Analysing Slavery in Mark Twains Writing

Analysing Sla actually in Mark Twains WritingINTRODUCTION jibe to widely held view on slaveholding, it is has been acknowledged that it is a virtually universal feature of human hi news report that has preserved up to nowadays. As absolute conclusion of old origins of bondage postings to the fact that on that point ar written documents survived from ancient time as written in e.g., the Code of Hammurabi and The Old Testament covering that slavery was established in the early civilizations. As to present days, the United Nations (hereafter UN) reports reveal a huge number of women, children and men world exploited and oblige into slavery ranging from at least eight hundred- thousand to three million stack trafficked annually. Therefore, globalization has brought not lonesome(prenominal) positive cultural exchanges, besides in like manner endemic slavery around the world, raising a discussion of tackling and eliminating this woundful switch off.Concerning the term slave ry, it denotes much of negativism and violence e.g., torture, kidnap, murder, inferiority, punishment as well as the wilful destruction of human mind and sapidity (Bales, 20056). Nevertheless, the historians (Bales2005David2004 Kopytoff1977) delimit that slaves through come out of the closet human history have been treated as inferior, uncivilized and bestialized e.g., Mark Twains story The Adventures of huckleberry Finn portrays the Southerners vision of a runa federal agency slave who is perceived as superstitious, uneducated and perhaps violent thing merely a human in their view.This helps to rationalize the hostile or negative relishings, attitudes and actions towards one ethnic group of commonwealth, in this case a blank persons disdain and transcendency overblack person. The spiffingity of white or Caucasian aftermath derives from times of slavery as the historian Kevin Bales (20057) states slavery throw out damage broad deals mind, namely, (1) slaves (2) slavehol ders and (3) members of confederation who live this system. As to Bales (ibid), such smart set accepts dehumanisation of a person that allow prospering slavery around the globe. gum olibanum, we foot observe that slavery has remerged not only in many contrasting times throughout human history, save also is present in our times. This research stem aims at illustrating a link between past and present displayed in Mark Twains literary works. They reveal that slavery in the South underside be perceived as a ghost of the past, which has been equally haunting African Americans and Caucasian race. As a result, the past has widened a gap between those two races in America. William Faulkner has said that only with Twain, Walt Whitman became a true indigenous American culture (quoted in Hutchinson, 199880). Mark Twain who was innate(p) and raised in the Americas South was the pioneer of displaying the spoken language, the very American language in sustains that is characterized as vivid, but with sardonic humour, neat aphorism. It has to be mentioned that Mark Twain is regarded as a complex personality since he managed to contradict himself not only in a real life, but also in his writings.The issue of the bachelor thesis is institution of slavery in Mark Twains works. In early(a) words, the paper investigates aspects and issue of slavery described in Mark Twains writings, including The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884-85) and A True Story, Repeated for Word, as I heard It (1874) which be set in the pre Civil War society of American South-West.The aim of the paper is to gain a comprehensive picture of slavery from Mark Twains works.The objectives of the research paperthe as sign up is to select and to review the most common images of slavery presented in Twains writings by such characters as Aunt Rachel, Jim and Huck Finnto make the use of a study of history i.e. Slavery in America , but take into account Mark Twains personal view on slaveryto analys e the images of slavery victimisation the writers storiesto test the results i.e. to compare those two different images of slavery i.e. literary works and official history of slaveryto draw the relevant conclusions taking into account both his writings and the historic context.Hypothesis Mark Twains literary works imply personal responsibility and awareness on such complex issue as slavery, but problems of slavery cannot be viewed separately from historical context.Methods of researchcase study analysis of such historical works on slavery written by Suzzane Miers, Igor Kopytoff, Christine Hatt,Robert McColley and differentsanalysis of two Mark Twains storiesJuxta sic to contrast and compare those two different images of slavery, namely, historical and literary description of slavery.The author of the paper has chosen the case study as a research method for a number of reasons. First of all, case study research allow us better netherstanding a complex issue or object and this metho d of study is especially useful for testing theory by using it in real world situations. Secondly, a case study is an in depth study of a particular situation. It is a method used to abbreviate down a very broad field of research into one easily researchable topic. Finally, it provides a structural way of looking