Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: Logically Emotional Appeal

Slavery is a humongous topic involving both slaves and former slaves. The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave Story is one such story. Douglass suffered punishments, and watching others get punished, he uses those experiences to make his argument against slavery.Douglass’ tone in the narrative is sarcastic and dark. Frederick Douglass successfully uses vast quantities of rhetorical devices, illuminating the horror and viciousness of slavery, including the need to eliminate it.

In the Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass: an American Slave, written by himself, the author argues that slaves are treated no better than, sometimes worse, than livestock. Douglass supports his claim by demonstrating how the slaves were forced to eat out of a trough like pigs and second, shows how hard they were working, like animals. The author’s purpose is to show the lifestyle of an American slave in order to appeal to people’s emotions to show people, from a slave’s perspective, what slavery is really like. Based on the harsh descriptions of his life, Douglass is writing to abolitionist and other people that would sympathize and abolish slavery.

In a Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave written by himself, the author argues that no one can be enslaved if he or she has the ability to read, write, and think. Douglass supports his claim by first providing details of his attempts to earn an education, and secondly by explaining the conversion of a single slaveholder. The author’s purpose is to reveal the evils of slavery to the wider public in order to gain support for the abolition of his terrifying practice. Based on the purpose of writing the book and the graphic detail of his stories, Douglass is writing to influence people of higher power, such as abolitionists, to abolish the appalling reality of slavery; developing a sympathetic relationship with the

My first example of diction that Douglass uses is “…in all its glaring odiousness, that slaveholders have ordained, and by law established, that the children of slave women shall in all cases follow the condition of their mothers; and this is done too obviously to administer to their own lusts, and make a gratification of their wicked desires profitable as well…” (2) Here Douglass is describing how slaveholders have sex with the female slaves and abandon the children born from it. He uses words such as odiousness, lust, and wicked desires to show how the slaveholders use and abuse the slaves in their employment for their own gratification. By using the aforementioned words, Douglass try’s to convey to his target audience the audacity of these men who abandon

One of the most striking parts of Douglass’ book is that he wrote about the physical abuse of slaves in great detail. Douglass did not shy away from gory descriptions in order to accurately portray the dehumanization of both the slaves and the slave owners. The first example of physical violence that Douglass provided is actually the first time that he himself was introduced to the cruelty of slavery. He describes his aunt being whipped “upon her naked back till she was literally covered with blood” mercilessly by their master, even after she begs him to stop. The diction that Douglass used is so violent in this passage and allows readers to truly understand what Douglass experienced. The master beats Douglass’

In The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, the author goes into detail about what his life was like when he was a slave. He wishes to get across his beliefs about slavery. The Narrative explores different reasoning’s for slavery and tries to denounce every argument that is used to justify slavery. This topic is something that has very deep meaning to Mr. Douglass, as he himself was a slave. He uses different ways to denounce the very existence of slaves. Frederick Douglass is trying to explain what slavery is really like, through his experiences and his analysis. His firsthand account of slavery brings about a new perspective that is usually not considered when slavery is learned about and taught in school. This new perspective helps

Douglass brings these points to light to show the contrast of how absurd the concept of slavery was. How a person out of the same mouth can agree that man is human and yet treat him like a slave; how can you agree that man is entitled to liberty, and yet beat man with a whip. Douglass was trying to prove the extreme level of hypocrisy within the heart of man that celebrated independence day while have a host of slaves under his control. In addition, Douglass is going through the process of eliminating every possible argument leading up to the argument where he compels his audience to think about the fact that if it is not any of the other arguments does this mean that slavery is divine, yet, he debunks this idea by stating, “That which is inhuman, cannot be divine!” (Douglass 315)

Andrews establishes the point that because Douglass had a targeted audience, he thus had to alter his writing and presentation. This being said, the question of his narrative’s validity needs to focus on the work as a whole. Various aspects of Douglass’s work prove that it is in fact, honest. Through his use of tone, facts, events, and neutrality, it allowed the reader to accept his

Frederick Douglass disagreed with the American Promise as it doesn’t represent Americans as a whole, just white people. This narrative is based off how Frederick got his education and became free through living life as a slave. A summary of the book shows how Douglass used his feelings and wanting freedom by escaping slavery. Also, Douglass did different things from other slaves to get his education. The purpose of this book was to inform the readers how the author used rhetorical devices to express Douglass gaining American Feelings and American Individualism.

