americans just like you and
He went through all this illegal actions, and partying lifestyle that he forgot to grow intellectually as well as religiously. But for him to find himself and his way of life he had to experience those things especially prison because if he didn’t, would he even have changed his attitude on life? Malcolm was able to overcome his battles with the help of refinement and literature. He was able to learn new things, which helped shape his thought process towards the end. Malcolm X’s spiritual journey was to reach happiness and contentment by fighting for black/Muslim ways.
It is here that I think Douglass makes another significant step, that is when he creates protections for himself and his clan, or as I like to think of it, their own declaration of independence from the slave community. But, like all things thus far in Douglass’s life, things fell through, and he suffered the mean hand of a relentless slave system. Although Douglas had burned his fake protection papers in order to save himself and his allies, the declaration was still clear in his mind. Like a true revolutionary, he stuck to it and eventually experienced life unrestrained by the horrid slave community in which he came from. It truly is amazing how much Douglass went through in order to experience life outside of his own community.
African American suffered beatings and lynchings. The inability to vote was only one of many problems blacks encountered in the racist society around them, but the civil-rights officials who decided to zero in on voter registration understood its crucial significance as well the white supremacists did. There was great hardship during the summer, but there were also successes. As a result of the Freedom Summer, the percentage of black voters increased, and students who attended the Freedom Schools showed greater confidence in themselves. “The prospected teachers were informed that ‘the kinds of activities you will be developing will fall into three different categories’, (1) Academic Work (2) Recreation and Culture Activities (3) Leadership Development.” “By any standard, Freedom Schools were a success.
There has been many short falls on many counts, and the fight for quality is far from over for the African Americans. They will struggle to achieve anything that they want to endure in their lives. This will profoundly changed people’s attitudes of Americans and at least make it possibility for Civil Right Movement gets better as time goes
What did freedom mean to the newly freed slaves? How did they express their new found freedom? Freedom is simply defined having liberty or independence. “With the end of Civil War, Illinois congressman declared in 1865,the United States was a new nation, for the first time wholly free.” (Foner 2007) Freedom mean to the newly freed slaves was “shaped by their experiences as slaves and their observation of the free society around them. To begin with, freedom meant escape the punishment by the lash, the separation from the families, denial of access to education, and the sexual exploitation of black women by their owners.
Freedom was so important to the African Americans because most of them had been taken from their homeland by force or through manipulation/lies. The chance for freedom did come at a risk. The risk for trying to escape and be free was beating or worse death if you were caught escaping. For the very few lucky ones, freedom was bought by money that had worked for. The reason for trying to escape was because some African Americans were hearing of all the better things that were to offer for them in the north, such as better housing and farmland.
To aware other slaves who are trying to pass, these punishments were often made public. During the time when slavery was abolished, there were still significant benefits of crossing the color-line. Because there were no masters to punish them anymore, light skinned African Americans experimented crossing the line as the benefits outweighed the risks. But the real truth proves that there was a high price to pay when it came to passing. Even though Passing was published in the early 1900’s and the African American situation was much better as compared to what it was 50 years ago, racism was still a solid problem at that period of time.