at events, collecting data, analyzing information, and describe the results. As a result, the researcher may get a better understanding of why the event happened as it did, and what is important to look at to a greater extent closely in the future.The first chapter deals with the history of racial discrimination and the concept of racism. The second chapter provides an insight into understanding of slavery and deals with the issue of institution of slavery in the USA. The deuce-ace one and its subchapters deal with issues of slavery, namely, they show how slavery is depicted in Twains literary work Huckleberry Finn and provide a brief insight into history of slavery in America and explores A True story and Aunts Rachel point of view of slavery.1 THE HISTORY OF racialism AND ITS CONCEPTThis chapter deals with the history and the concept of racism. racism is a subject that most slew, at least in westward societies, have their own opinion on and it is as old as civilization, it continues to be an important figure in society forthwith.Alana Lentin (2011) claims that racism is a political phenomenon rather than a mere set of ideas. To analyze racism it is necessary to go beyond the texts of racial scientists and to look at how certain political conditions during particular historical contexts led to some of the ideas proposed by racial theorists being integrated into political practices of nation-states. There are three aspects the political nature of racism, its modernity and its grounding in the history of the West that are fundamental to understanding racisms hold over contemporary westerly societies. It is very important as well to look at the statements, what a race is. match to Ivan Hannaford (1996), the word race as used in Western languages is first instal as late as the compass point 1200 1500. Only in the seventeenth century did it take on a separate convey from the Latin word gens or clan and was related to the concept ethnic group. In other words the dispositions and presuppositions of race and ethnicity were introduced some would utter invented or theoretical accountated in modern times and in any case, were not stipulation the meaning they have today until after the French and American revolutions. The reason why the notion of race became such a forefingerful and attractive idea is due to the deliberate manipulation of texts by scientists and historians to show that a racial order has al ways structured humanity (Hannaford 1996 4). There was a definite division of the periods over which the idea of race developed. Hannaford divides it into three stages 1684 1815, 1815 1870 and 1870 1914. The f inal period is known as the Golden Age of racism, it was a time when it was possible for the British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli to proclaim that race is all and there was no other truth. (ibid, 1996).As Alana Lentin (2011) states the word race was first used in its modern sense in 1684, when a Frenchman published his essay, where race stood for divisions among humankind ground on observable physical differences. At this stage race was used a simple descriptor and there was no intention of superiority meant by presenting humanity in this way (2011).Hannaford (1996) states that Western scholars later started to think about(predicate) that it means to be human that fundamentally changed the way people sight about the origins of human life, the universe and society. It is the bases for the way we think about these things to this day. The most significant changes were in fact that theo dianoetic explanations about life were replaced by logical description. (Hannaford, 1996 187) .Lentin Alan (2011) considers that many people do not ask nowadays why racism is apparently so important, despite the end of colonialism, slavery and the Holocaust, the answer is that it is natural. racial discrimination has entered into every(prenominal)day speech and therefore in our consciousness. The idea of racism is so widespread that we easily mistake it for something that is just there, a fact of life. racism is associated with the business and even hatred that human beings are commonly expected to have for for each one other. Fear based on racism is inherent and there is no need to ask why it exists (2011).As Neil Macmaster reminds us that racism is always a dynamic process, a set of beliefs and practices that is imbedded in a particular historical context, a particular genial formation, and is therefore continuously undergoing change, a plastic chameleon like phenomenon which constantly finds new forms of political, kindly, cultural or linguistic smell (2001 2).Le ntin (2011) refers to race in descriptive terms, it takes account of racionalization. Racionalization is the process through which the supposed inferiority of black, colonized and non-whites is constructed. Todays global racism divides the rich and the poor worlds and is no long-range a simple black and white issue. Racionalization involves endowing the traditions and lifestyles that are attributed to groups of different others with negative signifiers (2011). According to Alan Lentin (2011), the development of a radicalized discourse about a group of people provides justification for their discrimination. It puts into words the very thing about a