Motherhood In Slavery

The institution of slavery has affected the lives of both white and black women. Women in slavery experienced hardships and effects that men in slavery never experienced. One of the primary roles that a slave woman had was motherhood. After the child was old enough for labor, the slave mother was trained to labor in a domestic setting or work in the fields. Young enslaved women were expected to be maids, cleaners and some were employed as wet nurses and even breastfed the children of the slave master. There were more women then men working in the fields of the plantation especially at harvest time. Slave masters never considered slave woman as delicate human beings, but saw them as their property. Slave women were treated with so low value …show more content…
This consequence has caused many slave master's wives to be wretch. White women are devastated of the fact that their husbands have broken the promise of commitment. White women in this institution dealt with the fact that they are no longer their husband's attention. They have to deal with the hardship of being in a competition for their husband's affection. The slave now has become the recipient of jealousy by the wife of the slave master. Sometimes, an enslaved mother wasn't given a chance to love her child before it was separated from her forever. Incidents speaks on a scenario of a mother that had seven children. When the day of hiring comes, she could do nothing, but watch as her children depart from her. In effect, she runs away from her master never to be found again. Some enslaved men never experienced this hardship because the majority of the children's fathers were white slave masters. Slave women feared for the life of their child and did everything they could so that their child never experience the wrath of slavery. In Incidents, Brent explains that she would rather see her children die, then be under the hand of her slave master and so Brent goes in to hiding for the safety her children. Margaret Garner was another slave woman who killed her children for the sake of their spirits. Margaret would rather her children die then have then be taken into the …show more content…
White women felt as if their husbands were not valuing them the way they should be valued and began feeling unimportant. The colored enslaved women had to struggle with the emotional abuse from self-esteem. In Incidents, Brent speaks on how she was ashamed on telling her grandmother, Aunt Martha the lascivious persecution she was experiencing in the Flint household. Brent was ashamed that the people she knew would b disgusted by her. Linda felt that she was a disgrace to her family and had low self-esteem. Colored women also had the face the rigors of discrimination that were demonstrated by whites or even of the same race. In Incidents, Brent tells us about a time when she a nurse of The Bruce family baby's and she was told by Mrs. Bruce to sit at the table. Brent was then told to leave the table by a colored waiter because she was