Douglass’ use of literary devices enhances the story of his plight. For example, he writes that if the mother is a slave the child shall be as well. He states, “the slaveholder, in cases not a few, sustains to his slave the double relation of master and father” (Douglass, 1999 p.4). The use of litotic phrase emphasizes that this is a common

Who is afflicted by slavery? Frederick Douglass would argue that all people are damaged by the establishment of a slave state throughout his masterpiece by displaying to the reader how cruel people become when they diminish humans to mere possessions. In “The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass”, Frederick Douglass in addition to revealing the horrors committed upon black slaves, shows a unique perspective on how slavery negatively affects white slave owners themselves. Slavery does in fact affect the slave owner and Douglas experiences this firsthand through Sophia Auld by slowly watching her decay from being a caring person that even educated Douglass, to a cruel bitter slave owner that no longer cared about him.

Literacy rates have declined at a rapid rate due to the neglect of available educational resources and opportunities. Our country has failed at preparing our youth and will continue to do so unless a change is made. A decline in literacy rates have been a result of many unnecessary changes that may lead our country into a literacy depression. Improper education, limited access to books, technology, and poor role models all has made literacy spiral downward. We should ask ourselves what we can do and not try to do in order to make literacy rates rise.

After reading Douglass’s The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself, I have a better understanding of what it meant to be a black slave in the antebellum era, and have a better understanding of what form of oppression that they had to face. The fact that black people were oppressed into slavery created their own cultural identity. During this era, Douglass was able to pull himself out of terrible circumstances and taught himself how to read and write. As a writer capable of telling his own story, Douglass wrote an influential autobiography showing how he triumphed against prejudice, and he also offers a positive image of black people in a world where slavery was justified on the basis of race.

Yordanose SolomoneAfro 3597 WEssay ATuesday October 18, 2016The Contradicting Nature of Christianity and the Institution of Slavery A Thematic Analysis of Frederick Douglass 's NarrativeChristianity quite often, especially when associated to the system of slavery becomes even more of a contentious issue than it already is. In The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglass presents the theme of perversion of Christianity by slaveholders as a way to bring out the contradiction that lie deep within slaveholders ' adulterated interpretation of the belief system. In this paper, I will highlight these perversions that Douglass discusses in his narrative and explore why slaveholders ' form of Christianity make strong impression in his writing. Lastly, I will examine the larger tonal meaning as it relates to the theme and share some reasoning behind Douglass 's need to include it in his narrative.The first element of perversion of Christianity that Douglass mentions is the dehumanization role "the slaveholders '" Christianity plays in dismantling any form of familial structure the slaves may have created.Douglass speaks about this in this association with his own separation from his mother, Harriet Bailey and not completely knowing who his father is. Thus establishing the first element in this perversion, which can be explained easily as a breaking down the first requirement for a growing boy, a family.This perversion lets slaveholders not only to distort the

Within a slave narrative, the identity of the writer greatly affects the perspective of the story and the message that the author wishes to convey. For a narrative of this nature, to send its meaning directly and efficiently it must be able to illustrate the individual struggle of the writer as well as create a clear line between what it means to be a slave and what it means to be free. These identities of the author not only conflict with the image of self but also help to illuminate the struggles of the author. Each identity plays a part in constructing the narrative to depict both the hardships of slaves as well as the capabilities of those freed from enslavement to achieve more. Within Frederick Douglass’ narrative, he depicts both his