Characteristics of Slave Narratives

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Recommended: Negative social impact of slavery

Slave narratives are texts published before 1865, however they continue to persist throughout history either in the form of memoirs or through revisionary texts. The modern slave narratives written today still follow the characteristic format of the narratives published earlier in history. Numerous slave narratives surfaced between 1830 and 1861 in abolitionist journals, pamphlets, and short book length publications (Day).
Slave narratives are supposed to be an autobiography, meaning each should be a unique tale, uniquely told of a unique life. Most slave narratives are anything but unique. Most are a repetitive work that resembles many of the other slave narratives written at the same time. The writer of a slave narrative is bound by his/her situation to give a picture of “slavery as it is.” As such, the writers are careful not to fictionalize, which leads to the distinct form of the slave narratives. This conscious effort not to fictionalize has led to the slave narratives reading as carbon copies of each other. This duplicity of information from narrative to narrative has led to great speculation of the authenticity of each of the slave narratives as an autobiography (Olney).
Most slaves were illiterate, if anyone was taught teaching slaves to read or write, they would be fined, imprisoned, or whipped. If slaves were found to be literate, they too could be punished through savage beatings, imprisonment, or amputation of fingers and toes. Most slave owners taught their slaves to read as a way to Christianize them, but in the process, they felt the slaves literacy would make them harder to control and would ultimately lead to more runaways (Fast).
Slave narratives were widely used as propaganda tools to advance the political agen...

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...s. Allowing others to peer into their lives as slaves, could offer them the opportunity to avoid the same circumstances in future times if they choose. Unfortunately, slavery still exists in many forms today, forced labor, sex trafficking, bonded labor, child soldiers and forced child labor just to name a few (Day).

Works Cited

Bailey, Ted. “Portraits of Piety : Authenticating Strategies in Slave Narratives and Two Antebellum African-American Novels.” The AnaChronisT (2009): 47-66. Academic One File. Web. 22 Jan. 2014.
Day, Lisa B. “”I Reached to Where the Freedom Is“: The Influence of the Slave Narrative Tradition on A.J. Verdelle’s The Good Negress.” Critique 41.4 (2000): 411-424. ProQuest Central. Web. 22 Jan. 2014.
Fast, Robin Riley. “Brothers and Keepers and the Tradition of the Slave Narrative.” Melus 22.4 (1997): 3-20. ProQuest Central. Web. 22 Jan. 2014.

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