Week...wait what week is this? The one about slave narratives

Frederick Douglass was truly a unique oddity of his time. Well educated, profoundly intellectual, and black in the heart of an era when slavery was truly the fulcrum of our nation’s economic and moral prosperity. Douglas had found the avenue to better his circumstances through knowledge and inward reflection, but in the footsteps of his own, uncommon individual liberties followed a stampede of unrelenting oppression and scrutiny. He was one of only a few black men employed by white society, and the society’s most privileged would often condescendingly insist that Douglass merely relate the “facts” of his experience, and leave the philosophy, rhetoric, and persuasive argument to others. Yet Douglass’s 1845 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, can be seen as a response to both of these types of resistance. It is made all tooo clear that Douglass is The Narrative’s sole author, containing two prefaces from William Lloyd Garrison and another abolitionist, Wendell Phillips, who confirm this detail. Douglass’s use of the true names of people and places further silenced his detractors who questioned the truthfulness of his story and status as a former slave. Additionally, the Narrative proved to not only provide personal description of his own slave narrative, but recounted the emotional baggage that followed the experiences’ end trails. Douglass demonstrated his ability to be not only the teller of his story, but its interpreter as well. He took advantage of the popularity of slave narratives while expanding the possibilities of those narratives. In its somewhat unique depiction of slavery as an assault on selfhood and in its attention to the tensions of becoming an individual, Douglass’s Narrative can be read as a contribution to the literary tradition of American Romantic individualism. It celebrates the essence of what it means to live with the same self-hood echoed in the works found outside the “confines” of the coined: slave-narrative genre in literature.

Comparatively speaking, when exploring Douglass and Jacobs’ narratives we see a divergence of many of the rhetorical styles we’ve encountered in this class. We see the narrative depiction of slavery, or more generally speaking the concept of “confinement” (which we saw in Women’s Indian Captivity Narratives, and The Conquest of Spain) while also shedding some light on a philosophical reflection/argument to such circumstances, and such narrations (as we see in Emerson and Thorough, and even a little bit in The Coquette). This ultimately leads us to a first-hand re-telling of an off-hand, collective human experience. The story really vibes on its historical accuracy (that kinda exists in Witch Trial narratives we covered week 2…but not really) but, within this historical narrative lies the human investment in what is being clarified to his audience.

One passage that really stands out in my mind can be seen in the second chapter of the book….

“I did not, when a slave, understand the deep meaning of those rude and apparently incoherent songs. I was myself within the circle; so that I neither saw nor heard as those without might see and hear.”

This passage is part of Douglass’s long discussion at the end of Chapter II about the songs that slaves sing. As he often does in the Narrative, Douglass takes his personal experience of hearing slaves sing on their way to the Great House Farm and analyzes this as a common experience among all slaves. He uses his conclusions about slave behavior to correct white readers’ misconceptions. In this instance, Douglass explains that many Northerners mistakenly believe that the singing of slaves is evidence of their happiness, yet Douglass explains that the songs are actually evidence, on an almost subconscious emotional level, of the slaves’ deep unhappiness.
Douglass makes a distinction between the literal and the “deep” meaning of the songs. Douglass explains that the songs were difficult to understand—“apparently incoherent” to outsiders—but that the slaves themselves understood the literal meaning of the words they were singing. However, the “deep” meaning of the songs is not apparent to Douglass until he becomes an outsider to the group. Douglass implies that the “deep” meaning becomes clear only with distance and after applying tools of analysis. This distance explains Douglass’s particular position of authority in the Narrative. Douglass not only experiences life under slavery, but he now also has the tools and the distance with which to interpret the practices of slavery for outside audiences.

The quotation further provides an example of the tension inherent in the Narrative. Douglass must abandon his former slave self in order to become a narrator capable of interpreting the experiences of that former self. Implicit in this quotation is the idea that a culture remains invisible to those who are raised within it; while, our everyday practices may seem normal—they have little meaning and therefore cannot be interpreted. As such, Douglass does not understand the symbolic meaning of the slave songs when he is one of the singers. Douglass suggests that only after moving away from his culture can he gain interpretive distance from it.

Building on this idea, can you think of anything that found meaning to you only from a distance?

Personally, while I am a full time student here at Otterbein, I’ve also been trying to maintain a steady profession as a working musician. Although college makes it rather difficult at times, playing gigs, making music, and trying to leave myself a chance to do it for a living one day is a major priority in my life. And songwriting, might just be the absolute perfect depiction of saying/feeling something without fully understanding it: or “the deeper meaning” that I mentioned earlier. I find new meaning in old song lyrics that I wrote pretty much every time I play a show. And while I may have a set goal, or, conscious intention, or premeditated image that I try to share and express to myself or an audience, I can never predict the emotional/physical responses, or interpretations a song or a lyric will deliver on an individual or collective basis. But I accept this, knowing that as long as I write with honesty, my material will have genuine interpretations and meanings. I feel that Frederick Douglass is speaking about this same degree of recognition.