Finally, Fredrick Douglass exemplifies his discrimination against racial pride. Throughout the novel, Frederick Douglass gets beaten, whipped, starved, and much more. Mr. Auld (overseer of Frederick Douglass; planation) says that teaching blacks to read will mean they are useless, Frederick Douglass understands that blacks are as capable of learning to read as whites are, and only lack the opportunity to learn. Mr. Auld even insisted on saying, “ if you teach that nigger (speaking of myself) how to read, there would be no keeping him.” Fredrick then later says, “I now understood the pathway from slavery to freedom “ (Douglass 48). Fighting discrimination from slavery was difficult, but Frederick Douglass represented racial pride by fighting
Slaveowners during the mid 19th century treated their slaves as nothing more than laboring animals, for the one and only purpose of carrying out their “masters” orders. But literacy was not coincidentally separated from the slaves lives. “Mr. Auld found out and at once forbade Mrs. Auld to instruct me further, telling her, among other things, that it was unlawful, as well as unsafe, to teach a slave to read “(45). This quote occurs in the book, when Douglass’s new owner Mrs. Auld (whom is new to slave owning), teaches Douglass to read. Mr. Auld finds out and forbids Mrs. Auld to teach him further. Mr. Auld describes teaching slaves to read as unlawful and unsafe. To describe something as unsafe, is to imply it has the power to threaten someone or somethings safety. In this case the safety is the white mans ability to control and suppress slaves. Douglass from this experience is disappointed that his education has been interrupted. Even though it becomes more difficult to learn to read after that, Douglass learns something even more important from the experience: the mysterious power of education. The fact that Mr. Auld doesn 't want him to read, shows him that there 's something valuable there, making him want to learn to read even more. “… if you teach that nigger (speaking of myself) how to read,
Douglass was motivated to learn how to read by hearing his master condemn the education of slaves. Mr. Auld declared that an education would “spoil” him and “forever unfit him to be a slave” (2054). He believed that the ability to read makes a slave “unmanageable” and “discontented” (2054). Douglass discovered that the “white man’s power to enslave the black man” (2054) was in his literacy and education. As long as the slaves are ignorant, they would be resigned to their fate. However, if the slaves are educated, they would understand that they are as fully human as the white men and realize the unfairness of their treatment. Education is like a forbidden fruit to the slave; therefore, the slave owners guard against this knowledge of good and evil. Nevertheless, D...
One day, Douglass eavesdrops on him and Mrs. Auld’s conversation. Mr. Auld persuades her that reading “could do him (Douglass) no good, but a great deal of harm.” (page 39) This antithesis along with the rest of his statement makes Douglass come to the realization that literacy is equated with not only individual consciousness but also freedom. From that day on, Douglass makes it his goal to learn as much as he can, eventually learning how to write,
The Life of Fredrick Douglass shows how slavery could of not only affected the slaves but the owners as well. Thomas Auld was overall a cowardly owner and quite tough compared to other slaveholders. Douglass believed that since Auld obtained slave owning from marriage, it made him more of an unpleasant master because he wasn’t used to being around slavery and having so much power. Fredrick Douglass also was convinced that religious slaveholders were false Christians because they became more self-righteous and thought that God gave them the power to hold slaves. By telling stories to the reader, Douglass hoped to bring awareness to the harsh subject of slavery and show how the slaves kept hope during these miserable times.
Frederick Douglass, who was born into slavery around 1818, will forever remain one of the most important figures in America's struggle for civil rights and racial equality. As an ex-slave, his inspiration grew beyond his boarders to reach the whole world. Without any formal education, Douglass escaped slavery and became a respected American diplomat, a counselor to four presidents, a highly regarded speaker, and an influential writer. By common consent Douglass’s Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave (1845) is recognized as the best among the many slave narratives that appeared before the Civil War. He amazed people when he spoke bravely in his Fourth of July speech. He spoke out against oppression throughout America and abroad, and his struggle for freedom, self-discovery, and identity stands as a testament for all time, for all people. Although some people accused him of lying, exaggerating, and using his narrative and his well-known Fourth of July speech as part of an abolitionist plot, Douglass was able to clearly demonstrate his talents, sensitivity, and intellectual capacity by revealing the truth about the lives, culture, and psychological struggles of American slaves.
During the 1800’s slaves were brought to the thirteen colonies from the Atlantic Slave Trade to work without or little amount of pay and do nothing more or less without the guarantee of freedom. Slaves were dehumanized every way possible from refusing to take orders, to not being able to do the job and from religion belief according to the slave-owners. Frederick Douglass, born in Tuckahoe (present day Maryland) experienced the wrath of slavery and more during his time serving as a slave for multiple families/masters. Son of a slave-owner, Douglass did not possess his own agency due to the fact his mother was a slave even though his father was a white man, a common occurrence during slavery to increase and own more slaves and at the same time
Douglass managed to escape this and moved to a life in Baltimore. He was still a slave, but he was not treated as such. His mistress, Mrs. Auld, taught him to read and write. She was kind and caring, and Douglass said “that woman is a Christian.” By this the audience gets an insight into how Mrs. Auld was treating Douglass and can compare his current situation to his time on a plantation.