particular group that is said to disturb us and pose a threat to our way of life. The fact that racionalization and racism are repeated, affecting different groups over time, does not mean that racism is inevitable. Rather, it shows that considerable transformations of our political systems, our social and cultural infrastructure, and our discourse the very way in which language is used needs to change if racism in Western societies is to be overcome (201110).Memmi (2000) investigates racism as social pathology a cultural disease that prevails because it allows one part of society to empower itself at the expense of other. For Memmi, racism emerges from within human situations, rather than simply as the enforcement of an political theory, or the natural belief some people have according their innate superiority. Racism is a charge, like a judicial accusation that is levied against somebody, who is indicated as being in some manner (racially) different. It implies that the other has, in being different, somehow broken certain assumed rules, and is thus not a good person. Thus the person is devalued and disparaged and he suffers from it. The indictment, however, is unfounded and unjust, and the accused is thus the victim of an injustice. As well Memmi (2000) states that in France, reference to le raciste in a te rtiary person nominative mode, as to some unspecified person who behaves in a particular way, upholding certain ideas and attitude, would call up a more or less familiar picture, bur in the United States it would not really be as clear. It is a nation in which white racism is whole generalized and integrated into political and social life. Though it may be invisible in mundane life, it can see by White people through accepting themselves without question as white. Thus racism moves beyond individual prejudice to engage broader questions of collective behaviour and social responsibility.As it can be seen, the topic of racism is very broad. Some people would say that racism is just based on prejudices but some would say that it is something that people are born into, and they are not able to fight against it, nor break out of their social status. People who are in such situations, are born into a situation where they do not have an unfair disadvantage when trying to move out of their social status and thus fall into a category that can make them more susceptible to racial prejudice and ideologies. The next subchapter will have a closer look at types of racism. 1.1 TYPES OF RACISMThe current subchapter aims at giving additional conceptions of the term racism as well as outlining basic types of racism proposed by several authorities(Reilly, Kaufman, Bodino2003)(Fredrickson2002). The given partition suggests that there is obvious correlation between racism and slavery.The website on racism Anti-Defamation League jells racism as the belief that a particular race is superior or inferior to another as well as that a persons social and moral traits are predetermined by his or her inborn biologic characteristics.According to Reilly, Kaufman and Bodino (20039), race has no basic biological reality, because all we see is just a colour or different texture of hair or shape of eyes, but it does not have any decisive influence over a persons intelligence or other traits. As a result, misconceptions about race have lead to forms of racism that have caused much social, psychological and social harm (Reilly et.al.200310). Additionally, Frederickson points out (20021) that racism that is the antipathy of one group towards another that can be expressed and acted upon with a single mindedness and brutality.Nevertheless, the same experts describe racism as prejudice or discrimination against other people because of their race, due to their biology or ancestry and physical appearance. This pattern is clearly visible in Twains work The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn when a slave named Jim runs away from his proprietor, whereas the whole city spreads out the rumours about him having killed Hucks father. Their assumption is based on prejudice that all black people are savages, violent and ca not be trusted. Thus, their attitude towards, slaves can be described as racism, because they judged those people, due to their ancestry and physical appearance.Although the term racism first came into common usage in 1930ies (as stated in the book A Racism a short history) (Fredercikson, 20025), the act of discrimination is still there i.e. while reading Twains literary works we can perceive how nonreversible people were treated in the American South.This attitude or and approach of white superiority overwhelm the Southern society at the time when Huck Finn was embarking in his famous adventures on Mississippi river. A great deal of harm has been done to generations and in this particular case to Jim, Aunt Rachel and Huck Finn. The trouble oneself and burden of slavery of these characters are depicted in chapter three.As to types of racism, the website on American Research and Geography called Amerigis provides detailed information on types of racism. The types are as follows Historical, Scientific, New, Spatial, Institutional, Internalized and Individual.The online resource stated above claims that racism looks different today