In a letter to Captain Thomas Auld published in a newspaper, Frederick Douglass confronts Captain Auld in a public manner about their previous relationship as slave and slave master. Douglass presents himself as intelligent and sophisticated, which proves that he is capable of acting in a manner that is opposite of current stereotypes. Some of these stereotypes of slaves are that they are uneducated, always violent, of low class, and inferior to white men. Douglass presents himself in this way by vocabulary choice and appeals to pathos and kairos. Douglass chooses to use subtle verbal attacks to make his argument rather than using harshness such as vulgar language or a direct accusation. The subtle verbal attacks are expressed through analogies…
While Douglass’s Narrative shows that slavery dehumanizes slaves, it also advances the idea that slavery adversely affects slave owners. Douglass makes this point in previous chapters by showing the damaging self deceptions that slave owners must construct to keep their minds at ease. These self deceptions build upon one another until slave owners are left without religion or reason, with hypocrisy as the basis of their existence. Douglass uses the figure of Sophia Auld to illustrate this process. When Douglass arrives to live with Hugh and Sophia Auld, Sophia treats Douglass as nearly an equal to her own son. Soon, however, Hugh schools Sophia in the ways of slavery, teaching her the immoral slave master relationship that gives one individual…
Slavery, the dark beast that consumes, devours, and pillages the souls of those who are forced to within its bounds and those who think they are the powerful controllers of this filth they call business. This act is the pinnacle of human ignorance, they use it as the building blocks for their “trade,” and treat these people no more than replaceable property that can be bought, sold, and beaten on a whim. The narrative of Frederick Douglass is a tale about a boy who is coming of age in a world that does not accept him for who he is and it is also told as a horror that depicts what we can only imagine as the tragedies placed on these people in these institutions of slavery. It is understood as a chronicle of his life telling us his story from childhood to manhood and all that is in between, whilst all this is going on he vividly mixes pathological appeals to make us feel for him and all his brethren that share his burden. His narrative is a map from slavery to freedom where he, in the beginning, was a slave of both body and mind. But as the story progresses we see his transformation to becoming a free man both of the law and of the mind. He focuses on emotion and the building up of his character to show us what he over time has become. This primarily serves to make the reader want to follow his cause all the more because of his elegant and intelligent style of mixing appeals. Through his effective use of anecdotes and vivid imagery he shows us his different epiphanies over time, and creates appeals to his character by showing us how he as a person has matured, and his reader’s emotion giving us the ability to feel for his situation in a more real sense. This helps argue that the institution of slavery is a parasitic bug that infects the slave holder with a false sense of power and weakens the slave in both body and spirit.…
Frederick Douglass whimsically implies his message of how the treatment of slaves was unforgiving, no matter how hard they worked, in the end they were still slaves, through the implication of rhetorical devices such as anecdotes to provide a better ethos, harsh diction portraying his hatred for slaveholders, and anaphora to…
After reading a short excerpt from “Life of Fredrick Douglass”, I learned about the wretched, criminal, motives of enslavers. I understand the reasoning of why Douglass would rather be an animal. Douglass recalled the moment he realized how to read and understood the true characteristics of slavery.…
Douglass has a great advantage in appealing to his audience as majority of his readers may be less familiarized with the setting of a plantation, and more familiar with the setting of a city, which allows them to relate to his story more. However, Douglass has a good idea of what it means to have to relate and conform to a foreign life, as an escaped slave. He discusses his new life as a freedman in the narrative, and especially how the cuts of slavery still sting and run deep in his life. He feels as if he is unable to be at peace if so many he knows are still living lives of undecided servitude at the will of cruel masters, and that he will never be able to adapt to society this way. To represent his feelings to the reader, he occasionally writes of incidents where he felt out of place in his new society, and he occasionally vents to the reader of what it feels like to live in such a dramatically different way. Stating a long list of perilous situations he finds comfortably comparable to slavery, he writes, “Let him be a fugitive slave in a strange land--a land given up to be the hunting-ground for slaveholders--whose inhabitants are legalized kidnappers--where he is every moment subjected to the terrible liability of being seized upon by his…
In the passage from “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave,” in the third paragraph Douglass is trying to convey apostrophe, because it contrasts with his development. Douglass' utilization of grammar and metaphorical dialect set this passage separated and fortify Douglass' exhibit that in spite of the way that servitude would leave the reader "behold a man transformed into a brute" (16-17), slaves were not creatures but rather men, with dreams and yearnings of their own.…
