Slavery and Freedom: Illustrated Short Answer Exercises

Most of the following questions begin with a short thematic introduction, and all include at least one image. Please note that some questions ask you to read a primary or secondary text that is not included in your anthology.

Olaudah Equiano and the Early Abolition Movement

Equiano used autobiography as an abolitionist genre; his narrative reached an international audience and used the doctrines of both Christianity and Enlightenment philosophy to argue for immediate abolition of the slave trade. This illustration of a slave ship and its “cargo” shows how slavery dehumanized its victims. The other illustration resembles the contraption Equiano sees on the head of a female slave in Virginia: "the poor creature was cruelly loaded with various kinds of iron machines; she had one particularly on her head, which locked her mouth so fast that she could scarcely speak; and could not eat nor drink." At certain points in his narrative, Equiano confirms the horrors of the slave ship, writing, for example, of the suffocating "stench of the necessary tubs." At the same time, however, he resists the impulse to describe the slave trade's most gruesome scenes, writing, for instance, "we continued to undergo more hardships than I can now relate."

1. Do you find Equiano entirely forthcoming in his descriptions of the Middle Passage, or do you think he holds back the worst of it? In your answer account for the ways in which Equiano's wish to appeal to his audience would affect his descriptions. Refer to at least two representations of the Middle Passage in Equiano's text.

2. Slave traders in Equiano's time justified their profession by arguing that a crueler slavery already existed in Africa and that therefore they should not be blamed for the ill treatment of slaves in America. Consider the "iron muzzle" and other details in Equiano's implicit comparisons between African and American slavery. How do such details refute the slave traders' argument?

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Nat Turner and the Figure of the Black Rebel

Nat Turner was born a slave in 1800 in eastern Virginia. In his twenties he gained a reputation as a religious exhorter who had visions of apocalyptic retribution against the system of slavery. On August 21 and 22, 1831, Turner led a bloody slave rebellion in Southampton County, Virginia, in which more than fifty whites were killed. In retaliation, whites killed at least as many slaves and hardened their laws restricting the rights of slaves and free black southerners.

1. To what extent does this illustration bolster proslavery messages about the threat of slave insurrection? Against whom is the threat directed? Is this propaganda or just sensationalistic journalism?

2. Jean Fagan Yellin writes that "the Nat Turner figure, the figure of the black rebel who attempts the violent overthrow of slavery from within, appears repeatedly in literature written between 1830 and 1863, but is almost always muffled" (Yellin, Jean Fagan. The Intricate Knot: Black Figures in American Literature, 1776–1863. New York: New York University Press, 1972). Choose one other text from the anthology that incorporates the figure of the black rebel. You might want to consider selections from David Walker, Henry Highland Garnet, Frederick Douglass, or Harriet Beecher Stowe. Is the author's use of this figure fully realized, or "muffled" in some way? How would you explain the author's use of this figure in relation to his/her specific audience and purpose?

3. Chapter twelve of Harriet Jacobs's Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl begins, "Not far from this time Nat Turner's insurrection broke out; and the news threw our town into great commotion." How does Jacobs use the figure of the black rebel to develop her narrative's abolitionist argument? What specific proslavery arguments can she refute by drawing upon the Turner insurrection?

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Proslavery Propaganda: Black Sexuality

One antiabolitionist propaganda strategy capitalized on the anxieties of white men about the threat posed by free black sexuality. In this cartoon, the white male has lost control over the sexuality of black men and white women.

1. How do you think abolitionists of the 1840s would have responded to this image? Write a one-paragraph response from the position of Douglass, Jacobs, or any other abolitionist. Draw upon the facts of that person's life or details from his or her writing to develop your answer.

2. In your opinion, what specific details of the picture would be most disturbing to antiabolitionists who feared black sexuality? Which details do you find most disturbing or offensive, and why?

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The Fugitive Slave Law

Nineteenth-century audiences would have recognized a number of the figures in this cartoon. On the left, Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison defend a fugitive slave woman. To her plea, "Oh Massa Garrison protect me!!!," Garrison responds, "Don't be alarmed, Susanna, you're safe enough." On the right, a southern slave catcher ("Don't back out Webster, if you do we're ruined") rides Secretary of State Daniel Webster, a compromiser on the issue of slavery. The dialogue balloon at the bottom of the cartoon represents Webster's position on slavery and the Fugitive Slave Law: "This, though Constitutional, is extremely disagreeable." The fact that he is trampling on the Constitution might suggest that the cartoon's artist differed with Webster on the constitutionality of slavery. The man to the right of the slave catcher holds two books marked "Law & Gospel" and says, "We will give these fellows a touch of Old South Carolina." The man to his right says, "I goes in for Law & Order." In the background, a black man, possibly an escaped slave, strikes back at antiabolitionist forces; he may represent the increased militarism of abolitionists following passage of the Fugitive Slave Law. "It's my turn now Old Slave Driver," he says; the man on the ground cries, "This is all your fault, Webster."

