The Life Of A Slave Girl By Harriet Jacobs Essay

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs strongly speaks to its readers by describing the brutalities of slavery and the way slave owners can destroy peaceful lives. After reading and rereading the story have noticed certain things regarding how Jacobs tries to educate her readers and her intended audience which is the women of the North. As if we do not know enough about how terrible slavery is, this story gives detailed examples of the lives of slaves and provokes an incredible amount of emotions. She uses several tactics in her writing to reach her desired audience and does so very well.

Slavery was common in the eighteenth century. Slaves were seen as property, as they were taken from their native land and forced into long hours of labor. The experience was traumatic for both black men and black women. They were physically and mentally abused by slave owners, dehumanized by the system, and ultimately denied their fundamental rights to a favorable American life. Although African men and women were both subjected to the same enslavement, men and women had different experiences in slavery based on their gender. A male perspective can be seen in, My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass. A female perspective is shared in Harriet Jacobs’ narrative titled, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. Upon reading both of the viewpoints provided, along with outside research, one can infer that women had it worse.

In these two tales of brutal bondage, Harriet Jacobs' Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl and Frederick Douglass' Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, the modern reader can decipher two vastly different experiences from circumstances that were not altogether that dissimilar. Both narratives tell the story of a slave gaining his or her freedom from cruel masters, yes, but that is where the most prominent similarities end. Not only are they factually different, these stories are entirely distinct in their themes.

Harriet A. Jacobs Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl: Jacobs’s construction of black female empowerment despite the limitations of slavery

The feminist movement sought to gain rights for women. Many feminist during the early nineteenth century fought for the abolition of slavery around the world. The slave narrative became a powerful feminist tool in the nineteenth century. Black and white women are fictionalized and objectified in the slave narrative. White women are idealized as pure, angelic, and chaste while black woman are idealized as exotic and contained an uncontrollable, savage sexuality. Harriet Jacobs’ Incidents in the Life of A Slave Girl, brought the sexual oppression of captive black women into the public and political arena.

Slavery is perhaps the largest and ugliest blemish on the supposed “perfect” face of the American dream. History books recount decades of Caucasian Americans exerting their dominance over those of different, racial background. Perhaps the most discussed is the enslavement of the African-American population in the name of privilege and progress. Tensions culminate throughout the years until finally, the only thing powerful enough to destroy this evil empire rears its ugly head: war. It is no surprise then, that such a powerful and disgusting time is the subject of a vast amount of literary works. Two well-known authors who tackle this painful topic are Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs. Both Douglass and Jacobs provide deep insights into the life of slavery by recounting their actual experiences. These autobiographies possess great power, though they are by no means carbon copies of each other. There are more familial elements in Harriet’s account than Douglass’s, providing a more complex view in Harriet’s case. In addition, while both slaves clash with their masters, Douglass relies on more straightforward tactics. Meanwhile, Harriet relies on cunning to outwit those who oppress her. These differences ensure uniqueness without sacrificing a powerful impact. Indeed, both accounts provide a powerful, personal peek into the everyday life of a slave, alerting the reader in a way that no other work can.

Harriet Jacobs wanted to tell her story so that readers would know how slave girls were treated. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to be so public while writing her novel, but she decided that since she wanted others to learn and know about what happens in a slaves shoes, she decided to be completely open and write using her name and experiences. Jacobs’s uses emotion and diction throughout the entire essay to emphasize the struggles that her and many other slave women and men go through.

Harriet Jacobs' words in Incidents in the Life of A Slave Girl clearly suggests that the life as a slave girl is harsh and unsatisfactory. In this Composition, Jacobs is born a slave, never to be freed. She struggles through life in many instances making life seem impossible. The author's purpose is to state to the people what happened during slavery times in the point of view of a slave. Her life is so harsh that she even hides from her master for 7 years in a cramped space in the top of a shed without any room to walk. The theme of the story is a statement on how slavery was a much harder way of life than many people may have thought. Many people during these times thought that slaves were happy where they were and that their lives

Harriet Jacobs's autobiography, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861) is a wonderful slave narrative of recounting life experiences before being freed from slavery. Harriet Jacobs better known as "Linda Brent” talks about being born into slavery in 1813 near Edenton, North Carolina. She describes her childhood as being enjoyable with her family until she turned six years old, when her mother passed away. Due to Jacobs’s mother passing away she was then cared for by her mistress Margaret Horniblow. Horniblow taught Linda how to do important life skills such as teaching her to read, write, sew, and caring for herself.