Parallelism and pathos help to underline his main argument, which is how slavery corrupts the mind of a human into abusing their capabilities. Douglass describes his experiences in a way that lets audiences feel what Douglass felt. For example, Douglass recounts the experience of watching the slaveholder whip his aunt until she was covered in blood and the pleasure the slaveholder seemed to take in it. The graphic description of her abuse makes readers feel the same anger Douglass must have…
•Contemplate: to look at or view with continued attention; observe or study thoughtfully: to contemplate the stars.…
In the Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass, Douglass uses rhetorical devices to convey his meaning that slavery is the worst possible experience for humanity in a contemptuous tone. Douglass states, “the wretchedness of slavery, and the blessedness of freedom, were perpetually before me.” This use of antithesis in parallel structure is used to convey his meaning by contrasting the two ideas of slavery and freedom, showing how extremely awful or beautiful each is and to show the differences between them. The use of the word “wretchedness” creates a contemptuous tone in this quote. He then goes on to state that upon arriving in New York he felt “like one who had escaped a den of hungry lions.” This simile is used to show the extent of his fear when in the south, showing how slavery is the worst experience for humankind. This comparison is made using a scornful tone, shown by the dehumanizing of the South through slavery. Next, Douglass explains that during his stay in the North “[he] was afraid to speak to any one for fear of speaking to any one for fear of speaking to the wrong one, and thereby falling into the hands of money-loving kidnappers, whose business it was to lie in wait for the panting fugitive, as the ferocious beats of the forest lie in wait for their prey.” Douglass writes this long sentence for the rhetorical effect of imitating the style of a person ranting, or speaking uncontrollably due to fear to show the horror of slavery. This is written in a bitter or scornful tone through his descriptions of the fugitive kidnappers. Douglass also includes that “[he] saw in every white man an enemy and in every colored man cause for distrust.” This almost equal parallelism is used to compare the common fear Douglass had for both races. The negative outlook on both races shows Douglass’s disdainful tone. Douglass further explains his outlook when he states his motto at the time was “Trust no man!” This…
We know that one of his intended audiences is African Americans because he consistently states things such as “I was compelled to resort to various stratagems” and “Thus, after a long, tedious effort for years, I finally succeeded in learning how to write”. These sentences show us how difficult it was for him and states how he had to go through many trials to finally learn to be literately correct. By not giving up, he shows us how important he thinks it is for slaves to learn how to read and write. We also know that his other audience were white Americans because of his use of contrast. He describes how his mistress changed from being a nice, helpful, and loving woman to being a mean, evil spirited brute because of the simple fact of being a slave holder and her husband’s characteristics rubbing off on her. By stating “Slavery soon proved its ability to divest her of these heavenly qualities” he shows us how much of a negative effect slavery can be not only on African Americans, but also on white Americans. Frederick Douglass most likely chose this audience because many slaves probably did not know the extent of how important it was to read and write,…
In Chapter 10, Douglass is living with Mr. Covey and claims that he is “called” by god for his abolitionist work. Douglass uses figurative language such as a simile to demonstrate that Douglass would rather die escaping than stay in the bond of slavery and die unfree. This simile is demonstrated in the following passage: “I had as well be killed running as die standing.” Douglass constantly uses the pronoun “I” to signify his defiance to his liberation. The phrases “killed running” and “die standing” emphasize that Douglass is determined to risk his life to be free. He claims ultimate authority for his religious and political experience which he eventually professes that the Bible rejects slavery. This excerpt is important because it shows…
Comparisons can be drawn from anything, no matter how different they are from one another. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass and the “Report of the National Committee on a National Press” are different in almost every way but the ways they convey their arguments. Through diction, pathos, and imagery Douglass and the Report convey their ideas for the abolishment of slavery.…
He put a stop to this behavior quickly, “To use his own words, further, he said,”If you give a n* an inch, he will take an ell. A n* should know nothing but to obey his master- to do as he is told to do. Learning would spoil the best n* in the world. ”(Douglass 28) This crass and vile language lit a fire in young Douglass, “From that moment, I understood the pathway from slavery to freedom.…
The Dehumanization of the Enslave: Frederick Douglass The Narrative of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself…