Slave Fifth response

The chapter that I felt was my favorite and that I can talk about is The Fugitive Slave Law. This chapter to me felt like it was giving me more about what slaves went through then other chapters. The main reason was Luke. Luke was what I consider a person I could almost hear when he spoke. The things that Luke went through while he was a slave was to me almost beyond cruel. The master even though he kept getting weaker and weaker still had some energy to beat Luke, and I can’t grasp my mind around that. This man is dying, and barely has energy at all, except for when it comes to beating Luke, that is just sick. That is why this chapter just jumped out at me as the chapter I can say is my favorite, not because of the beating, but of the reality.

Incidents in the life of a slave girl fourth response

Linda and her brother William are very close but the relationship is more then that. William and Linda were always close, even though they had tough lives; they still had time to bond as siblings. But what makes this relations ship so interesting, is what happened to each of the siblings. Linda was stuck moving from master to master, and even her children are expected to become slaves because that’s what happened to children whose mothers were slaves, they became slaves, if the father was a slave and the mom was not, the children would be free. But what happened to William was different; he was given the ability to find out what freedom was about.

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Third response

When Linda’s daughter is given a gold chain to wear, Linda gets upset at this matter for many reasons. First off Linda thanks her old mistress for the chain, but truly she despises the thing, for what Linda believes that chain symbolizes is the chains of slavery, and she wants her child to never feel the weight of that chain, even if it is made of gold. I agree with this comparison because the mistress is literally telling that child you are going to be a slave no matter what you ever do and let this chain symbolize your initialization into the world of slavery. The mistress knew what she meant, the only reason she chose the chain to be gold was so Linda would keep it, even if it symbolizes everything she hates, it is still worth a lot of money.

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Second response

“There is danger in love for a slave.” When Linda said this she meant many things. This quote was Linda’s way of stating that love only brings problems to a slave, whether that person loves another slave, or one of their owners, all that love leads is to complications and harder times. I agree with Linda because so far through the book even the word love feels to me like a taboo. And Linda felt what happens when you let your love be known, in the chapter Lover, Linda confesses her love, and is stricken on the face for it. This is one of the reasons why I believe that love only brings problems for a slave.

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl First response

The importance that Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl is defined as truth rather than fiction is because of what the overall story is about. This story is about an African- American slave thus it would only defeat the purpose of the book to make up things that would depict a horrible act in history. Then there is the fact that the editor didn’t clean up the book in terms of both language and content. The reason why I believe he did that was to almost make the book more realistic in terms of how it should of sounded to the main character when they went through it. Which is how it should be, the book should be as close to truth as possible and with the way the book is written, it is easy to feel the main points of the book by reading it in this fashion.

Notes to the State of Virginia Response

Thomas Jefferson was one of the greatest men if the history of the United States, but after reading Notes to the State of Virginia, I am starting to see a new light to the man that created the Declaration of Independence. Even though Thomas Jefferson seems completely different in each of these documents, it only natural for a human to be unpredictable. But these two documents were actually supposed to be part of the same one. The things that Jefferson talks about in Notes to the State of Virginia, mainly about slavery, don’t seem to resonate when you think about Thomas Jefferson, but really he couldn’t of cared more about the topic. Jefferson seems radically different in Notes to the State of Virginia rather then in the Declaration because no one knew about that side of him, even though he was still the same Jefferson we all know and respect.

Declaration of Independence response

When I was reading the Declaration of Independence, one sentence seemed to just stand out. That sentence was, “He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.” Throughout that entire sentence, it sounded like he was a pirate going along from town to town raiding and pillaging. But this is not the case. The king did not hop on a pirate ship and go to the colonies to raid and pillage. What that sentence really means is that the King had been using the force of his military to control the seas of the colonies, which has caused a loss of trade thus plundering their seas. Ravaging the coast and burning our towns mean this meant by the fact that the British terrorized the colonists with their might and during the war burnt down their homes literally. Finally what destroying the lives of our people means is self-explanatory, the British army did kill many colonists during the war and even before that. And that is what is meant by, “He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.”

The Crisis, No.1 response

Panics can produce as much good as hurt. This came from Thomas Paine’s “The Crisis, No.1”. When Paine says that statement what I think he is trying to say is that panics, even though deadly and hurtful, bring things to light that would previously had never been found out at all but because of the panic, these things are discovered. Another reason for why Paine states that panics can produce well is that panics are the literal touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy. Along with that the true thoughts of a traitor come to light as the panic almost sifts out the inner thoughts of the man and holds them up for the public to see. This shows that panics can do as much good as bad.

Sinners in the hand of an Angry God response

The picture that Edward is trying to paint to us about early American Puritan religion is that the Puritans were a very judging and stubborn people. The Puritans were also very easy to sentence a person to eternal hellfire and that there were no second thoughts about it. These Puritans just saw in black and white, right and wrong, if you did something immoral there was no room for repentance, thus no disagreement among the Puritans. Which leads that to our discussion about the tolerance of early settlers, which was that you were either tolerant or you were exiled for your radical thoughts. These Puritans were so passionate about what they worshiped, and were not tolerant, for they have multiple times exclaimed their hate of Jews. These Puritans were quite opposite then the early settlers like Roger Williams who accepted all religions.

Great Gatsby discussion response

During the discussion on Tuesday one of the themes was God / religion. During this time we talk about how some of the people in The Great Gatsby viewed who they thought was their God. We talked about how Gatsby thought that he was his own God, TJ Eckleburg thinks that advertising is his own God, and that Owl eyes believes that god is clueless. While looking at these views from Gatsby, TJ, and Owl eyes we can see that each of them have definite different views. But overall these views after looking at the book, they are all correct, Gatsby believes that just because he has money he is all powerful, TJ uses his advertisement to make sure people go only to him for glasses, and Owl eyes being clueless doesn’t have any idea of what God should be.

The Green light response

At the end of the book we read about Nick looking at the green light and how we all are striving for something. And I agree because we as humans have a natural tendency to want what we can’t have. Throughout all our lives we see and think about things that would make our lives better, some light that we look at and yearn for, even though we may never get it. And then there are some of us who look at that light and say,” I’m going to get that light, I am going to get that someday.” This thought states that even though this thing that we want is not entirely in our grasp we still fight against a current, a current that we try to overcome and one day claim this light. Why in the first do we think of this light, do we ever think that we need to get it, well I think that the reason we need it is because of our insecurities and our overall need to have what we can’t have. With these things set in place we as humans try to fight against that current to claim that light and get what we have always wished for. But the light is also a two way street, if your light is something that is not possible to attain, like control of the universe, there is no point in trying to get that light, but if your light is possible to attain, then you should go for it, no matter what.