Critical Analysis of Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl free essay sample

The life of a slave woman is far more complex than that of a slave man, although understandably equal in hardships, the experience for a woman is incredibly different. The oppression that women have faced throughout their lives in the struggle to even be considered equal to men is more than evident in slavery, not only because they were thought of as lesser but in some ways many women actually believed it to be true. The experiences that Linda Brent, pseudonym for the author Harriet A. Jacobs, went through in her life story in Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl prove that the difficulties for slave women were more than significant in many different cases. For Linda Brent, her life had been a constant fight since she was six years old and looking back on it, she never saw that change over the years. When she found out she was giving birth to a baby girl, she couldn’t help but envision every single hardship, suffering and regret of her own for her daughter’s life too. Every bit of emotional anguish and grief she had felt throughout her lifetime as a slave was about to be passed on to her most prized possession, her daughter. Women who live and fight through slavery experience a different kind of life that only they themselves can imagine, and any mother who knows this could never hope for their child to go through the same agony they have endured, especially if it was going to be their daughter. â€Å"When they told me that my new-born babe was a girl, my heart was heavier than it had ever been before. Slavery is terrible for men; but it is far more terrible for women. Superadded to the burden common to all, they have wrongs, sufferings, and mortifications peculiarly their own (Jacobs 77). † Quoted by Linda Brent (Harriet A. Jacobs) in Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl, she describes one of the most important contributions to the literature of slavery and to me the one major theme that comes from this passage, understanding the emotional anguish of slave women. After analyzing this particular passage from the autobiography, I have come to realize that there are many different themes depicted in this story but only one seems to be significantly evident throughout. She emphasizes that the life of a slave woman is incomparable to the life of a slave man, in the sense that a woman’s sufferings are not only physical but also extremely mental and emotional. Whether or not a slave woman is beaten, starved to death, or made to work in unbearable circumstances on the fields, she suffers from and endures horrible mental torments. Unlike slave men, these women have to deal with sexual harassment from white men, most often their slave owners, as well as the loss of their children in some cases. Men often dwell on their sufferings of bodily pain and physical endurance as slaves, where as women not only deal with that but also the mental and emotional aspect of it. Men claim that their manhood and masculinity are stripped from them, but women deal with their loss of dignity and morality. Females deal with the emotional agony as mothers who lose their children or have to watch them get beaten, as well as being sexually victimized by white men who may or may not be the father of their children. For these women, their experiences seem unimaginable and are just as difficult as any physical punishment, if not more so. The understanding of the life of a slave woman is far beyond the knowledge of you or I, unless you have actually been an enslaved woman. These literary elements depicting the passage from this story are the only way to better comprehend the truth behind female slavery. If you are a mother, than maybe you can understand the utter attachment to your children, and therefore you can imagine what it must be like to have them taken away from you. Throughout her story, Linda Brent never loses sight of her self-respect and her desire to have a normal home and family. She is constantly fighting for herself as a mother to her children and focusing on their futures over her own. She said, â€Å"I had my secret hopes; but I must fight my battle alone. I had a woman’s pride, and a mother’s love for my children; and I resolved that out of the darkness of this hour a brighter dawn should rise for them. My master had power and law on his side; I had a determined will. There is might in each (Jacobs 85). † As you can see in this statement she had an undying love and hope for her children. She was devoted to them and willing to bear great suffering for their sake. In the previous main passage I am depicting from, her motherly strengths are shown as well. It is evident that she cares for her children more than herself when she realizes that her new-born baby is going to be a girl, and her heart stops in fear of what this new child’s life will be like. She has no idea what the exact outcome will be for her baby’s future, but can only imagine what it will be like, as she knows her child will have to undergo the same lifestyle she has. Slavery during this time was not changing or ending by any means, and this only meant that every new life that is created is being brought into this world under the same circumstances of control. A woman’s virtue is their deem to moral excellence, and thus a foundation to good moral being. The virtue of womanhood is in a sense their devotion to purity, submissiveness and domesticity. In slavery women fought to protect their virtue with every last breath they had, but often times they had to surrender it. A powerless slave girl cannot be held to the same standards of morality as a free woman. In this story, Linda Brent sadly had no choice but to surrender her virtue as she fought for years against Dr. Flint’s sexual threats, she then in turn began a shameful affair with a white neighbor, Mr. Sands. Although she thought this outcome was better than being raped by Dr. Flint, she suffered much moral demise from her affair with Mr. Sands especially as he was the father of her children. The sexual abuse these slave women endured on a daily basis left them no room for high morals and self-respect. â€Å"Pity me, and pardon me, O virtuous reader! You never knew what it is to be a slave; to be entirely unprotected by law or custom; to have the laws reduce you to the condition of a chattel, entirely subject to the will of another. You never exhausted your ingenuity in avoiding the snares, and eluding the power of a hated tyrant; you never shuddered at the sound of his footsteps, and trembled within hearing of his voice (Jacobs 55). † In this excerpt Linda is stating that she knows that what she has done is wrong and that she, more than anyone else, feels the pain of her mistakes, but she also believes that a slave woman should not be judged in comparison to a free woman. Like I stated earlier, the standards of morality cannot be the same for both a slave woman and a free one in society, it is completely unfair. Most female slaves realize that they are committing sins, but they also have come to terms with the fact that they would not be partaking in the same morally conflicting activities if they were free. So unless a free woman has been sexually victimized, she has no right to condemn a slave woman for her past. There is no possible way one could understand the lengths and intensity of sexual harassment and abuse unless you have been helpless and defenseless in front of it. Slaves have no control over their own bodies or their fate and future, therefore how can they be convicted of unethical or morally corrupt actions. The toll that slavery takes on any human being is never quite understood by that of a free person. It is nearly impossible to completely engage yourself in a story unless you have been in that person’s shoes and have endured the same exact hardships they may speak of. Just like in the sense of death, it is impossible to understand what it is and what it feels like until you have witnessed and experienced it firsthand with a family member or friend. Slavery, like death, seems unimaginable to people of our time or even free people who lived during that time, and you can only truly feel the pain if you were a part of it. For Linda Brent, in her life story of her struggles through slavery, she exposes much of her personal defeats in hopes that by reading the physical and mental tortures she went through, others can understand a small portion of what her life was like. The emotional anguish of slave women will never be felt firsthand unless you were one of them. The life of a slave woman entails her emotional agony with the loss of her children, her shame and regret from the sexual abuse of her slave owner, and her mere daily thoughts reminiscing on every heartache and hardship she dealt with along the way. Works Cited Jacobs, Harriet A. Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl. Ed. Jean Fagen Yellin. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1987. Print.