Anne Rowlandson The American Voice Analysis

The Irrepressible American Voice
One of the greatest things about being an American is the ability to voice my opinion and viewpoint regardless of race, gender, or class. This was not always the case. Many have had to struggle to make their voice heard, and the mindset of American’s furthered the oppression of minority voices. Revolution invigorated the American spirit with a new sense of self-worth and validation of artistic expression by all people. Voices that were once silenced found listeners through literature. Rather than one genre or narrative making way for the next through hostile takeover, many voices rise and refuse to be muzzled. Before independence there seems to be a pattern that suggests that there was no room for more than

one narrative in American literature, and afterward resistance to oppression appears to be fixed with the American voice in Literature.
Pre-Revolutionary America validated the representative voice of the people through oppressive tactics, which tore down one narrative while lifting up another. Native narratives were overshadowed and undervalued by a growing European culture, which had moved well beyond oral tradition. Emerging narratives by European Americans, even those written by women, served to further the idea that one culture and its narrative was superior to another. Even after the Native voice of America is drowned out, there are distinctions made between European Americans that reinforce the idea that some voices are supersede others. The true revolution and rebirth in America, the Civil War and end of slavery, still saw division; most surprising is the differing opinions on freedom held by African Americans. Still, the attitude that one voice is made louder by silencing another exists in American literature.
Following revolution and rebirth, we see a new spirit in literature. Gothic literature, which gave new life to folklore and created new folkloric traditions as well, refused to be silenced, and welcomes new voices into its folds still today. The voice of women, perhaps the most silenced group of humans in history, finds an audience in the late 19th century, and their works are accepted with credit and merit. The pinnacle of the post-revolutionary spirit is manifest in the genre of realism; which validates the voice of the few, as well as the many, and especially ensures that the voice of the oppressed rings louder than the Liberty Bell.
Native Americans are the first to experience pre-revolutionary literary oppression. Cain submits that the Iroquois Creation Narrative, written by David Cusick in English, “…is one of the earliest books produced by and for a Native American community” (10). So, if using Columbus’s entry into the Americas as a rough estimate of European and Native American interaction, it took almost three and a half centuries before the voice of the Native American was heard in literary form. That native voices only existed as literal voices for so long was my first of seven insights this semester.
Even still, that voice was not meant to be heard by the masses, but by the community that the voice is reflective of. Similar to the silencing of Native voices by those of Europeans, Native voices among Native communities gave way to whichever version was set in print. Furthermore, Cain writes, “Although Iroquois tribes each have their own creation stories, they all draw upon a cosmology keyed to the myth of ‘a woman who fell from the sky’” (10). Cusick’s version of creation becomes the version of creation. Oral traditions are lost, and all other versions of the story are silenced.
Further subjugation and discretization of the Native voice can be seen in American literature leading up to the Revolutionary War.

Narratives such as Rowlandson’s gave a voice to women in the realm of written words, but at the cost of the Native voice. According to the website www.maryrowlandson.com,
…in 1682 [Rowlandson] published a narrative of her captivity which became America's first best seller. At that time it was highly unusual for a woman to be a published author. Hers is a story of the triumph of faith over adversity. It provides a first hand description of Indian life during this conflict [, King Phillip’s War]. (n.p.)
While Rowlandson’s narrative was highly read throughout the American colonies, the narrative of the Native became her description of them. Rowlandson’s words are considered to reflect “triumph of faith over adversity,” while at the same time solidifying the preconceived notion that Natives are uncivilized savages. This narrative gives rise to her credibility as an author, and at the same time ensures that the voice of women moved further from the realm of the oppressed, and into that of the oppressor. My second insight was how stereotypes and misconceptions in literature are a powerful means by which to change the fate of an entire

people.
My third insight, which informs my conclusion on the evolution of the American voice, comes from the PBS website we accessed during week five of the course. Not only were the American masses stratified by class, but the military chain of command for both the American Revolutionists and the British soldiers was also stratified by socioeconomic class and status. This insight helped me further understand the reason that some writing was dismissed and others celebrated. Once the Native voice was thoroughly discredited, then came further discrediting of narratives within each social strata. The PBS website, under the tab “Military Perspectives” states, “It is a myth that revolutionary-era colonists were more or less equal when it came to status and wealth. Society was very stratified, and commanding officers were typically members of the elite upper-class” (n.p.). Similar to receiving a commission, authorship and acclaim is reserved for those of the “ruling-class.” The voice of the everyday American underdog remains muzzled at this point in history.
My insight number four is the differing views on African independence, even among African Americans. The lowest tier on the American social hierarchy in the 19th century would be the Slave class. Even the voices of African American authors we have sampled this semester had their narratives promoted by upper-class backers, which means that control over which narrative is being told and read belonged to the elites of society rather than the masses. Donna Campbell writes, on the WSU website under the link “Slave Narratives” that, “From 1760-1947, more than 200 book-length slave narratives were published in the United States and England, and according to Marion Starling … more than 6,000 are known to exist” (n.p.). So why weren’t the other 5,800 narratives published? Perhaps they did not fit the narrative that those doing the publishing agreed with.
Walker and Douglas, although both persecuted under American Slavery and institutionalize racism, had different views of what it meant to be Black in America. Cain writes, “Walker wrote, “Let no man budge us one step…” in response to the notion that America was not the homeland of him or his people (510). Douglas on the other hand, in his speech, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July,” makes his feelings know when he states, “With brave men there is always a remedy for oppression. Just here, the idea of a total separation of the colonies from the crown was born!” (1026). Douglas makes clear in his contemptuous speech that until African Americans shed the entanglements of the oppressive host culture they were subject to, then they would forever remain oppressed. At any rate, this is a very different view of African Americanism compared to David Walker’s “this is my America” approach.
My fifth insight is that I never really considered the connection between women writers and how their voices and social status become elevated in written works.

Much discrimination and misogyny still permeate our social stratosphere, but while reading written words one cannot help but to be placed in the author’s shoes, and therefore accept their words as our own. Cain writes, “Many of the texts written by women during this time reflect the idea that there are natural differences between the sexes. Usually a female narrator…privately addresses a mainly female audience about issues that might seem mainly to concern women” (825). Because the text is written in a female voice, the reading adapts themselves to that voice, and gives credit to the

work.
Hearing a woman speak in the antebellum period would not have swayed males with centuries of patriarchal customs to fall back on to truly listen. Cain states, “…by publishing their work, women writers were entering a virtual public space and, simply by doing so, they were challenging the doctrine of separate spheres” (825). This represents a turning point in American literature when narratives no longer became replacements for an outdated or unpopular one. The narrative of women, although highly accepted in this period of rapid physical and social reconstruction, was not going to replace that of white men in America.