Planter-Class White Ladies

During the Antebellum age of America, new values and ideals began to arise. These ideals were reflected in the households of middle class citizens and grouped together to create the “Cult of Domesticity.” The cult helped form the foundation of female inferiority in the male dominated society. As “slaves” to the home, women were to uphold morals that were no longer relevant in the new industrialized world. The ideas that led to this treatment of women were drawn from religion, “scientific studies”, and the Industrial Revolution.

Women have had a hard time with their lives for as long as we know. They were treated as property, an item, and less than a male would ever be. They have struggled, but some struggled more than others. Some lead an easy life as less than human, but others had a hard time. The hardships may have been due to disease, child birth, and home life. This paper will cover the hardships between the Chesapeake and New England women and their differences.

In this short paper, we will speak about the role women had in society in the antebellum south and how it was affected.

In a time period when women were considered inferior, as were blacks, it was unimaginable the horrors a black woman in the south had to endure during this period. African women were slaves and subject to the many horrors that come along with being in bondage, but because they were also women, they were subject to the cruelties of men who look down on women as inferior simply because of their sex. The sexual exploitation of these females often lead to the women fathering children of their white masters. Black women were also prohibited from defending themselves against any type of abuse, including sexual, at the hands of white men. If a slave attempted to defend herself she was often subjected to further beatings from the master. The black female was forced into sexual relationships for the slave master’s pleasure and profit. By doing this it was the slave owner ways of helping his slave population grow.

Douglass not only describes slaves as animals, but he describes slave treatment as if they were animals to further describe the horrendous lives of slaves. Slaves were fed food in troughs (36). By choosing the word “trough”, Douglass emphasizes the poor treatment of slaves; slaves were not good enough to be fed from bowls or plates, they were no better than animals. Douglass also compares women on the plantations to breeding animals. Women were expected to reproduce in order to increase their masters’ wealth, not to create a family. Women and children were separated before the child was a year old so they would not form familial bonds with one another. When Douglass’ own mother died, he compared it to a stranger dying because he had no connection with her (18). Slaves were not only thought of animals, but also fostered as animals. Douglass describes Mr. Covey as a “nigger-breaker”, Douglass was broken in “body, soul, and spirit” by

There was an actual inventory taken of each woman’s home. This candid look into the lives of these women shows us the differences as well as what ties them together. Whether on a farm, the frontier or in town, these women shared the same daily duties. These included the ever important meal preparation, the building and regulating of fires, animal and garden tending, mothering the children and spinning to provide clothing and essentials for their family. This look into their homes showed that no matter if you have two rooms are four, ornamental decorations or punch bowls for entertaining, spinning wheels or none, each woman’s role and duties were just as important as the other. The fact that one woman had little in wealth made little distinction of her from the other two.

In Celia, a Slave, written by Melton A. McLaurin, the relationships of race, gender, sexuality, power, law, and slavery in the antebellum South is revealed by Celia’s case. In antebellum South, many things dictated a person’s worth, but the race of a person was the number one factor. If a person was of a race other than Caucasian, such as being Black, then he or she would live in the United States as one of two classifications: slave or freed slave. Of these two classifications, both were thought as being subpar humans when compared to white citizens. Due to these beliefs regarding Blacks, slave and free, Blacks themselves were unable to protect themselves from slave masters and in most legal standings (McLaurin 137). This means that Blacks did not have the same citizenship as white people because a slave was not a citizen in the eyes of the law but the human property of his or her master. Gender is the second idea that dictated a person’s worth and character. Males, white particularly, always held more power and sexual control over the women of the antebellum South. White women, when married, became the legal property of her husband (139). Even if a woman was not married, then she was still considered the property of her father and under his protection until she was given away. For example, Virginia Waynescot and Mary Newsome both lived with their father, Robert Newsome (10-11). By living with their father, the two daughters basically handed over their power because Robert

In their narratives Frederick Douglass’ and Harriet Jacobs’ recount the agony they have gone through in a slaveholding society, where gender played a deceiving role during the captiva-tion. For slaves it was impossible to achieve designated stereotypical roles of the sexes, respec-tively for male and female, as the only officially recognized gender at that time. While Harriet Jacobs was restricted in her aspire for freedom due to her role conflict as mother and slave, Fred-erick Douglass seems distant to family matters and focused on getting his independence and pride back with education and resistance. Both were constrained to follow the general pictures default to fit the American culture and the norms set by society towards gender throughout their captivation as slaves. Yet, these specific examples of their life are despite their differences, very similar in their desires.