1. Briefly explain the abolitionists' and antiabolitionists' positions regarding the constitutionality of slavery. Why did slaveholders think it was constitutional? What did abolitionists argue in response? Why would the Fugitive Slave Law have exacerbated the issue of constitutionality to the degree represented in the above illustration?

2. The cartoon depicts Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison standing together against the Fugitive Slave Law. But, in fact, passage of the law hardened some differences between the two abolitionists because Douglass grew impatient with Garrison's philosophy of passive resistance. Whose side would you say was taken by the artist of this illustration? Refer to selections by Douglass, Henry Highland Garnet, or David Walker to develop your answer.

3. What does this image suggest about gender stereotyping in antislavery illustrations? Why is the woman in need of protection, when both Douglass and the black male in the background actively engage their opponents? How well does this representation of women match what you know of antislavery activists such as Sojourner Truth, Harriet Tubman, and Harriet Jacobs?

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Frederick Douglass and the "Representative" African American Male

This image of a crouching slave became an icon of the abolitionist movement of the 1800s. It appeared in antislavery publications such as William Lloyd Garrison's newspaper The Liberator, in pamphlets and broadsides, and it was even stitched into pincushions and printed on stationery. It was highly effective because of its representation of a heartfelt appeal for help, and its often-attached slogan "Am I Not a Man and a Brother?" forced audiences to answer the question and take a position on slavery. Some, however, have criticized the paternalistic assumptions behind the image, suggesting that the depiction of a suppliant black male reduces the role of African Americans in the antislavery struggle.

1. Write a paragraph in which you agree or disagree with the charge that this image of a crouching slave contributed to paternalism among whites in the antislavery movement. Do you think nineteenth-century abolitionists, black or white, would have recognized this paternalism? In your answer, try to refer to at least one text in the anthology.

2. The other illustration depicts Douglass battling those representing proslavery forces who had come to disrupt a meeting of abolitionists in Indiana in 1843. It appeared in Douglass's 1881 autobiography, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass. In what ways does it counter the implicit messages of passivity in the antislavery icon of the crouching slave?

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Harriet Jacobs and the Sexual Violence of Slavery

This illustration emphasizes the physical brutality female slaves had to endure but only implicitly draws attention to the sexual oppression that women slaves also faced.

1. Draw upon your reading of Harriet Jacobs's Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl to describe slavery's brutality against women. What additional punishments and insults did Jacobs suffer because she was a woman? Why do you think it was difficult for abolitionist illustrators to represent the full story of slavery for women like Jacobs?

2. Some readers feel that Harriet Jacobs hesitates too much when narrating the sexual advances of her master Dr. Flint. Do you agree? Quote at least once from Jacobs's narrative to support your answer. How do you think her contemporary readers would have responded to the narrative’s depiction of sexual abuse?

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Gender and Abolitionist Discourse

These two images appeared so often in abolitionist media that they became icons of the movement. They were reproduced in newspapers such as William Lloyd Garrison's The Liberator and in antislavery pamphlets and broadsides, and they were even printed on stationery and stitched into pincushions that were then distributed by the American Anti-Slavery Society. They appear to make identical statements about the inhumanity of slavery and the need for complacent northerners to mobilize against the institution. Yet Jean Fagan Yellin has observed differences in the two images, based upon nineteenth-century conventions that ascribe mobility to men and passivity to women. Though the two slaves are posed similarly, Yellin observes that the male "is shown as powerful and athletic; it is not impossible to imagine him bursting his fetters and asserting his freedom. Indeed, his right toes are curved underneath like those of a runner ready to rise. . . . In contrast, the female supplicant appears too weak to break her chains, especially since, unlike those of the male, they fetter her to the ground." (Yellin, Jean Fagan. Women and Sisters: The Antislavery Feminists in American Culture. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989.) If Yellin's analysis is correct, then Sojourner Truth had at least two objectives in her "Speech to the Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio, 1851": first, to expose the inconsistency of using middle-class gender norms in the representation of slave women; and second, to revise the public image of black womanhood, from one that implies passivity (as depicted in the above image) to one that evidences individual agency and action (as depicted by Truth herself).

1. Yellin assumes that these icons are "coded" with the assumptions of gender inequality that permeated American society in the nineteenth century. Do you agree with her analysis of the two images? Why or why not?

2. How does Truth accomplish these two goals in her speech? You might want to begin by listing the arguments against women's rights that Truth responds to in her speech, since these were used to justify middle-class conventions of "true womanhood" in Truth's time. Then consider how well these arguments match the facts of Truth's own life.

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