Frederick Douglass Language Analysis

Back in the 1800s, many had the idea that slavery was a natural, necessary practice. Some even referred back to the Bible to justify the actions of abusive slaveholders. In Frederick Douglass’ narrative of his life as a slave, he shares his side of the story, and explains that the positive ideology of slavery is a facade. Douglass debunks the mythology of slavery by rebuking its romantic image through vivid imagery and specific diction, by refuting the belief of black intellectual inferiority through self-education, and by revealing the promotion of disloyalty among slaves through stories of betrayal. Douglass uses descriptive language in his narrative to explain how slavery was falsely romanticized. People who heard slaves sing on plantations

White slaveholders kept their slaves in the dark in terms of education, as well as individual identity. Slaveholders would not tell slaves about their family or where they came from, or how to read and write. Slaves were kept illiterate so they were unable to document their experience as a slave, and so they could not read about abolitionist movements, or documents of that nature. To whites, knowledge was the equivalent to freedom, so they forced their slaves to remain illiterate. However, Douglass was accidentally shown the ticket to freedom, through Mr. Auld. Once Mr. Auld explained to Douglass that he was not allowed to become literate, Douglass “understood what had been to [him] a most perplexing difficulty...the white man’s power to enslave the black man” (page 47). Once Douglass understood what it would take to become a free man, he worked hard to become literate. By becoming literate, he was no longer inferior to any white man. He understood what it meant to be an abolitionist, and began planning ways to escape. Other slaves inhibited intellectual capabilities because Douglass “devoted [his] Sundays to teaching [his] loved fellow-slaves how to read” (page 87). Douglass and his fellow slaves worked together and devised a plan to escape slavery, which involved Douglass writing passes for each individual. Later on in the novel, literate slaves help Douglass become a free man. This further proves Douglass’ point that blacks are not intellectually inferior to