Freedom In James Baldwin's The Slave Dancer

Freedom Freedom is one of the greatest values in life. It is our very nature and that is the reason everyone resents if his or her freedom is encroached upon. “Freedom” means many things to many people. We can free like birds flying in the sky and as wild as animals’ running on the land; but no one knows what happens next. Freedom also can be lost. James Baldwin once said; “Freedom is not something that anybody can be given. Freedom is something people take and people are as free as they want to be.”
(The World Complete Word Power Library. World-childcraft International, Inc. Chicago:
1980)

Shabanu : Daughter of the Wind
But her camel’s leg breaks. She is unwilling to sacrifice Mithoo. She loves him too much, having raised her from birth. She must accept the marriage to the much older man, Rahim-Sahib. As she bears the brunt of Dadi’s anger, shabanu grows more powerful. Dadi said “It isn’t matter of what she wants!” (Fisher Staples, Pg234). This when Dadi found out shabanu was lied to them about the menstruation comes.
The slave Dancer In the book The Slave Dancer, by Paula Fox, which is set in 1840, thirteen years old, Jessie Bollier is kidnapped from his New Orleans home and forced to play his fife on a slave hop while the slaves are “danced” or exercised. He lost freedom in the ship. He had to do the work in the ship in order to survive. People on the ship believed it was racist and that it portrayed slaves unfairly as weak people unable to fight for themselves.“You’ll see some bad things, but if you didn’t see them, they’d still be happening…” (Fox, pg 282) Jessie is only thirteen, but as Purvis, the captain of the ship, observes he was not too young to see the harsh truth of life. Jessie Bollier, his windowed mother, and his sister lived in a one- room
Mrs. Browning 's husband subsequently purchased her freedom. In 1818, Alethia Tanner purchased her own freedom for $1,400. Ms. Tanner then bought the freedom of her sister Laurena
Cook and five children in 1826. People be willing to use their money to get their freedom, this showed how freedom has been important to their life. “I well know the value of that bit of paper; but much as I love freedom, I do not like to look upon it. I am deeply grateful to the generous friend who procured it, but I despise the miscreant who

demanded payment for what never rightfully belonged to him or his. (Savage, p. 301) Everyone has the right to do what they want in the world. So in our lives, there are so many things that lose and gain. Freedom can be of these things too. People will get what life gives them but someday we may lose it all. We have to cherish what we have for now on.
Word Cited Page
Fisher-Staples, Suzanne. Shabanu: Daughter of the Wind. Dell Laurel: New York,2003

Fox,Paula. The Slave Dancer. New York: Dell,