Week 3 Discussion

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Arts Humanities

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Apr 3, 2024

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Uploaded by runninggirl1998

For this week’s discussion on perseverance, I chose to discuss the narrator in “The Soft-Hearted Sioux” by Zitkala-Sa and Linda Brent in “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl” by Harriet Jacobs. Both of these people showed a continued effort to accomplish their beliefs despite opposition and failure. In “The Soft-Hearted Sioux” the narrator is a Native American who wishes to follow a different path than his ancestors. He leaves the village for 9 years and returns from living among white people and hopes to bring Christianity to his village. Despite the pressure from his tribe, the young man remained steadfast in his intention to hunt “for the soft heart of Christ” and stubbornly followed and preached the Biblical teachings. (Zitkala-Sa, 1901/2023, p. 615). Despite his perseverance, the tribe wouldn’t convert to Christianity because the medicine-man was the leader of the people and called him a traitor. The tribe moved camp without the narrator and his family. Day after day the narrator tries to hunt to feed his family, so in desperation he goes to a nearby cattle farmer’s field and kills one of his cows, and the farmer. He hurried back to his father with the food, but when he arrived, he found his father dead. The narrator showed perseverance in trying to get the village to convert to Christianity and also by going out to get food for his dying father. In “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl” Linda Brent was born into slavery and was forced to work for the Flints. Dr. Flint constantly sexually harassed her, and Linda believed, “it seems less degrading to give one’s self, than to submit to compulsion.” (Jacobs, 1861/2023, p.849). In order to avoid being raped, Linda sought after Mr. Sands (another slave owner) with which she had two children. Linda feared that her children would be working on the Flint’s plantation, so she ran away and eventually reunited with them in New York. Linda manages not only to survive but also to transcend seemingly insurmountable barriers. Linda showed perseverance throughout her life by portraying extraordinary psychological and spiritual strength, and not letting her moral duties go out the window even as a slave. References Zitkala-S ̈ a. (2023). The Soft-Hearted Sioux. In R.S. Levine, G. Avilez, M.A. Elliott, S.M. Gustafson, A. Hungerford, & L. Siraganian (Eds.), The Norton Anthology of American Literature (Shorter 10th ed., Vol. 2. pp 613-617). Norton. (Original work published 1901). Jacobs, H. (2023). Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. In R.S. Levine, G. Avilez, M.A. Elliott, S.M. Gustafson, A. Hungerford, & L. Siraganian (Eds.), The Norton Anthology of American Literature (Shorter 10th ed., Vol. 2. pp 831- 852). Norton. (Original work published 1861).
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