2.3 Capture and the impact of the slave trade on the west african socities Part 2: slave narratives

What did phillis wheatley become a symbol of? Why is she important ?

• She was the first english black woman to publish a book, she was sold to be a servitude to caught who passed of slave owners the wheatley’s

• Symbol of intellectual ability of african descent

• Wrote about a preacher

• Symbol of antislavery and the ideas about their humanity

• Forced people to ask if black people we just like them

• Showed capabilities of black people, poetic genius

What was thomas jefferson’s response to phillis wheatleys poetry

• He wrote that she was not a poet

• Said her poetry was bad and it was not worth talking about

• Wrote her name wrong

• Said poetry comes from misery but not them

Phillis Wheatley is the first english speaking person of african descent to _________ and the ___ american woman of ___ to do so.

A. publish a book

B. Second

C. race

What are some notes about her poem that we took and what claim did we write?

• Pagan land → geographic land with non-monotheistic religious beliefs

• Benighted soul → person who is ignorant/unenlightened

• Considers africa not a godly land

• forceful conversion?

• Tone: Sarcastic?

• They can be fixed, converted to go to heaven

Phillis Wheatley utilizes words such as benighted, the phrase, may be refin’d and join the angelic train, to express how africans who were displaced from their homelands and influenced to convert did not believe there was anything wrong with their religion and whole mock the converters

What are some notes about Olaudah Equiano Biography

• Former enslaved black man

• became writer and leader abolitionist

• Helped to expose evils of the slave trade and fought for its elimination

• 1789 oublihshed his autobiography, interesting narrative of the life of (his name), about surviving the middle passage

• Born in 1745 southern nigeria, father was the leader of the community

• European visitors came with guns and gunpowder, exchanged them for prisoners of war & criminals

• Involved in sea battles → purchased by king robert, made it possible for him to purchase his freedom and taught him how to read and write, allowed independence

• almost kidnapped back into slavery

• encouraged to write and speak about his experience, powerful voice for the cause

What sensory details does equiano use to describe his capture and the middle passage

• tossed up

• motionless

• serverly cut

• flogged

• handled

• loathsomeness of the stench

• salutation

How does his account reveal both personal trauma and broader patterns of the slave trade

Shows how he wished for death (trauma) and how he was physically handled brutally, was cramped and was sick with horror, anguish, despair, and etc

How did equianos narrative expand or challenge what you learned in class about the middle passage

It expanded my idea of the cruelty and inhumane conditions slaves we put through and the actions slave ships owners would do just so they could keep their profit

His autobiography was written in protest against the horrors of slavery. How does he attempt to convince the reader of the unjustness of slavery, what strategies does he use?

He utilizes word choice to show how traumatic slave ships were to slave victims. For example, he states how “I received such a salutation in my nostrils as I had never experienced in my life: so that, with the loathsomeness of the stench p, and crying together, I became so sick and low that I was not able to eat nor had I the least desire to taste anything. I now wished for the last friend, death, to receive me.” nothing is more scarring than unwillingly losing your desire to taste, which is a necessary need of life. Also being surrounded by the terrible stench sticks with you and shows just how powerful the unsanitary environment was to the bodies of others. Also wishing death is traumatic as it shows how your mental health has declines very badly and this is not what anyone would want, along with the crying and despair he was with.