Essay Sample on Slavery, Dueling, and Identity

Legal Slavery during the three decades of the early 1830s to 1865 of Civil War end, indigenous genres was in perfection by African American writers and written literature. The most eloquent expression is of the short stories in Harriet Jacobs on Rape and Slavery in 1860 and Solomon Northup description of a Slave Market in 1841. Like all slave narratives, they generate autobiographies on their slave life. They both embody the tension between the generated conflicting motives. The writers during this period both constituted to include own authenticating endorsement and tell their stories in a more personal manner. Solomon Northup describes his terrors that he encountered in a slave market, whereby he was in captivity and sold into Slavery from being a free man in New York. Harriet Jacobs, on the other hand, explains struggling experiences with sexual assaults after she was born into servitude in North Carolina. The growing tensions surrounding Slavery by analysis of both description of a Slave Market by Northup and Rape and Slavery by Harriet Jacobs can relate to the tensions of Slavery and offer experience on the same.

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The narratives comparison of Jacobs and Northup demonstrates the experience and full range of demands that slaves did expertise. The prescribed formats of their narratives and publication governance are some of the similarities that surround Slavery. Both narrators give accurate information with emphasis on their suffering experiences during bondage under cruel masters and their will and strength to be free for their freedom. Northup narrative is of his experience whereby he was in captivity for twelve years after being kidnapped. In a slave market, he describes the horrors that he did encounter, such as being forced to dance at one night and the next day the slaves were on market sale ("Solomon Northup Describes a Slave Market"). Customers came to inspect them, feeling their hands, make them open up their mouth for teeth inspection and sometimes stripping their clothes off in a small house in the yard. Jacobs's struggles with sexual mistreatment from the master as she explains in detail that the master would not allow her to be on sole but rather have her and make a woman out of her. The master claims to be the father of the little slaves also declaring to be their master. The narrator condemns the kind of behavior and affirms that a decent society should not tolerate such things ("Harriet Jacobs on Rape and Slavery").

Literacy within the narratives is one of the most significant elements that develop in the scenes. Proslavery writers often declared that slaves could not read and write, but the narrators did the impossible as they explain how they made it to freedom. There is gender consideration in fight against Slavery for both cases whereby they want their freedom and are determined to fight to the death. The narrators have collective will, whether being a woman or a man slave. Jacobs, in her story, did not face punishment, but her freedom was taken away when she claims that her grandmother tried many ways to buy her, but the master was too conscientious about selling. Northup's description of a slave market clearly states that men were required to be definite, implying that, as a slave, hard labour was theirs. The two narratives relate to the growing tensions surrounding Slavery with their determination to gain duel and competing for American personalities from enslavement. Slaves wanted to achieve freedom, and for Northup and Jacobs, they wanted respect for other women and bondsmen. Additionally, they were determined for the honor of their humanity.

The analysis of both description of a Slave Market with Rape and Slavery can relate to the tensions of Slavery and offer experience on dueling and identity. The rise of Slavery was because masters wanted people to work in their farms, and during this period, the beginning era of the Civil War it called for drastic measures. Masters wanted to expand their wealth, whereas they had big farms, and at that period, cotton was the only thing that would sell well, making them productive (Hummel 167). With Slavery, there was the rise of the cotton kingdom and upsurge the position of the United States globally. Slavery grew alongside with cotton industry, with thousands of acres farms stretching the regions for masters. The farms were worth a lot of money and offered massive production for raw materials. Slavery arrived long before the industry, but the profitability of it called upon reasons for the use and purchase of slaves, the justification for slavery continuation, and urgency for slaves while confining them. Masters came together to gain profits by buying and selling their slaves in the market while slaves tried to come to an understanding with a duel to stop and free themselves from the oppression.

Works Cited

"Harriet Jacobs on Rape and Slavery, 1860." The American Yawp Reader, www.americanyawp.com/reader/the-cotton-revolution/solomon-northrup-describes-a-slave-market-1841/.

"Solomon Northup Describes a Slave Market, 1841." The American Yawp Reader, www.americanyawp.com/reader/the-cotton-revolution/solomon-northrup-describes-a-slave-market-1841/.

Hummel, Jeffrey. Emancipating slaves, enslaving free men: a history of the American civil war. Open court, 2013.

Northup, Solomon. Twelve years a slave: narrative of Solomon Northup. Vol. 1. Library of Alexandria, 1853.