Native Slave By Race example essay topic

Race is defined according to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language as "a group of people united or classified together on the basis of common history, nationality, or geographic distribution". Race was furthermore defined by Europeans during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. These classifications were made based on observable physical differences including skin and hair color, hair type, body proportions, and skull measurements. As the dictionary notes, "The notion of race is nearly as problematic from a scientific point of view as it is from a social one" and this is supported by the number of changes in the way race is viewed over different time periods. In Shakespeare's Tempest of the sixteenth century, the made-slave Caliban is viewed by his race by Prospero, and likewise Caliban judges Prospero by race. Furthermore in Behn's Oroonoko of the seventeenth century, Oroonoko was explored and admired because of his distinguished intelligence regardless of typical racial views.

And lastly in D'Aguilar's Feeding the Ghosts of the eighteenth century race is what deemed the slaves to be in their position, and the [majority] of the crew viewed the slaves as stock only and ignored their human qualities. Shakespeare's Tempest explores the effects of race in the sixteenth century. As Prospero and Miranda come along to the island by fate of their tiny boat landing there, they encounter the only inhabitant and native Caliban who immediately shows them how to live by the land to survive. In return, Prospero enslaves Caliban to serve him and his daughter justified by the European belief that Caliban being a native, he was to serve Christians. Prospero does however teach Caliban language and some general knowledge to help him to become more civilized. Prospero identifies with the ideas of Barthelmeow de Las Casas in that it is believed that Europeans should instill fathership to the natives.

One may have believed that although Caliban remained a slave throughout his time with Prospero, Prospero had come to respect him as a fellow human being (in contrast to a savage slave.) However this belief is upset when Caliban expresses his desire to have Miranda (although by force), and Prospero is insulted and furious with Caliban for thinking that a native could ever have his [European] daughter. Miranda's once understanding ways and desire to teach Caliban language changes to bitter hatred and she expresses this all when she says, "Abhorred slave, Which by any print of goodness wilt not take, Being capable of all ill! I pitied thee, Took pains to make thee speak, taught thee each hour One thing or other. When thou didst not, savage, Know thine own meaning, but wouldst gabble like A thing most brutish, I endowed thy purposes With words that made them known. But thy wile race, Though thou didst learn, had that in't which good natures Could not abide to be with.

Therefore wast thou Deservedly confined into this rock, who hadst Deserved more than a prison". (Shakespeare, I ii. 352-362) This passage seems as though Prospero and Miranda were merely treating their slave well, and not respecting him as a human all along although they had made it known otherwise to Caliban. Their truthful opinion on his race surfaces in this event. Likewise Caliban repents against the two unappreciative of the language that they had given to him, and through this his opinion on them surfaces also. "You taught me language, and my profit on't Is I know how to curse.

The red plague rid you For learning me your language!" (Shakespeare, I. ii. 366-368). The problems and ungratefulness towards both parties from each other comes from the misunderstanding created by two different cultures and the assumptions they made of one another's races. In the end however Caliban comes to believe that he is a natural slave and encompasses that fate, because of his treatment from Prospero.

In Oroonoko a black man is related to and respected by white men. Although it is freely expressed that it is a time of slavery for use on sugar plantations and the narrator speaks of the slave trade referring to the slaves as "merchandise trafficked" reducing the slaves to merely stock; uniquely it is also stated that the Europeans "find it absolutely necessary to caress them as friends, and not treat them as slaves". Therefore Europeans view the slaves as stock, but yet still as humans. This refers to the idea of the seventeenth century of the "noble savage" depicting natives with a savage body yet Greek head symbolizing the intelligence that the natives could achieve. While Oroonoko is judged and expected to be something (a savage) because of his physical characteristics, Europeans still manage to look past that when he can prove his intelligence and already accumulated knowledge.

Once they can respect him for his intelligence, they also accept and begin to admire him for his physical attributes. Europeans could view him as one of their own rather than a lesser-being. This is supported as the narrator of Oroonoko describes him, and he says, "His face was not of that brown, rusty black which most of that nation are, but a perfect ebony, or polished jet. His eyes were the most awful that could be seen, and very piercing; the white of them being like snow, as were his teeth.

His nose was rising and Roman, instead of African and flat. His mouth the finest shaped that could be seen; far from those great turned lips, which are so natural to the rest of the Negroes. The whole proportion and air of his face was so noble, and exactly formed, that, bating his colour, there could be nothing in nature more beautiful, agreeable and handsome... Nor did the perfections of his mind come short of those of his person; for his discourse was admirable upon almost any subject and whoever had heard him speak, would have been convinced of their errors, that all fine wit is confined to the white men, especially to those of Christendom; and would have confessed that Oroonoko was as capable even of reigning well, and of governing as wisely, had as great a soul, as politic maxims, and was as sensible of power as any prince civilized in the most refined schools of humanity and learning, or the most illustrious courts". (Behn, 80-81) Oroonoko is equated to a European in this passage, most specifically comparing him directly to an European when speaking of the shape of his nose. He is also directly compared directly when speaking of his wit being that of a white man.

This suggests that Oroonoko was seen by Europeans as one just as respected as another white European man by means of intellect and civility. Furthermore on page 83, Behn writes, "he came to talk things so soft, and so passionate, who never knew love, nor was used to the conversation of women; but (to use his own words) he said, most happily, some new, and till then unknown power instructed his heart and tongue in the language of love, and at the same time, in favour of him, inspired Imoinda with a sense of his passion". This encompasses a European conception of love. One would not naturally think of natives loving one another however Oroonoko's love for Imoinda relates him in yet another way to being most like a European himself.

