The Identity Of African Americans

The author’s diction illustrates Douglass view of the world around him and his feelings about a community created by fear and injustices. “The wretchedness of slavery” provoked Douglass to “trust no man”, which gave him the sense of feeling “perfectly helpless.” Being imprisoned in slavery for so long caused Douglass to witness the evils of man and experienced the cruelty of being alone. Even more when the “ferocious beats” showed their “greediness to swallow” it left Douglass “toil-worn and whip-scarred.” As time passed by Douglass’ desire for freedom has grown. However, when he does escape he puts himself in his own state of slavery that is run by fear. Douglass’ desires has not even freed him, but it also allowed him to live in life without

Frederick Douglass’ autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave offers a depiction of slavery like very few before him, from his firsthand accounts. Douglass wanted to show his opposition to slavery and knew he would meet many criticisms. Due to this criticism, he had to mask much of his work with irony. Some of his works are obvious and others are a bit harder to see. The more difficult ones were put in place by Douglass in order to provide a deep and profound statement, without arousing too much opposition. If he had he would have faced much more threats than he did. He not only

Douglass got his passion to promote freedom for all slaves after he escaped from slavery and ultimately had an end goal to “abolish slavery in all its forms and aspects, and promote the moral and intellectual improvement of the coloured people and hasten the day of freedom to the three million of enslaved fellow countrymen”. He also wrote several autobiographies describing his experiences as a slave. One of the autobiographies in particular, ‘Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave’ published in 1845 was a best-selling and was extremely influential for promoting the cause of abolition. The narrative shows a compelling argument to basic human rights thus making it extremely influential as the narrative clearly possesses features and linguistic skills, which for most white people, negated their common perception of black people being illiterate in the 19th century.

Douglass also in his speeches liberated what Americans in this economy would have done with blacks. In his speech “what the blacks want” he states, “I have had but one answer from the beginning. Do nothing with us! Your doing with us has already played the mischief.” (Douglass). Society’s “America” has already put us in a category. Race we are not superior or equal to no other. Economically we don’t have the means to live out what we strive for. Education wise we have none, we are not sufficient enough to read or write for us to have a better life. Douglass in this speech stresses to leave us alone we are cable of doing bad or good on our own. His would view principle of self-ownership, which he understood to include both the racial and equality.

After about nine chapters detailing his slave life, he says, “You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man.” (Douglass, 75) He then goes on to describe the turning point for him that sparked his quest for freedom. By structuring his narrative this way, he reveals both sides- how slavery broke him “in body, soul, and spirit” (Douglass, 73) and how it eventually “rekindled the few expiring embers of freedom” within him (Douglass, 80). In doing so, he gives the reader an insight into how he became himself, and reinforces the evils of slavery in the way it shapes a man’s life. Douglass’ use of diction and structure effectively persuades the reader of the barbarity and inhumanity that comes as a result of slavery.

“You are a product of your environment.”- W. Clement. The way you were raised, the people who raised you and the community that you are raised in all play a role in who you are as an individual. Constantly throughout time the way an individual defines themselves is based on their roots, the actions or reactions that have built a foundation of who they’re today. Through the lens of a slave later turned into one of the largest faces of abolitionist acts, Frederick Douglass creates “The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass” in which he accounts the community he was raised in and the constant fear instilled within his community as well as his later assimilation into new communities and possibly being responsible for creation of a

To begin with, Frederick Douglass, a former slave wrote and spoke about the establishment of slavery and southern culture based on his youthful experiences as a slave. Douglass is a powerful speaker for the abolitionist movement and became a leader of the anti-slavery movement. One of the main reasons for his writing of the Narrative was to prove to critics that such a well-spoken and expressive man could not have once been a slave. Douglas eventually gains the resources and convictions to escape to the North and wage a political fight against the institution of slavery. I believed that his most inspirational saying was when Douglass said, “I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong.”

