AF AMER 6 Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Harriet Ann Jacobs, Slave Narrative, Sexual Maturity
Document Summary
Incidents in the life of a slave girl by harriet jacobs. First full length slave narrative by a women. Enslaved women are contending with a negative image. Establishes virtue and respect by being black. Only slave narrative that graphically describes sexual abuse. Direct appeal to white women because black and white women both experience female sexuality, etc. Black women enter the literary space between the (male) slave narrative and the (white) female novel. 2 literary modes of production = 2 paradigms. Signifiers of biology and signifiers of gender. Douglass and jacobs, male & female slaves coming of age. This is how a slave became a man . Becoming of age sexually means becoming prey to the sexual predatory tendencies of males. Efforts to be virtuous are deprived when in a position of slavery due to the sexual tendencies of white men . Due to economic dominance in the system.