from it did thirty years ago. The author of the current paper finds important to mention that racism bear in 19th century was blatant and caused so much pain and injustice to black race. Thus, the graduate proposes the idea that discrimination and injustice has derived from the time when slavery was acceptable even more it was the cornerstone of the Souths vision of sound social order. The author of BA thesis asserts that such blatant discrimination has never been go through in human history as it was back in early 19th century it was the root of all sin caused to black race.The classification of racism is based on several resources such as the Internet resource mentioned above, and three publications on racismThe types are as followsCultural racismAccording to Belgrave et al(2010104) cultural racism is expressed as assumed superiority of a language or dialect, values, beliefs, worldviews and cultural heritage e.g., in the novel Huckleberry Finn the slave named Jim is regarded as superstitious per son whose beliefs and values are regarded as infantile even compare to young white lad like Tom Sawyer.Individual RacismThe same scholar (ibid) explains that individual racism has the same meaning and features as of racial prejudice i.e. it assumes the superiority of ones own racial group and justifies its domination and power over other race. For example, when Pap Finn gets all furious about a white shirted free nigger to right to vote, because he holds the view that black race has no right to freedom nor participate in elections. As he states they told me there was a State in this country where theyd let that nigger vote, thus he determines , Ill never vote agin as long as I live.Institutional RacismThe Internet source American research and geographic information system point to white privilege that frequently is hidden, because it has become internalized and integrated as part of ones outlook on the world by custom, habiliments and tradition. For example, concerning antebellum society in the South of America if a white person helps a runaway slave towards freedom, and in doing so he violets the laws of man, and he believes the laws of God (Hutchinson, 1998130). The fact of helping slave that according to the Southerner rules is a deadly sin that sends a sinner into flames of hell. This points out that the church played a great role in peoples lives whereas any person who would disobey the given rule would be perceived as danger to their moral social order in the South. As a result, the southern upbringing does not allow Huck Finn to show his sympathy towards Jim, a runaway slave.Slavery functioned as main social moral and religious issue in the South. The preceding sentences and extracts from Twains writings show that social order had a tremendous impact over members of the Southern society at the given time. Nevertheless, at that time there were no subtle forms or hidden ways of showing ones hate towards other race, unlike today where many people expres s their hate via the Internet. On the contrary, it was impossible to show sympathy towards a slave e.g., the runway slave Jim who has abused the system and has sinned against the owner Miss Watson, arises the question to Huck whether he deserves his freedom.Additionally The psychologists Bhattacharya, Cross, Bhugra (201041) also give the classification racism based on the analysis of human behavior under certain circumstances, namely, being exposed to people of other ethnicities in our global world. The author of the BA thesis will highlight the types which can be found in the following works The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and A True Story, Repeated for Word, as I heard Itdominative when a person acts outaversive when a person feels superior , but is unable to actregressive when a personsdue to his or her view on racism behaves regressivelypre-reflecting when a person has fear of strangerspost reflecting when a person justifies his fear of strangersThe study on racism shows that it involves biased judgments on humans and their action e.g., racist determines what is good, correct, beautiful, sane, normal. Nevertheless, the historians and other experts of this field (Fredercikson, 2002), (Reilly, Kaufman, Bodino 2003), ( hum 1987) agree upon the view that racism and the same slavery is seen as ideology, as practice as social structure. Whereas, Mark Twains writings reflect on slavery as doctrine, practice and social cornerstone of the America South in antebellum society that has brought so much injustice and pain, as well.The next subchapter will explore the ideology of racism.1.2 political orientation OF RACISMThe chapter gives an insight into the ideology of racism as it is an important matter discussed, portrayed in history books and literature. Ideology is a body of beliefs that drives the goals and expectations of an individual or a group. According to Martin N. Marger (2006) As a belief system, or ideology, racism is structured around three basic idea sHumans are divided course into different physical types.Such physical traits as people display are intrinsically related to their culture, personality, and intelligence.The differences among groups are innate, not subject to change, and in the basis of their genetic inheritance, some groups are