When first introduced to Douglass and his story, we find him to be a young slave boy filled with information about those around him. Not only does he speak from the view point of an observer, but he speaks of many typical stereotypes in the slave life. At this point in his life, Frederick is inexperienced and knows nothing of the pleasures of things such as reading, writing, or even the rights everyone should be entitled to. Douglass knowing hardly anything of his family, their whereabouts, or his background, seems to be equivalent to the many other slaves at the time. As a child Frederick Douglass sees the injustices around him and observes them, yet as the story continues we begin to see a change.
During the time of slavery, slaves were put to work on plantation, fields, and farms. They were considered property to their slave-owners and put under unfair living conditions. Growing up in this era, we can see the injustice between white and colored people. And one slave by the name of Fredrick Douglass witnessed this unjust tension. And because of this tension, dehumanizing practices became prominent among the slaves and in slave society. The most prominent of these injustices is the desire of slave owners to keep their slaves ignorant. This practice sought to deprive the slaves of their human characteristics and made them less valued. Fredrick Douglass was able to endure and confront this issue by asserting his own humanity. He achieved
In the year 1826 Fredrick Douglass realized that he would eventually escape slavery. He would recount this thought four times in his life when he has to become most rebellious in order to survive slaveholders attempting to establish control and dominance in different ways. Each time one comes along Douglass responds using a different form of retaliation or rebellion to show his masters that they don’t own as much control over him as they think they do. All of these attempts to resist his masters control, slavery, and what slavery stood for were detrimental to Fredrick’s escape but the most influential one, the resistive act that started, and kept, the ball rolling was Fredrick’s determination to become literate. Knowledge is power and without his ability to read and write Douglass would have never escaped slavery or written a Narrative of his life.
In order for Douglass to reach his goal of becoming a free man he thought the only way out was education. He needed to learn how to read, write, and think for himself about what slavery was. Since literacy and education were so powerful to Frederick he persevered to get himself the education he wanted. …. Douglass knew it wouldn’t be easy, but that didn’t stop him. Douglass realized the “ conscious of the difficulty of learning without a teacher, I set out with a high hope, and
He had long fought to learn to read and was so excited and eager to do so, he never expected the circumstances of this to be as dehumanizing as they were. He regretted learning to read because it brought him nothing but desperation, he learned his awful truth and that of his fellow slaves. "It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy." (Douglass, 24) The truth was that the more he learned the more he became aggravated, he knew there was not much he could do. It brought his moral down along with many other feelings, even a slave like Frederick had learned the awful feeling of
When Douglass moves to Baltimore, he becomes the property of Hugh Auld. There he is cared for by Hugh’s wife, Sophia. The reader’s first impressions of Sophia are favorable; she is a warm, gentle woman who wishes to teach Douglass to read and write. Douglass himself is surprised at how kind she is at first, and he mentions that Sophia Auld has never owned slaves before, and therefore has not been affected by the evils of slavery. Douglass notes that she does not wish to punish him just to keep him subservient like his former masters did, and she does not beat him or even mind at all when Douglass looks her in the eyes. Sophia also teaches Douglass the alphabet and several words. However, her husband Hugh, who has already undergone the transformation that slavery causes, immediately orders her to stop when he hears of this. Here, we see the contrast of two distinctly different people with regards to the institution of slavery. Sophia Auld is pure, innocent, untouched by the evils of slavery. Hugh Auld, on the other hand, has experience with the system of slavery and knows that in order to keep slaves obedient, they must also be kept ignorant and fearful.
Auld, he was introduced to education which gives him a sense of humanity back. Mrs. Auld taught Douglass the alphabet and how to spell small words. However, Mr. Auld found out and disapprovingly said “ if you teach that n- - - - - how to read… it would forever unfit him to be a slave” which Douglass took note of to (250). Douglass realized the importance of his master being scared of him reading and spelling and noticed the value in having and education. Having an education and realizing the importance of that was a major building block in forming Frederick Douglass’s identity.
Mr. Auld, a slaveholder, prevented his wife from educating and teaching Douglass to read, stating that slaves should not learn as they could become unmanageable. Douglass explained that what Mr. Auld “loved most, that I most hated. That which to him was a great evil, to be carefully shunned, was to me a great good, to be diligently sought; and the argument which he so warmly urged, against my learning to read” (27). Most apparent in education, Douglass and Mr. Auld obstinately express their beliefs and differences. Douglass utilizes antithesis in order to present the separation between himself and Mr. Auld through the difference in education created by slaveholders. The separation is the slaveholder’s rationale for his mistreatment of the slave. The system of slavery has convinced and manipulated the slaveholder into taking education from their deserving slaves. Slaveholders hold the believe that if slaves are to be educated, they would they would rise in opposition against this society, similar to Douglass. Mr. Hopkins was known to be “less cruel, less profane, and made less noise, than Mr. Severe. His course was characterized by no extraordinary demonstrations of cruelty. He whipped, but seemed to take no pleasure in it. He was called by the slaves a good overseer” (17). Though he did not enjoy whipping his slaves, Mr. Hopkins continued to do so out of “obligation”. Douglass employs irony in order to present the severity of slaveholders’ cruelty. A regular slaveholder is inhumane and takes pleasure in the torment of his slaves. The severity of their actions are great to an extent such that if a slaveholder whipped without feelings of pleasure, he is considered a good master. Ordinary slaveholders see slaves only as property, and barely acknowledge them as human; this miniscule amount of acknowledgement leads to a desensitized outlook to the harm