Life Essay Example

Harriet Jacobs’ slave narrative entitled, “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl,” gave a true account of the evils slavery held for women, a perspective that has been kept relatively secret from the public. In writing her story, Jacobs, though focused on the subjugation due to race, gave voice subtly to a different kind of captivity, that men imposed on women regardless of color in the patriarchal society of the nineteenth century. This form of bondage is not only exacted from women by their husbands, fathers, brothers, and sons, but also is accepted and perpetuated by women themselves, who forge the cage that holds them captive. Jacobs directed her stirring account of the afflictions a woman is subjected to in the chain of slavery to women of the North to gain sympathy for their sisters that were enslaved in the South. In showing this, Jacobs reveals the danger of such self-condemnation women maintain by accepting the idealized role that men have set as a goal for which to strive. Harriet Jacobs’ slave epic is a powerful statement unveiling the impossibility and Harriet Jacobs’ slave narrative entitled, “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl,” gave a true account of the evils slavery held for women, a perspective that has been kept relatively secret from the public. In writing her story, Jacobs, though focused on the subjugation due to race, gave voice subtly to a different kind of captivity, that men imposed on women regardless of color in the patriarchal society of the nineteenth century. This form of bondage is not only exacted from women by their husbands, fathers, brothers, and sons, but also is accepted and perpetuated by women themselves, who forge the cage that holds them captive. Jacobs directed her stirring account of the afflictions a woman is subjected to in the chain of slavery to women of the North to gain sympathy for their sisters that were enslaved in the South. In showing this, Jacobs reveals the danger of such self-condemnation women maintain by accepting the idealized role that men have set as a goal for which to strive. Harriet Jacobs’ slave epic is a powerful statement unveiling the impossibility and