innately superior to others (Marger 200619).Thus, racism is a belief that people are divided into hereditary groups that are different in their social behaviour. Racist thinking states that differences among groups are innate.Carol Brunson argues that the ideology of racism prescribes the parameters for perceiving social reality thereby defining guidelines for desirable interracial behaviour. Once the members of society are imbued with racist thinking, they will not only perceive their institutions as natural, they will voluntarily carry out institutional mandates as of they are a function of their own individual choice (Carol Brunson, 198717).According to the authors of the books on the ide ology of race it can be seen that it is powerful and it persists in different forms of expression. Robert Miles work Racism is an essential reminder that racism is the object of ideological and discursive labouring. Robert Miles argues Racism is best debated primarily as an ideology for at least one other reason. Racism, qua ideology, was created historically and became interdependent with the ideology of nationalism. The argument that racism is a form of ideology is important and worth repeating (Robert Miles, 200310).When it comes to ideological components assumptions of racism, Carol Brunson holds the following viewpoint Racist institutions not only create the structural conditions for racism, but also create a culturally sanctioned ideology that keeps the system operating. Racist ideology is a set of notions that ascribe central importance to real or presumed biological, cultural, and psychological differences among racial groups, attributing the arrangement of both historic and current social systems to these differences (Carol Brunson, 198715). art object ideological and cultural arguments are two pillars that support racism, one or other may be in the forefront at any given time. Stephen Gould states two assumptions of biologically based racist ideologyHumans are classifiable into discrete, hierarchically ranked biological groups (with whites at the top).Differences among the races reflect the natural and/or ordained order and therefore are eternally fixed (Gould, 198145).Besides this biological argument, there exists also cultural argument, explaining the realities of the lives of people of colour. William Ryan (1976) defined blaming the victim as an ideological stance that locates the origins of social problems. Ryan identified four steps in victim blaming process. Locating social problem and population affected by it, resemblance of values and behaviour of people affected by the social problem, locating the source off the problem in how the affe cted people are different from the successful ones, initiation of treatment that would change the affected people (Ryan, 1976).Victim blaming therefore provides a framework for explaining the problems of people of colour. It is also a framework for strategies to ameliorate the position of people of colour in our society. Many people learn about the ideology of racism and families, schools and media contribute to this teaching. They learn and behave according to the dictates of racist ideology. Carol Brunson argues that very early, children of all backgrounds learn stereotypes about other groups regardless of whether they have contact with actual people (Carol Brunson, 198718). These stereotypes later shape peoples reality and they start judge and interpreting ideas and behaviours by their learnt stereotypes. Each persons own judgement is not harmful but over time the prejudices may become poisonous and damaging.As it can be seen, there appear new arguments of racism and its ideolo gy, justifying institutional, cultural and individual racism. While these new faces and arguments of racism try to cover the problem, racism and racist ideology are alive and existent in America. Racism affects us as individuals and the choices that we make in responding to it. Anti-racism education should require an immediate focus on each individual. The goal of the anti-racism education should be generation of development of individual consciousness, enabling people to become active initiators of the change in perception of racism. All people should be responsible for transformation of racism ideology. However, the situation is difficult because, while groups keep racism alive, the responsibility is not equally positioned. Yet, racism has always at peace(p) hand in hand with slavery, and it is a precedent to slavery.Racism is diabolic. It is not a social problem that will gradually disappear through education and legislation. These alleviate the symptoms, but no more than that. The only cure is in understanding that sliminess is real. In the words of Jeffrey Burton Russell,The essence of evil is abuse of a sentient being, a being that can feel pain. It is the pain that matters. Evil is grasped by the mind immediately and immediately felt by the emotions it is sensed as hurt deliberately inflicted. The existence of evil requires no further proof I am therefore I suffer evil.The definition implies two things One, that every human being suffers evil. Two, every human being inflicts evil. Thus, the essence of the human condition is in how we live with evil.Of necessity, then, evil has two faces one is