The Imagery in Frances Harper's "The Slave mother" is extremely vivid, and the reader is able to easily see this because in every short stanza Harper makes sure that there is an image of something relating to an nonbiological slave mother and her son. For example, Harper describes a mother trying to hide her son under her dress because he is trembling in terror clinging to her for safety. "Her boy clings to her side, And in her kirlte vainly tries, His trembling form to hide". Harper uses this stanza to describe a scared child because everyone can relate to that kind of fear, and has felt it not only as a child but in their adult lives as well. As an abolitionist writer who is trying to persuade the audience, she makes a smart choice to use this imagery because it allows the audience to grasp how fearful the child is, which obviously has something to do with him being a slave. Also, at the beginning of the poem there is a stanza in which Harper describes the slave mother in grief who is praying "Saw you those hands so sadly clasped-- The bowed and feeble head-- The shuddering of that fragile form-- That look of grief and dread?" Harper uses this imagery well and it allows the reader to feel the sadness of a poor mother praying for her child. This is good imagery as well because all mothers (black or white) are always concerned about their children and it is natural that a white mother who is reading this would be able to relate to a slave mother who feels sadness and love for their children. This hopefully was able to give a strong impact on white mothers during the time of publishing because it allowed white women to realize the pain and dread that so many slave mothers went through during slavery--even children that weren't biologically related! Also, Harper's explanation of this slaves love for her child also show all whites the aspect that slaves WERE human and were capable of having feelings of love and sorrow and all other emotions. 

Blog Entry #6

In "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl", Harriet Jacobs describes the events of her life as a female slave. At her time in society, being both female and a slave put her in the very bottom of the lowest possible social class. This factor was something that defined the choices she made in her life and sadly for Harriet lead her to what became "failures". An example of this is when she is taken advantage of by her Master, Mr. Flint, and has his child. Since she is his property, Flint is able to do whatever he wants with her, more specifically he is allowed to rape her and take advantage of her as he pleases. Since Harriet wanted to get married to a freed black man and was not allowed to by Mr. Flint's choice (also a failure), my guess is that this made things worse for her because of Flint's jealousy. Unsurprisingly, Harriet becomes pregnant with a child of Flint's, and poor Harriet struggles with this fact "I shuddered to think of being a mother of children that should be owned by my old tyrant" (778). This is something that Harriet obviously did not want to happen in her life, but because of her position in society and being a woman, she had no choice. "I wanted to confess to her that I was no longer worthy of her love; but I could not utter the dreaded words" (778). We know that Harriet feels like this is a failure in her life because despite her close relationship with her grandmother, she is too ashamed to give word to her, and is so uneasy about her dignity and reputation. "My relatives would hear of it, I felt wretched...My self respect was gone!...And now, how humiliated I felt!" (778). Harriet's choices were effected negatively in society because as a slave girl, she didn't even have choices. This lack of respect, freedom and self-ownership takes everything out of her hands and puts them into her owners, which in the end leads to failures because she had no control over her life or what might happen to it. 

Blog Entry #4

In the story "The Tenth of January", the author Elizabeth Phelps tells us a story of a young woman named Aseneth--Sene for short. Sene works in a factory with several other women and is much different from the other girls due to her physical disabilities. "her neck and shoulders were closely muffled... she wore a faded scarlet hood which heightened the pallor of what must at best have been a pallid face. It was a sickly face, shaded...it [her mouth] would have been a womanly, pleasant mouth, had it not been crossed by a white scar, which attracted more of one’s attention than either the womanliness or pleasantness". Many of the girls in the factory know that Sene is not like them and therefore do not treat her with the same respect as they treat other coworkers and people in their town. "Del shook back her curls; 'who do you suppose would ever marry you?'" Not only do the girls treat Sene with disrespect, but so do the younger children in her town and many of the older people don't pay attention to her because of her deformities. "She remembered stealing out at last, after many days, to the grocery round the corner for a pound of coffee. 'Humpback! humpback!' cried the children,—the very children who could leap and laugh." Elizabeth Phelps makes a point about society and how they treat people based on their differences. We can pair this contextual evidence along with the gloomy, dark setting of the story, seeing Sene struggle for the love and attention from her secret love, and think about the tragic ending of her death to see that Phelps has created a strong theme of discrimination and social injustice during this story, which unsurprisingly matches up with this time in society.

Blog Entry #3

In Irving's sweet, short story "The Wife", he allows us to see a few things regarding American values at this point in society. The values of marriage, women, and economics are all presented here, and I will say it was interesting to see how some values are the same, and how some have changed. Regarding women, times have definitely changed. In the story, the narrator first describes a man's position in marriage, and describes women as being helpless and dependent (unsurprisingly). It is interesting to see this because now days there are countless families where the women are the only one's in the marriage with a job, or both man and women work together for their family. Women in today's world are no longer helpless by any means. Leslie the husband is nervous what his wife's reaction will be when she finds out that they are going to be living in a more poverty-stricken lifestyle. To his surprise, his wife is always there for him and is supportive of what has happened to them and never complains once, which was the exact opposite of how he thought she would react. This is a marriage value that I appreciate, and I think that this is a good example of a strong marriage; one that is bound by support, love and a deep companionship that lasts even when lifestyles have to be changed, especially for the worse. His wife never made one complaint about their lifestyle and was supportive of her husband during their rough times. In terms of economics values, those have not changed either; in today's world each and every one of us has to admit that how much money we make is a big factor in our satisfaction of life--we are so easily confused with money and happiness. There was still a value on living a lavish lifestyle and being able to attain every tangible object, but despite Mary and Leslie's economic issue, they were able to still live a happy life and still found many joys in living in a less lavish home with a more simple interior.