Compare the representation of family in the salves narratives of Douglass and Jacobs In this essay, I will talk about Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass and Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl in terms of family. Regarding the authors, Frederick Douglass was born in February 1818 and died in February 1895. On the other hand, Harriet Ann Jacobs was born on February 11, 1813, and died on March 7, 1897, a woman who, nowadays, is remembered as an abolitionist writer and feminist. Before we start getting into this issue, it would be appropriate to explain what “slavery” means. By “slavery” we understand the state in which someone belongs to someone else; one person is considered by law someone else’s property. This
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The slave’s status may be permanent and it is habitually inherited by the slave’s children; “Chattel slavery throughout the America was, like family traits, passed down from generation to generation.” (Walvin 30) Moreover, even though some assumptions do not claim it “…slaves in antiquity were sometimes able to maintain familial structures of their own – even though slaves could not legally marry and the children of slaves were legally the property of the parent’s owners.” (David L. Balch 207) Although both Douglass and Jacobs were slaves, they went through a distinct situation in the way of becoming slaves; On the one hand, Douglass tells us at the beginning of his book that he does not know his age; “I have no accurate knowledge of my age, never having seen any authentic record containing it.” (Douglass 12) He thinks he is nearly twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old. As I mentioned before, masters wanted their slaves to be as ignorant as possible, the less they knew, the better; “… it is the wish of most masters within my knowledge to keep their slaves thus ignorant”. (Douglass …show more content…
But we, who were slave-children, without father or mother, could not expect to be happy. We must be good; perhaps that would bring us contentment.” (Jacobs 30) Linda is talking to her brother here; he told her that he wishes he had died when their father did, because everyone seems so unhappy. She tells him that not everyone does, there are privileged people who have not to go through all those sufferings they have to face. This reflexion is just a way to represent the total unjustness and inequality the society in that period
The slave’s status may be permanent and it is habitually inherited by the slave’s children; “Chattel slavery throughout the America was, like family traits, passed down from generation to generation.” (Walvin 30) Moreover, even though some assumptions do not claim it “…slaves in antiquity were sometimes able to maintain familial structures of their own – even though slaves could not legally marry and the children of slaves were legally the property of the parent’s owners.” (David L. Balch 207) Although both Douglass and Jacobs were slaves, they went through a distinct situation in the way of becoming slaves; On the one hand, Douglass tells us at the beginning of his book that he does not know his age; “I have no accurate knowledge of my age, never having seen any authentic record containing it.” (Douglass 12) He thinks he is nearly twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old. As I mentioned before, masters wanted their slaves to be as ignorant as possible, the less they knew, the better; “… it is the wish of most masters within my knowledge to keep their slaves thus ignorant”. (Douglass …show more content…
But we, who were slave-children, without father or mother, could not expect to be happy. We must be good; perhaps that would bring us contentment.” (Jacobs 30) Linda is talking to her brother here; he told her that he wishes he had died when their father did, because everyone seems so unhappy. She tells him that not everyone does, there are privileged people who have not to go through all those sufferings they have to face. This reflexion is just a way to represent the total unjustness and inequality the society in that period