individual, the other is collective. That we as individuals will and do commit evil is unavoidable. Our efforts not to do evil, however, need the support of a collective, i.e. a society that not only fucks evil but condemns it.In contemporary America,In her Gifford lectures, Hannah Arendt said As citizens, we must prevent wrong-doing because the world in whic h we all live, wrong-doer, wrong-sufferer, and spectator, is at stake the City has been wronged.We could almost define a crime as that transgression of the law that demands punishment regardless of the one who has been wronged.the law of the land permits no option because it is the community as a whole that has been violated.America is struggling to reach a consensus that racism violates the community as a whole. It cannot do so as long as blacks are still excluded from a sense of community.Blacks have no doubts or questions about their humanity and thus are made to suffer evil, an evil that is still not obvious to the white majority. Racism is an act of evil but white people do not hear the moaning of the wounded or the death rattles of the dying.The evil of slavery, the evil of the Holocaust are written large. So much so that many are in danger of thinking that these cataclysms are the only ways in which racist evil expresses itself. That is why it is both ironic and maddening tha t so many blacks equate anti-Semitism only with the Holocaust and thereby purpose that because they would never condone the extermination of Jews they are not and could not be anti-Semitic. Non-blacks are equally culpable when they equate racism solely with acts of violence.Because our perception of evil is limited to the dramatic, we have lost the capacity to recognize it. Evil has become so prosaic in appearance, manner and style that it is now woven into the fabric of the normal like smog, acid rain and K-mart. Hannah Arendt maintained that the horror of evil in the Third Reich was that it had lost the quality by which most people recognize it the quality of temptation. The racist evil of contemporary America is as charismatic as an empty can of cat food. In her Gifford lectures, Hannah Arendt attempted again to describe the figure of Adolf Eichmann and what had so horrified her about himI was struck by a manifest shallowness in the doer that made it impossible to track down t he incontestable evil of his deeds to any deeper level of roots or motives. The deeds were monstrous, but the doerwas quite ordinary, commonplace, and neither demonic nor monstrous. There was no sign in him of firm ideological convictions or of specific evil motives, and the only noble characteristic one could detect in his past behavior as well as his behavior during the trialwas something entirely negative it was not stupidity but thoughtlessness.It was this absence of thinking which is so ordinary an experience in our everyday life, where we have hardly the time, let alone the inclination to stop and think that awakened my interest. Is evildoing (the sins of omission, as well as the sins of commission) possible in disregard of not just base motivesbut of any motives whatever, of any particular prompting of interest or volition? Is wickedness, however we may define itnot a necessary condition for evil- doing?What Arendt saw in Eichmann is true of American society. This is not a country of wicked white people imbued with a virulent racism based on some principle or other. What exists is far more distressing. Racism has become a psychological habit, a habit many wish to dislodge, but it is so ingrained that they do not know where to begin. It is imperative, however, that they look, for as Goethe wrote in Wilhem Meister, every sin avenges itself on earth.Where they must look is in themselves. Whites cannot feel the pain of blacks, Jews and women until they feel the pain they inflict on themselves by passively accepting a definition of Order that crowns whites as racially superior beings. I do not know why whites do not feel the evil they inflict on themselves because I see the evil of racism taking its revenge on a drug-addicted white society which did not care forty years ago when drugs appeared in black slums. If America had been able to feel then that black life is human, if America had been able to feel that racism is a silent evil inflicting pain as mu rderous to the human spirit as any weapon is to the body, it would have been alarmed and moved to alleviate the conditions that made drugs appear to be a viable alternative. If America had been able to conceive that black life is human life, thousands of white and black lives would not have been destroyed, literally and psychologically, since drugs entered white American society. I do not understand why white America cannot understand this simple principle Everything white people do to black people, they will eventually do to each other.The ultimate evil of racism is not in its effects, but in the inability of white people to recognize themselves in black people. This evil will continue until white people take responsibility for that which they wish was not within them, namely, evil.Ultimately, we must accept that evil is, that it is not something out there but something in here. It cannot be expunged because our humanity lies as much in our capacity to evil as