Uncle Tom's Cabin Artifact

Uncle Tom’s Cabin written by Harriet Beecher Stowe can be regarded as a cultural artifact. It is significant that Uncle Tom’s Cabin emerged during a time of intense political, social, and economic transformation. This anti-slavery novel was created to support those who already fought for rights of the African American communities, and to make those who still consider slavery acceptable finally realize the atrocities they were committing by contributing to the ongoing oppression of a group of individuals. Even though there was a lot that was right and historically significant about the novel’s intentions, a lot can happen when a cultural artifact is consumed and becomes part of the way a society thinks and acts. Stowe was able to create characters

“The Uncle Tom” stereotype emerged and is still considered an insult to the African American community today. It was used to describe African Americans that were eager to please their owners and sat idly by while slavery remained at large and did nothing to help their own race. When there were other African American’s risking their lives trying to escape the viciousness of the plantations, or were fighting for their rights of equality up North, Tom was concerned with pleasing his master and dodging confrontation. In chapter 40, 6 pages in Tom is say’s to Legree, “’Mas’r, if you was sick, or in trouble, or dying, and I could save ye, I’d give ye my heart’s blood; and, if taking every drop of blood in this poor old body would save your precious soul, I’d give’em freely.” The book obviously states that Legree hates Tom. Yet he would save his life if it came down to it. Tom is completely discombobulated with the thought of misbehaving. And this doesn’t just go for Legree; his attitude was comparable when he was with St. Clare and Mr.

This is robustly shown in the characters of Topsy and Sam. On page 87 Chapter 7 is a common example of Sam’s dialect. He is talking to Mr. Haley and says, “Wal, now, I hope mas’r’ll ‘scuse us tryin’ dat ar road.” He also says “bery” instead of “very” multitudinously throughout his appearances in the novel. Topsy is another character that is shown as highly uneducated. An example of speech is in Chapter 20 page 304. She is talking to Miss Ophelia and says, “I spect I grow’d. Don’t think nobody never made me.” “Grow’d” is not the right tense and there is a double negative in the second sentence. When people read this novel it illustrates African American’s poorly. That they are all savage like and unsuited to be part of a