LITR 4332 American Minority Literature 2013 Student Midterm Samples midterm assignment #1. Short essay (4-6 paragraphs) on 1 of 2 options option 1a. Highlight and analyze passage from readings

Jasmine Summers

Slavery and Sexuality

Passage: Even the little child, who is accustomed to wait on her mistress and her children, will learn, before she is twelve years old, why it is that her mistress hates such and such a one among the slaves. Perhaps the child's own mother is among those hated ones. She listens to violent outbreaks of jealous passion, and cannot help understanding what is the cause. She will become prematurely knowing in evil things. Soon she will learn to tremble when she hears her master's footfall. She will be compelled to realize that she is no longer a child. If God has bestowed beauty upon her, it will prove her greatest curse. That which commands admiration in the white woman only hastens the degradation of the female slave.

            This is a passage from Harriet Jacob's Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl.  This particular passage from this reading stuck out for me because of the detailed account of the hardships she encountered and how her text created visuals in my mind of her oppression.  Although I am African American, I have never heard of Harriet Jacobs before, and although I am aware of the issues suffered by women in bondage, I have never truly stopped to lament on them.

            The institution of slavery can only be described by me as brutal, oppressive, and destructive, but as a woman in slavery, one's existence must be filled with even more misery. The term "double minority" applies for these women, because not only did they have to deal with the issue of slavery, but also the issues that women of all backgrounds had to deal with, being treated as an object, and unwanted sexual advances. I think women have always been dealt a bad card in society, and have always been seen as the weaker sex and second class citizens, but being a slave and a female in America lent them a whole new set of problems. Slaves were not only kept in physical, mental, and spiritual bondage, but many times female slaves did not have freedom over their own bodies which added sexual bondage to their already dire situations.

            Jacobs' narrative illustrates the negative sexual components of slavery and the issues that resulted from it. The first issue of dealing with unwanted sexual advances from the slave master, suffering through the mental and, or physical abuse from the slave master's wife who would take out her frustrations of her husband's infidelity on the slave girl or woman. The final issue would be dealing with pregnancies that may have resulted from sexual encounters with the master or even other men on the plantation. 

            Experiencing any type of sexual harassment is devastating for a woman, but especially for a girl that still thinks as a child and does not yet even comprehend what sex is. Jacobs details what it is like to be that girl and to have your childhood and innocence taken from you. She writes that one learns to "tremble when you hear your master's footfall", allowing her reader to feel that the tremble and fear is a special type of fear, one experienced only by women and girl slaves, not males. Another issue of suffering at the hands of your mistress comes across as sad to me. Although the wife of the slave master, she is still a woman without a voice in that time period, similar to that of the slave woman, and she unfortunately has no other outlet to deal with the disapproval of her husband’s actions, except for displaying extreme disdain for the women their husbands desire and the children their husbands create.

            The final issue of pregnancies resulting from sexual affairs with the master or other men of the plantation is the saddest of all. These children are created by the master, but will never be able to join his family or be considered his "true child". Jacobs depicts a scene in her narrative of two sisters laughing and happily playing together, one the master’s child, and the other, his child by a slave woman. Although they share the same bloodline, one's life was sure to blossom into something beautiful, and the other's into something horrible. The children born unto these slave women, although most likely near White in appearance, would still have to face the issues of this institution of bondage and the fear of being sold and separated from family, a tragedy faced time and time again by mothers of these children.

            Although Jacob's master never forced himself upon her, she still had to make difficult choices in order to protect herself and her children based upon his actions. She suffered under his rule and many other female slaves suffered the same and even worse fate than she. Her story vividly illustrates the realities in the life of a woman slave in the U. S.