Solomon Northup, Author of Twelve Years a Slave

Solomon Northup was a free black resident of New York State who was drugged on a trip to Washington, D.C. in the spring of 1841 and sold to a slave dealer. Beaten and chained, he was transported by ship to a New Orleans slave market and suffered more than a decade of servitude on Louisiana plantations. Northup had to hide his literacy or risk violence. And he was unable, for years, to get word to anyone in the North to let them know where he was. Fortunately, he  was eventually able to send messages which prompted legal action that secured his freedom. Writing His Narrative and the Impact on Abolition After regaining his freedom and miraculously returning to his family in New York, he collaborates with a local attorney to write a shocking account of his ordeal, Twelve Years a Slave, which was published in May 1853. Northup’s case and his book attracted considerable attention. Most slave narratives were written by former slaves who had been born into slavery, but Northup’s perspective of a free man kidnapped and forced to spend years toiling on plantations was especially disturbing. Northup’s book sold well, and on occasion, his name appeared in newspapers alongside such prominent abolitionist voices as Harriet Beecher Stowe and Frederick Douglass. Yet he did not become an enduring voice in the campaign to end slavery. Though his fame was fleeting, Northup did make an impact on how society viewed slavery. His book seemed to underscore abolitionist arguments advanced by people such as William Lloyd Garrison. And Twelve Years a Slave was published at a time when the controversy over the Fugitive Slave Act and events such as the Christiana Riot were still on the minds of the public. His story came to prominence in recent years thanks to a major film, â€Å"12 Years a Slave,† by British director Steve McQueen. The film won the Oscar for Best Picture of 2014. Northups Life as a Free Man According to his own account, Solomon Northup was born in Essex County, New York, in July 1808. His father, Mintus Northup, had been born a slave, but his owner, a member of a family named Northup, had freed him. Growing up, Solomon learned to read and also learned to play the violin. In 1829 he married, and he and his wife Anne eventually had three children. Solomon found work at various trades, and in the 1830s the family moved to Saratoga, a resort town, where he was employed driving a hack, the horse-drawn equivalent of a taxi. At times he found employment playing the violin, and in early 1841 he was invited by a pair of traveling performers to come with them to Washington, D.C. where they could find lucrative work with a circus. After obtaining papers in New York City establishing that he was free, he accompanied the two white men to the nation’s capital, where slavery was legal. Kidnapping in Washington Northup and his companions, whose names he believed to be Merrill Brown and Abram Hamilton, arrived in Washington in April 1841, just in time to witness the funeral procession for William Henry Harrison, the first president to die in office. Northup recalled watching the pageantry with Brown and Hamilton. That night, after having drinks with his companions, Northup began to feel sick. At some point, he lost consciousness. When he woke, he was in a stone basement, chained to the floor. His pockets had been emptied and the papers documenting that he was a free man were gone. Northup soon learned he was locked inside a slave pen which was within sight of the U.S. Capitol building. A slave dealer named James Burch informed him that he had been purchased and would be sent to New Orleans. When Northup protested and asserted he was free, Burch and another man produced a whip and a paddle, and savagely beat him. Northup had learned it was extremely dangerous to proclaim his status as a free man. Years of Servitude Northup was taken by ship to Virginia and then onward to New Orleans. In a slave market, he was sold to a plantation owner from the region of the Red River, near Marksville, Louisiana. His first owner was a benign and religious man, but when he got into financial difficulty Northup was sold. In one harrowing episode in Twelve Years a Slave, Northup recounted how he got into a physical altercation with a violent white master and was nearly hanged. He spent hours bound with ropes, not knowing if he would soon die. He recalled the day spent standing in the broiling sun: What my meditations were — the innumerable thoughts that thronged through my distracted brain — I will not attempt to give expression to. Suffice it so say, during the whole long day I came not to the conclusion, even once, that the southern slave, fed, clothed, whipped and protected by his master, is happier than the free colored citizen of the North. To that conclusion I have never since arrived. There are many, however, even in the Northern