Enslaved African-American Woman

The book focuses on intimate relationships and trying times for enslaved women. The readers have insight into the world of American Slavery its effect on women of African descent.

The title of this book comes from the inspiring words spoken by Sojourner Truth at the 1851, nine years prior to the Civil War at a Women’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio. In Deborah Grays White, Ar’n’t I a woman her aim was to enrich the knowledge of antebellum black women and culture to show an unwritten side of history of the American black woman. Being an African- American and being a woman, these are the two principle struggles thrown at the black woman during and after slavery in the United States. Efforts were made by White scholars in 1985 to have a focus on the female slave experience. Deborah Gray White explains her view by categorizing the hardships and interactions between the female slave and the environment in which the

Deborah Gray White’s Ar’n’t I a Woman? details the grueling experiences of the African American female slaves on Southern plantations. White resented the fact that African American women were nearly invisible throughout historical text, because many historians failed to see them as important contributors to America’s social, economic, or political development (3). Despite limited historical sources, she was determined to establish the African American woman as an intricate part of American history, and thus, White first published her novel in 1985. However, the novel has since been revised to include newly revealed sources that have been worked into the novel. Ar’n’t I a Woman? presents African American females’ struggle with race and

During the nineteenth century, white mistresses and enslaved women struggled to acquire agency in an antebellum economically driven apparatus. Although these women encountered varying experiences, they intersected at the male and masculine hegemony that draped their

During the antebellum South, many Africans, who were forced migrants brought to America, were there to work for white-owners of tobacco and cotton plantations, manual labor as America expanded west, and as supplemental support of their owner’s families. Harriet Jacobs’s slave narrative supports the definition of slavery (in the South), discrimination (in the North), sexual gender as being influential to a slave’s role, the significant role of family support, and how the gender differences viewed and responded to life circumstances.

Slavery was common in the eighteenth century. Slaves were seen as property, as they were taken from their native land and forced into long hours of labor. The experience was traumatic for both black men and black women. They were physically and mentally abused by slave owners, dehumanized by the system, and ultimately denied their fundamental rights to a favorable American life. Although African men and women were both subjected to the same enslavement, men and women had different experiences in slavery based on their gender. A male perspective can be seen in, My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass. A female perspective is shared in Harriet Jacobs’ narrative titled, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. Upon reading both of the viewpoints provided, along with outside research, one can infer that women had it worse.

In a time period when women were considered inferior, as were blacks, it was unimaginable the horrors a black woman in the south had to endure during this period. African women were slaves and subject to the many horrors that come along with being in bondage, but because they were also women, they were subject to the cruelties of men who look down on women as inferior simply because of their sex. The sexual exploitation of these females often lead to the women fathering children of their white masters. Black women were also prohibited from defending themselves against any type of abuse, including sexual, at the hands of white men. If a slave attempted to defend herself she was often subjected to further beatings from the master. The black female was forced into sexual relationships for the slave master’s pleasure and profit. By doing this it was the slave owner ways of helping his slave population grow.

This paper discusses the experiences of African American Women under slavery during the Slave Trade, their exploitation, the secrecy, the variety of tasks and positions of slave women, slave and ex-slave narratives, and significant contributions to history. Also, this paper presents the hardships African American women faced and the challenges they overcame to become equal with men in today’s society. Slavery was a destructive experience for African Americans especially women. Black women suffered doubly during the slave era.

The period of the antebellum south was among the most burdensome times for African American slaves, especially females. During the early 1800s the lives of enslaved women were extremely demanding. The female slaves were expected to bear children, as well as were required to work just as hard as the male slaves on the plantation. Days were long and laborious for slave mothers, they had to make sure that all the work that needed to be done was completed, and also care for their children. Female slaves’ jobs varied from housework, to field work. Slave mothers knew that giving up on their work was not an option, they had to persevere for their families. Motherhood and work went hand in hand for female slaves, one was not able to do one and not the other.

African American women have been an oppressed group since slavery times and are still being oppressed in one of the simplest ways: through stereotypes. Though there are several stereotypes of African American women we will only focus on three of them, which have transcended through time and taken on new names, the mammy, the jezebel, and the matriarch. All three of these stereotypes have an origin in slavery times and were used to justify mistreatment of African Americans (Collins 2000). In fact, portraying African American women as jezebels, mammies and matriarchs helps to justify the continued oppression of black women in the United States (Collins 2000). These controlling images are designed to make racism, sexism, and poverty appear as a normal part of an African American woman’s life (Collins 2000).

Harriet Jacobs, in her narrative, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, was born into slavery in the south. While her youth contained “six years of happy childhood,” a few tragedies and mistresses later, Jacobs spent many years in pain under the possession of her cruel five-year-old mistress, Emily Flint, and Emily’s father, Dr. Flint. Once able to obtain freedom, Jacobs spent most of her life working for the Anti-Slavery office in New York, in hope that one day she could make a difference in the world. “She sought to win the respect and admiration of her readers for the courage with which she forestalled abuse and for the independence with which she chose a lover rather than having one forced on her” (Jacobs 921). Linda Brett, the pseudonym that Jacobs uses to narrate her life story, endures the harsh behavior women slaves were treated with in the south during the nineteenth century. The dominant theme of the corruptive power and psychological abuse of slavery, along with symbolism of good and evil, is demonstrated throughout her narrative to create a story that exposes the terrible captivity woman slaves suffered. The reality of slavery in the past, versus slavery today is used to reveal how the world has changed and grown in the idea of racism and neglect.

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

Along with the Mammy stereotype, the portrayal of Black women as being lecherous by nature is also a continuing stereotype. Lewd, hypersexual and loose are a few descriptive words associated with this stereotype (Thomas et. al, 2004). The Jezebel is everything the Mammy is not. Physically, she is seen as being a mixed-raced woman with Eurocentric features that those who fall into the physical characterization of the Mammy try to achieve. She has light-skin, less kinky hair, smaller lips and a more slender nose. Although the Jezebel fits the Eurocentric beauty standards, this image “branded Black women as being sexually promiscuous and immoral” (West, p. 294) due to the sexual violence committed against them during slavery. Hutchings et. al (2010) argues that, “explicit racial cues are not necessarily a thing of the past and under certain conditions they can be

It can be said that enslaved African women played a very important role and were greatly involved in acts of resistance in Jamaica in the first half of the 18th century. This research will discuss how involved these women were in the acts of resistance in Jamaica. We will be taking a look at the role of Nanny of the Maroons, and others like her. This research will also look at day to day resistance efforts that all enslaved women used, which are just few of the things that will allow us to fully understand the hardships that enslaved women went through and as it relates to their acts of resistance and how much of an important role it played. The 18th century, at this point in time being involved in resistance was rather difficult for females;

The status of the mother determined the status of the children. “[Women] had no rights of any kind and no legal authority over anyone---even their children who belonged to their owners. Even if enslaved women wanted to decide whether or not their child will be enslaved, the decision will already be made for them. Thus, showing how conditions were for enslaved Africans in the sixteenth century. Since they were not able to fully gained their freedom at that time, they had to deal with oppressive