D'Aguilar's Feeding the Ghosts depicts slaves in the most savage of ways. The European sailors of the boat treat the slaves barely to keep them alive by feeling them in rations and not food of any good quality, packing them into the ship with no room to turn over in shackles, punishing them with no human regard, and disposing them over the ship while still alive. Some crew members still believe in the humanity of the slaves (those being known as the less intelligent of Europeans), although members such as Captain Cunningham see the slaves purely as stock. Kelsal acts the same as Cunningham would but for different reasons.

Despite knowing Mintah from when he is abandoned and sick at the African missionary when she nursed him back to health and helped him regain his identity, Kelsal refuses to see her as nothing more than a native slave by race, and even takes extremes to throwing her over the side of the ship with no regard to her life. This he would do to someone comparable to himself in that she knew English, and was baptized Christian like other Europeans. "His eyes narrowed and trembled, perhaps against the wind and rain. Did Mintah look changed? She was the woman he had beaten earlier. He had done that.

And for good reason. His name was not to be used in this way by a slave. She had been warned, beaten, chained, gagged and here she was again, as impudent with his name as before. She was a fine specimen, would fetch a good price in Jamaica, but he couldn't keep countenance her another moment on this ship". (D'Aguilar, 47) He does this because of the humiliation he felt by being re-taught and ordered to pay off his care by working around the missionary by black natives. If it was not for Kelsal racist view of the natives, he would have still respected the slaves as humans therefore he would not have been humiliated by repaying his debt back at the mission.

It is left up to a simpleton, Simon, to see Mintah for the person that she is rather than see her by race suggesting that it takes intelligence to know enough to be racist. Simon however grows to love Mintah therefore complicating their relationship to one another. Simon did give Mintah the change to practice mental resistance of the experience. Him keeping her secret of her life in the storage room allows her to hold onto her identity and participate in a few activities that relates her to actual historical figures. For example, she first plans to escape all of the slaves and overtake the power of the ship from the Europeans so she steals the tools necessary and passes them along to the slaves with her plan also. This compares to the success of the same plan on the Portuguese slave ship of the 1830's, the Amistad, where the slaves were eventually given their freedom by the courts because of the lack of ownership of them (seeing as how the owners were killed on the ship by the slaves.) Mintah's plan however was not successful like it was for the slaves of the Amistad because too many slaves were afraid to participate in the overturning, therefore the Europeans easily resisted with their guns as force.

Furthermore Mintah was allowed to write her experience on the ship on the paper she found in the trunk of the storeroom. This compares to historical figure Phillis Wheatley who resisted the slavery through her writing in the later 1700's, and eventually got her work published under her own name despite being a slave. Just as Phillis Wheatley had the assistance of her owner John Wheatley in teaching her language, writing, and other subjects despite this being illegal, Mintah had the assistance of the missionary that had taught her to read and write and of religion. The both of them used this tactic to express their feelings of their situations, making their physical resistance much easier to cope with. As Phillis Wheatley states in her poem "On being brought from A F R I C A to A M E R I CA", Some view our sable race with scornful eye, "Their colour is a diabolic die". Remember, Christians, Negroes, black as Cain, May be refin'd, and join th' angelic train.

Although Wheatley still knows that she is seen negatively because of her race, her writing allows her to describe how she feels about it, and the writing will later be used to inspire others to resist the slavery as well. Mintah's writing provided her with the same sort of escape as it did Phillis. Also, just as Phillis writing would inspire others to resist in the future, Mintah's writing would condemn the Captain Cunningham later on at the trial [whom would not have been otherwise] with the proof of the feelings of the slaves provided in Mintah's writing. These three books represent the cycle of European feelings towards slaves over the course of the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries.

During the sixteenth century the natives were seen as natural servants, however there was still a desire to instill fathership and educate them to some reasonable point. Furthermore, natives gain more respect during the seventeenth century and can be seen as a man just as any other European man. However, with the eighteenth century came a time of reverting back to the beginning and viewing natives solely by race as stock and with no attempt to educate them in anyway. It seems as if Europeans never sought out any problem with the natives, that they were in fact in belief that the natives were born servants yet still humans.

It is proven that they are seen as humans because during the seventeenth century the natives are allowed to be seen as intelligent as a European man. It could be questioned that the Europeans felt intimidated by these natives gaining so much respect and power and that is why they reverted back to such strict measures of suppressing them. Also, with the natives gaining so much more respect, the Europeans would begin to lose their source of free labor and with the need for sugar in high demand and growing every day, they could not afford this loss. And although in the sixteenth century regarded the natives as humans and not purely as stock, the treatment of them compares. Just as Caliban helps Prospero during the sixteenth century, Mintah helps Kelsal in the eighteenth century, and both Europeans were not grateful and enslaved them in return. Therefore it is thankful to historical figures such as Phillis Wheatley who began the acknowledgement of the slave experience through her writing or this cycle of 'stock to human and back to stock' view may have lasted considerably longer confusing the identities of the black natives much more, jeopardizing the culture of the natives forever.

Shakespeare, William. The Tempest. 1611. Behn, A phra. Oroonoko. 1688.

D'Aguiar, Fred. Feeding the Ghosts. 1997 web web.