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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
A 5 page essay that compares Harriet Jacobs' Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl and Frederick Douglass' Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. Similar in goals, the writer argues that Jacobs had a harder task because she felt compelled to defend herself not only as a person, but also as a woman. No additional sources cited.
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5 pages (~225 words per page)
File: D0_khhjfd.rtf
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under slavery. The goals of these authors in relating their narratives are quite similar as they are each attempting to persuade a basically white readership of their shared humanity.
The ultimate purpose of both Jacobs and Douglass is to persuade their readers that that black people are "people," individuals who think, feel, and who are capable of noble aspirations
and dreams. The books differ, of course, in accordance to the differences between the lives of the authors, but they also differ in one principal respect. Jacobs, unlike Douglass, felt
compelled to defend herself not only as a person, but also as a woman. In other words, Jacobs tailored her account to also encompass nineteenth century concepts of
gender in a severely patriarchal culture. Jacobs balanced her presentation of herself and her actions against the backdrop provided by slavery, but she also designed her narrative in a manner
that stresses her femininity, showing that she fully realized how a "true woman" of that era was expected to behave. An analysis of Jacobs text demonstrates that she managed this
tricky maneuver quite well, but it also shows that her actions are much more circumscribed then her male counterparts. Women in the nineteenth century were expected to stay completely out
of the public social sphere, keeping themselves completely within the domestic sphere. The "good" or "true" woman was passive, dependent on the men in her life. Any independent action or
sign of autonomy were interpreted as "male" characteristics and considered deviant when demonstrated by a woman. However, a slave woman was denied the opportunity to cultivate what the nineteenth
century considered to be truly "feminine" attributes. Surprisingly, the childhood that Jacobs describes was very normal. This was because her family was intact, with her mother, father, brother and
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