When a man grows up as an untaught slave in the southern eighteenth-century, he has no other ambitions than to be free. But for Frederick Douglass, freedom was merely step one. Douglass began his life on a plantation owed from the moment he arrived. He was not destined to stay put there. Born in (what he can come close to) 1818, he began life out as a man in chains but ended up a respected wordsmith, but still apologetic for his short comings. Douglass learned how to read, write, and give speeches; he influenced a nation for changes among writers today; and he had different approaches to the era he lived in, but knew he wanted change to exist among all. These things were needed to occur in order for the slavery and African-American society to be recognized as equals among all. His wit was not small nor was his leadership not seen as defiance. Each step of his journey, brought him to a different place where he faced a challenge that could not have been met any other way, but with strength and education where he was successful in obtaining. Douglass was not only a speaker, but was an author of his time. Many colleagues wrote of him and his life even after he passed away. In Douglass’ works he spoke of his ignorance and blunders, but continued to sow his good seed. In the book “The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas an

“For the present, it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. Is it not astonishing that, while we are ploughing, planting and reaping, using all kinds of mechanical tools, erecting houses, constructing bridges, building ships, working in metals of brass, iron, copper, silver and gold…that, while we are engaged in all manner of enterprises common to other men…we are called upon to prove that we are men!” (Douglass) During his speech, Douglass elaborated on the different aspects of why blacks have a natural right to freedom as any other human being He argued it is wrong to turn a man into a “brute” and proceeded to argue that slavery is not divine in its origin. Douglass’s speech was a calling for equality, for change. He accomplished his goal and proved the fourth of July was a revolting reminder to him and those like him of the continual inhumane cruelty American attempted to conceal through its mockery.

One of the most well-known slavery narratives was lived and written by Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. Frederick Douglass was a civil rights activist who was born into slavery on a plantation in eastern Maryland in February 1818. His exact birth date is unknown, he states in his narrative, “I have no accurate knowledge of my age, never having seen any authentic record containing it.”2 His birth name was Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey, which was given by his mother Harriet Bailey, who died when he was about 10 years old. At a young age, Douglass was picked to live in the home of a plantation owner Captain Anthony, whom some believe may have been his father. In his narrative that was published in 1845, sixteen years before the Civil War began, Douglass describes his life as a slave and his aspiration to become a free man. He describes the painful struggle to break free from the physical and mental bondage of slavery. Frederick Douglass resisted slavery by withstanding along with defying his owners. He prepared himself for life as a free man by self-improving himself through the use of education. Douglass’s experience reveals about the difficulties enslaved people would face, when and if they were granted their freedom, was that if they were not educated they were not totally “free.”

Fredrick Douglass uses complex syntax and vivid imagery to convey the struggles of the American slave to the American public and law makers. Douglass uses his public platform to raise awareness about issues American slaves face every day to create strong emotions and reactions in the public. The strong language and rhetorical elements create a power and controversial piece over the right of the American slave.

At this age, Douglass obtained a copy of “The Columbian Orator” that included arguments against slavery and introduced it as an issue of human rights. He was now able to dispute the injustices of both his personal slavery as well as slavery as a system. However, this further left Douglass conflicted; he states, “...while they relieved me of one difficulty, they brought on another even more painful than the one of which I was relieved. The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers.” (35) Douglass struggled more with this knowledge because he saw the truth in which “The Columbian Orator” described. The truth that came with literacy instilled within Douglass a pursuit for freedom.

The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave details the progression of a slave to a man, and thus, the formation of his identity. The narrative functions as a persuasive essay, written in the hopes that it would successfully lead to “hastening the glad day of deliverance to the millions of [his] brethren in bonds” (Douglass 331). As an institution, slavery endeavored to reduce the men, women, and children “in bonds” to a state less than human. The slave identity, according to the institution of slavery, was not to be that of a rational, self forming, equal human being, but rather, a human animal whose purpose is to work and obey the whims of their “master.” For these reasons, Douglass articulates a distinction

The African American community has sat at the end of a discriminatory lens from the moment they set foot in the United States. For that reason, black communities have undergone the process of community building to ensure that all members feel a sense of belonging.

Fredrick Douglass also came to exude a great sense of racial pride as his life progressed. At first, his only perception of his people was that of a lowly slave nation. Yet, he was dedicated to trying to improve their lot. After his fellow slaves learned that he was literate, they “insisted that I must keep a Sabbath school.” He agreed to this proposal because he felt that the only shot his “brothers” had at gaining their freedom was through the power of the written word. Later, when he and his fellow slaves were jailed after their plans to escape to freedom were revealed, he states that “our greatest concern was about separation.” Douglass felt a sense of responsibility and kinship towards the members of his own race, and was loath to break these bonds. His racial pride reached its peak when he saw the houses that the free blacks in the North lived in. Douglass proudly writes that “I found many, who had not been seven years out of their chains, living in finer houses, and evidently enjoying more of the comforts of life, than the average of slaveholders in Maryland.” When Douglass saw how well some of his kinsmen were living, he could not help but change his impression of his people being a downtrodden slave nation. He came to recognize his race for what they truly were: a people equal in stature to any other, even the lofty Caucasians.