States, benevolent and well-disposed men, who will pronounce my opinion erroneous, and gravely proceed to substantiate the assertion with an argument. Alas! they have never drunk, as I have, from the bitter cup of slavery. Northup survived that early brush with hanging, mainly because it was made clear that he was valuable property. After being sold again, he would spend ten years toiling on the land of Edwin Epps, a plantation owner who treated his slaves brutally. It was known that Northup could play the violin, and he would travel to other plantations to perform at dances. But despite having some ability to move about, he was still isolated from the society in which he had circulated prior to his kidnapping. Northup was literate, a fact he kept hidden as slaves were not allowed to read or write. Despite his ability to communicate, he was unable to mail letters. The one time he was able to steal paper and manage to write a letter, he was unable to find a trustworthy soul to mail it to his family and friends in New York. Freedom After years of enduring forced labor, under threat of whippings, Northup finally met someone he believed he could trust in 1852. A man named Bass, who Northup described as a â€Å"native of Canada† had settled in the area around Marksville, Louisiana and worked as a carpenter. Bass had been working on a new house for Northup’s master, Edwin Epps, and Northup heard him arguing against slavery. Convinced he could trust Bass, Northup revealed to him that he had been free in New York State and was kidnapped and brought to Louisiana against his will. Skeptical, Bass questioned Northup and became convinced of his story. And he resolved to help him obtain his freedom. He wrote a series of letters to people in New York who had known Northup. A member of the family which had owned Northup’s father when slavery was legal in New York, Henry B. Northup, learned of Solomon’s fate. An attorney himself, he took extraordinary legal steps and obtained the proper documents that would allow him to travel into the slave South and retrieve a free man. In January 1853, after a long trip which included a stop in Washington where he met with a Louisiana senator, Henry B. Northup reached the area where Solomon Northup was enslaved. After discovering the name by which Solomon was known as a slave, he was able to find him and initiate legal proceedings. Within days Henry B. Northup and Solomon Northup were traveling back to the North. Legacy of Solomon Northup On his way back to New York, Northup visited Washington, D.C. again. An attempt was made to prosecute a slave dealer involved in his kidnapping years earlier, but the testimony of Solomon Northup was not allowed to be heard as he was black. And without his testimony, the case collapsed. A lengthy article in the New York Times on January 20, 1853, headlined â€Å"The Kidnapping Case,† told the story of Northup’s plight and the thwarted attempt to seek justice. In the next few months, Northup worked with an editor, David Wilson, and wrote Twelve Years a Slave. No doubt anticipating skepticism, Northup and Wilson added extensive documentation to the end of Northup’s account of his life as a slave. Affidavits and other legal documents attesting to the truth of the story added dozens of pages at the end of the book. The publication of Twelve Years a Slave in May 1853 attracted attention. A newspaper in the nation’s capital, the Washington Evening Star, mentioned Northup in a blatantly racist item published with the headline â€Å"Handiwork of Abolitionists†: There was a time when it was possible to preserve order among the negro population of Washington; but then the great majority of that population were slaves. Now, since Mrs. Stowe and her compatriots, Solomon Northup and Fred Douglass, have been exciting the free negroes of the North to action, and some of our resident philanthropists have been acting as agents in that holy cause, our city has been rapidly filling up with drunken, worthless, filthy, gambling, thieving free negroes from the North, or runaways from the South. Solomon Northup did not become a prominent figure in the abolitionist movement, and he seems to have lived quietly with his family in upstate New York. It is believed he died sometime in the 1860s, but by that time his fame had faded and newspapers did not mention his passing. In her non-fiction defense of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, published as The Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe referred to Northup’s case. â€Å"The probability is that hundreds of free men and women and children are all the time being precipitated into slavery in this way,† she wrote. Northup’s case was highly unusual. He was able, after a decade of trying, to find a way to communicate with the outside world. And it can never be known how many other free blacks were kidnapped into slavery and were never heard from again.

