African-American Literature Term Paper

African-American Literature

Unfortunately, the perverted socio-economic institution known as slavery has always had significantly greater psychological ramifications and horrors for women, than it has traditionally had for men. This is particularly the case when one considers chattel slavery, such as that which was prevalent in the United States in the inception of this country's founding. Many of the perverse manifestations made evident by slavery's effects upon women are detailed in Harriet Jacob's thinly veiled fictional/autobiographical accounting of her life entitled An Incident in the Life of a Slave Girl. While the inhumane, unnatural occurrence of having one's body, soul and mind owned as a piece of property by another is similar for both men and women, the effects of this perceived ownership are inherently different for women and affects the nature not only of their servitude, but of their attempts to escape it.

The attempt to escape slavery is one point of commonality that can be found between both male and female slaves during the time Africans and African-Americans were held in bondage in the United States. In point of fact, it may be argued that attempts to be rid of the life of slavery is a shared interest among nearly all who were ever enslaved, whether chattel slaves or otherwise. This point is certainly not lost upon Jacob, who writes her first person narrative under the guise of Linda Brent. When Brent has determined to disengage herself from a life of slavery in the 16th chapter of the narrative, she perceives both the voice of her father and references Nat Turner within her thoughts which are, decidedly, upon freedom, as the following quote shows. "As I passed the wreck of the old meeting house, where, before Nat Turner's time, the slaves had been allowed to meet for worship, I seemed to hear my father's voice come from it, bidding me not to tarry till I reached freedom or the grave (Jacobs, 121)." Such thoughts quite literally and figuratively indicate the systematic history of slavery, and also the history of slaves attempting to liberate themselves from the clutches of such a vile institution. Furthermore, thoughts of Nat Turner and that of Linda's father, who was free for a good portion of his life, are demonstrative of the level of conviction which Brent has regarding her desire to obtain freedom.

However, Brent's attempt to gain freedom are decidedly unlike Turner's in the fact that Turner did not runaway to procure his liberty -- he chose to fight until the death of either himself and his band, or that of his oppressors. Brent, however, is largely against her own death, for the simple fact that she has brought children into the world that she needs to protect. The following quotation demonstrates this essential difference between Brent's and Turner's struggle for freedom, which is representative of a key distinction between female and male slaves. "My friends feared I should become a cripple for life; and I was so weary of my long imprisonment that, had it not been for the hope of serving my children, I should have been thankful to die; but for their sakes, I was willing to bear on" (Jacobs, 140). Turner may have been willing to "bear on" for the sake of posterity, but he…