Rhetorical Analysis Of Frederick Douglass Essay

bigotry which dehumanized African-Americans by enslaving them for years. Abolitionist leader, Frederick Douglass, uses different approaches in his Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass to encourage his audience to abolish slavery. Knowledgeable that his audience is primarily white Christian males, including both slave owners and abolitionists he offers evidence to illustrate how slavery is unethical. Douglass uses his personal experiences, intense graphic detailed atrocities, and the manipulation

In this selection from the “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave”, Frederick Douglass vividly describes his feelings about being a newly liberated fugitive slave. In doing this, he describes the different emotions he felt. Saying that out of the joy also came distrust. He was happy that he was not a slave anymore but could not trust a soul, for the white man would immediately take him back to the horrible life of a slave and the black man might stab him in the back and rat

Noted abolitionist Frederick Douglass, in his self titled slave narrative addresses the indescribable sadness that the slaves were experiencing, which they portrayed through song. He intensely describes the emotions that he hears within the songs of the slaves. In the passage Douglass shows how the slaves believe that they feel, versus how they really feel, and he does this this by changing the tone throughout the passage. He uses these tones to make the reader fully feel the helplessness that the

In his memoir, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Frederick Douglass argues for the abolition of slavery by reminiscing on his life as a slave. He draws attention to the cruelties he and other slaves endure and compares it to the white masters’ humanity. To do so, Douglass also uses the irony of relationships and family in white masters but lack of recognition of such in the slaves. Furthermore, Douglass uses the irony of the use of religion in order to excuse slavery

known slave author and orator, Frederick Douglass, in his narrative, “The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave” alters the way people view slavery. Douglass’s purpose is to convince the audience that slavery should be abolished. He creates a haunting tone in order to persuade the readers that slavery is wrong. He uses many real life accounts of horrifying instances of beatings, murders and torture to prove that slavery is unjust. Douglass illustrates many emotions in his

After reading Frederick Douglas’ speech What to the Slave is the 4th of July? I find myself both embarrassed and incredibly humbled. Here we have a man that was born into slavery in 1818 and, in spite of insurmountable odds, taught himself to read and write, and go on to become a peerless transcendental pontificator. The speech he gave on July 5th 1852 to the Rochester New York Ladies Anti-slavery Society will remain as one of the most empowering and articulate exhortations in our nation’s markedly

1. Douglass established ethos with a white-northern audience by establishing his ability to narrate his story and goal to abolish slavery in a calm manner. His words are clear and direct. Frederick is able to convey his sufferings and all the slaves without coming across as angry and full of hatred. By doing so, he was able to get the attention of white-northerners to listen to his cause. The descriptions of violence he shared were enough to make white men and women to understand the sufferings of

Through the use of various anecdotes, Frederick Douglass illustrates the brutality suffered by the slave; the reader reacts emotionally to these incidents. For instance when Douglass talks about how the slaves are beaten and mistreated he discusses a slave who was shot since he refused to obey his master: ”and in an instant poor Demby was no more. His mangled body sank out of sight”(39). In this quote Douglass shows how mistreated the slaves were and makes the reader feel sad that a slave would

In a time where African American have been deprived of rights, Frederick Douglass seeks to highlight the hardships faced by a slave to white Americans. In order to better get his point across Douglass utilizes a multitude of rhetorical devices, from chiasmus and parallelism to imagery and paradox. In some cases, he highlights the complexity if a subject and in others, he makes the point clearer to the reader by juxtaposing two ideas to emphasize the differences and underlying message through what

Purpose: Douglass is pointing out the utter hypocrisy of these Southern “Christians” that own slaves. Quote: “I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling this religion of this land Christianity. I look upon it as the climax of all misnomers, the boldest of all frauds, and the grossest