Masculinity didn’t do a good job of attaining the hoped-for standards, as they didn’t have other equally profound consequences for American middle-class culture at this time. It justified the exclusion of women from the world as acceptable to both women and men at this time, and it cultivated strong bonds around women as well. They in fact shared the biological experiences central to their definition as women and spoke the same language of virtue and piety, which essentially means that they instilled a awareness of a set of common goals for them and experiences present for them, which had values specific to women, and distinct from those of men. The key to this was the extensive networks of female friends that were present during this time period for these women. Since women were supposedly better than men during this time, it was feasible and easy to believe that women were obliged and privileged to work together and help other women, who were fallen, and poor, who were having some sort of trouble during this time period as a result of the society that they were present in during this time period. Southern white women during this time were aware of the ideology of domesticity during this time, and they would try to implement it and its teachings for their lives, but their expectations were frequently articulated during this time period. There was little industrialization, domestication, urbanization, immigration, and therefore, social dislocation present during

Women’s issues during slavery and even into the Reconstruction Era were not held as top priorities within the social structure of life during those times. The main political and social issues were within the male spectrum, and therefore left women’s rights and values in second place, behind men. Within the nineteenth century, there were four specific characteristics that society deemed should be associated with a woman; piety, purity, domesticity, and submissiveness. However, this was not the case when it came to black women. They were not able to exemplify the expected worldview of womanhood due to their circumstances.

In lines 18-32, Douglass describes what was an abnormality in those times- a white woman (his master’s wife) taking pity on him, and teaching him to read and write. Douglass’s juxtaposition of his master’s wife’s attitude toward him- which was one of a “pious, warm and tender-hearted” nature, to the way the rest of society perceived him as a “mere chattel” helped highlight just how abnormal her behavior was. This contrast further developed through the fact that to treat a slave as a human being back in those days was “not only wrong, but dangerously so,” yet despite that commonplace assertion found all throughout life back then, his master’s wife still treated Douglass no different than she would treat a friend. This section of the text elaborated upon her kind-hearted nature, which led her to pity and help those worse off than her, no matter how society perceived it. Douglass emphasized this point by using mostly long, well constructed sentences that were filled with figurative language. This syntax helped elaborate upon the tone of newfound hope in this section, by demonstrating his flowing thoughts and feelings, due to his newfound freedoms. This syntax helped emphasize the fact that Douglass had acquired the very knowledge slave owners sought to keep from him, therefore acquiring the power that had been kept from him his whole life.

During the 19th century, black women faced a plethora of hardships culminating from hundreds of years of oppression and denigration while simultaneously fighting for equal rights with all other women. One of the biggest obstacles that was necessary to overcome was one of the most common ideologies of the West, the Cult of True Womanhood. This Victorian ideal of womanhood defined women within a domestic sphere and required them to be subservient to their husbands (Broude). These women gave up much more than their rights outside of the home, they were taken advantage of physically, mentally and sexually. The majority of women during this time did not meet this standard of true womanhood and never could hope to. This ideal and the common stereotypes of the time were questioned by an African-American woman named Sojourner Truth.

Slavery has always been the most dreadful phenomena of our world. Slavery, by itself looks so unusual and provokes mixed feelings from the heart of each person. In other words, slavery change a human being into a “thing” or even some type of consumer item. However, a fugitive slave, Frederick Douglass writes the novel called “The Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass” to reveal how the slavery system works. Douglass’ narrative resembles not so much an autobiography as a memoir. If we read this novel closely, women often appear not in a primary plot, but in a short passage and as a vivid images; specifically, an image of abused bodies. Douglass associates women with suffering. Also, he gives an understanding

“There is no protection. To be female in this place is to be an open wound that cannot heal. Even if scars form, the festering is ever below” (Morrison 163). Toni Morrison, in her novel A Mercy, suggests that women in 17th century American society were constantly subjugated as inferiors no matter their class or privilege. Although Rebekka and Widow Ealing were both privileged, white women, they still faced the societal pressures that harmed the mother-child relationships among the slaves – Lina, Florens, and Sorrow. Each chapter of A Mercy is told from a different character’s perspective, allowing readers to understand the similarities among the female characters’ standpoints during this time period. By depicting the tribulations of motherhood that extend beyond society’s narrow stereotype, Morrison exposes how societal pressures of the late 17th century America influenced the complexities of motherhood.

The Woman in White was authored in 1859 by Wilkie Collins, which is regarded as one of the most sensational and finest mysterious novels. The book outlines the role of women in the society. The female gender is perceived and portrayed as inferior to their male counterparts. Women are expected to look after children and their husbands, as well as do housework. They are not allowed to access higher education. Also, the middle-class experience is more embraced than the senior level, as the latter is characterized with riches, extravagance, and laziness, unlike the former which is morally upright and rational. Through this paper, it will be not only pointing out the themes of injustices against women, and the decadence of civilization but also