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs is an Autobiography from the point of view of a southern slave. She has named herself Linda Brent in the book to keep her identity anonymous. The book takes place in between 1820-1840 in which slavery was still legal and common throughout the United States south. The book begins in an unnamed town in the south in which the protagonist was raised in as a slave. Harriet Jacobs wrote the book to shine light on how slaves were treated in the south. She shows how even thought they were not always treated poorly they were never treated as equals.The purpose of the book is to show the horrors and tribulations a slave would have to go through on a daily basis. Not only does she point out the life of a slave but also the life of a women during a time in which even a white women were not treated as equals. Harriet Jacobs writes this book to anyone who is not a slave. In particular she writes to men and women in the north in hopes that they can help free them from the injustices that slaves and women face everyday. Harriet Jacobs chose to write to the north because she knows that only the north can stop slavery because the south is completely engulfed in the practice of slavery. Harriet Jacobs attempts to inform the north by writing a slave narrative about her own life. She does this by using the pen name of Linda Brent. The narrative begins in an unnamed town in the American South. She is

Throughout history, humans have enslaved humans. If slavery never existed, neither would temples or civilization or pyramids. Although they have always provided what is needed, owners would still abuse and mistreat their slaves. However, some slaves have written books about their life in slavery and the cruelties they endured. These stories are called slave narratives, pieces of literature that are written by slaves about their own personal lives (Gale 1). The purpose of these narratives is to show the harmful lives of slaves and what they had to endure (“Slave” 1). Harriet Jacobs and Frederick Douglass are two slaves who are famous for their narratives. Both authors wrote about the hardships in and out of slavery and they are both well educated

Harriet Jacobs book tells us a lot about gender and race, and the issues faced in the U.S. South during the 19th century. In the lifetime of slaves within the south, daily routines very much banked on the slaves gender. Male slaves were known to work out doors doing more physical labor compared to women who were known to be caretakers and do small petty things. Family life for slaves in the south was not easy due to the fact that they were constantly taken away from each other. Marriages in the South were also difficult for slaves and for slaveholders. In Harriet Jacobs’ book Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Jacobs gives clear descriptions of the conceptions of masculinity and femininity between slaves, their family life, and of love/marriage

Harriet Jacobs in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl uses clear detail and straightforward language, except when talking about her sexual history, to fully describe what it is like to be a slave. Jacobs says that Northerners only think of slavery as perpetual bondage; they don't know the depth of degradation there is to that word. She believes that no one could truly understand how slavery really is unless they have gone through it. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl do not only tell about the physical pains and hard labor that she went through. It mostly concentrates on the emotional viewpoints on it and what it did to shape who she is. When writing her story, Jacobs

In her poignant autobiography, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Harriet Jacobs offers the audience to experience slavery through a feminist perspective. Unlike neo-slave narratives, Jacobs uses the pseudonym ‘Linda Brent’ to narrate her first-person account in order to keep her identity clandestine. Located in the Southern part of America, her incidents commence from her sheltered life as a child to her subordination to her mistress upon her mother’s death, and her continuing struggle to live a dignified and virtuous life despite being enslaved. Using an unconventional chronological structure (interrupting the narrative to address social, political, or historical commentary) Jacobs centralizes few arguments such as the economics of slavery, hegemony, pain (physical & emotional) and the quest for freedom. However, she admonishes the reader not to be empathetic for her for “…it is not to awaken sympathy for myself [to which] I am telling you truthfully what I suffered. I do it to kindle a flame of compassion in your hearts for my sisters who are still in bondage” (Jacobs, 28).

Women in the society have continued to face challenges since time memorial. For a long time now, women have been objectified and consequently, treated as if they were properties for the convenience of their male counterparts. This explains both the genesis and the essence of feminism, which preoccupies itself with the attainment of equal rights for the female folk. This offers believability to Harriet Jacob’s account of active female resistance to sexism as represented in her book, “The Life of a Slave Girl.” The story is purposed to outline the brutality of the sexual harassments that women, of yesteryears as of today, face. Notably, the story is a personal account of Harriet’s own experience of sexism, from the perspective of a slave girl. Harriet Jacob, in her narration, “The Life of a Slave a Girl’, shows many instances of resistance.