How Do People Learn (Language) - 829 Words

How do people learn (language)? How we teach language should be based on how people learn language. Do we learn language the way we learn everything? Or is there some special way our brains learn language? Today we will talk about some of the hypotheses which have been suggested for how people learn (in general) and learn language (in particular). This child has learned sign-language from his parents – but how? NATURE vs. NURTURE People who argue for language learning by NATURE believe that humans are born with a built-in ability to learn language – that it is part of the structure of our brains. People who support NURTURE side of the argument believe that we learn language the same way we learn everything else, e.g.†¦show more content†¦S: I played basketball. T: I’m not very good at basketball. This responds to the meaning. NATIVISM (INNATE LANGUAGE ABILITY) Shortly after Skinner wrote his book, a young linguist named Noam Chomsky (1959) wrote a strong critique of the Behaviorist theory for language learning. Chomsky’s main argument against Behaviorism was this: IF CHILDREN LEARN LANGUAGE BY CONDITIONING AND IMITATION, WHY DO THEY SAY THINGS THEY HAVE NEVER HEARD BEFORE? WHY CAN ADULTS MAKE COMPLETELY NOVEL SENTENCES? †¢ Fish feet †¢ My brother only eats the blue monkeys. Chomsky also argued that the language children are exposed to is â€Å"deficient† for language learning. Chomsky claimed that the language children hear is full of â€Å"performance errors† such as grammatical mistakes, false starts, slips of the tongue, etc. CHOMSKY’S LAD Therefore, Chomsky argued, children must be born with some special built-in ability to learn language. He called this special built-in ability, the Language Acquisition Device (LAD). This device supposedly contained the main rules for all possible human languages. 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How To Write A History Essay Example For Students

How To Write A History Essay The Struggle Against Christianity in GermanyThe struggle against Christianity in Germany assumed greater proportions by the end of 1941. On Nov. 10 the official Vatican radio station in Rome broadcast, without comment, a catechism published by the German weekly Nordland, organ of the German Believers in God, in its issue of Sept. 15. There the principles of the German faith were given in the form of questions and answers. Some of the answers read: We National Socialists are believers in God because in us as German men veneration of the divine and faith in it are impressed in an indelible manner in our blood and being. We National Socialists believe: in the divine; in the unity of the universe; in Mother Earth; in destiny; in the creative force of our blood; in our people and its mission; in our Fuehrer; in the National Socialist peoples community; in ourselves. In the catechism it was further said: The divine in its highest form is personified in the German people because the individual only within his people can develop his divine faculties and energies or rather only in the people can he live. What derives from the fact that the divine in the highest form is personified in the people? It derives from it that service for the Fuehrer, for the people, and for the fatherland is divine service. To believe in our people and in its mission means: to have unshakeable conviction that our people represents the highest worth of all humanity on earth; to follow the will of nature according to which the best people is called upon to command; to know that to be led by the best people redounds from the necessity of things in benediction on other nations; to work, sacrifice ourselves and fight indefatigably for the ascent and victory of our people.A book circulated by the end of November in 200,000 copies in Germany, especially among the Elite Guard and the youth and called God and People, outlined the national German faith which was to replace the Catholic and Protestant churches. The book had no author named, but the unknown writer identified his views with those of the Nazi party and of its Fuehrer. The wide and encouraged circulation at a time of extreme paper shortage was proof enough of the semi-official character of the book. There it was said: We Germans have been called by fate to be the first to break with Christianity; it is to be an honor For two thousand years the Church had time to begin molding mankind into a cleaner, higher striving race. The Church not only did nothing, but has degenerated into a restraining impediment. Finally, the Fuehrer and his movement have come, decried as heretic, to perceive and form true divine will. Christianity has failed and thus runs in its death hour. A thousand bonds tie us to the Christian belief. But one blow will make us free. To make Germans strong and ripe for this step is our task, our holiest obligation. This new German faith is in no way dogmatic: German faith will not dictate to anyone his relationship to God. Everyone seeks his own way. But no one seeks it in Rome or Jerusalem. Germany is our Holy Land. It will be our religion . .. We want faith which flames out of the depths of German nature and out of German hearts. The Catholic bishops protested against the spread of this book in a letter read from all pulpits, in which they said: The existence of Christianity and of the Church in Germany is at stake. .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc , .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc .postImageUrl , .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc , .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc:hover , .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc:visited , .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc:active { border:0!important; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc:active , .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .ue2ce36df40212272d10ce712f1ae10dc:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: adversity Essay Recently a book has been spread in hundreds of thousands of copies which asserts we Germans have to choose between Christ and the German people. With flaming indignation, we German Catholics refuse to make such a choice.At the beginning of 1942 Dr. Alfred Rosenberg, who has been one of the spiritual fathers of National Socialism, has released for publication a 30 point program defining the religion of National Socialism. The 30 points, which may be of immense importance for the future of Germany and of any German-controlled parts of the world, in view of the position of the author and the official character of the program, are the following: The National Reichs Church will take over all existing churches and chapels, which will become national churches. While no German is obliged to join the Church, that Church itself is called to serve its single doctrinerace and people. Its domain is limited by the territorial frontiers of the Reich and its colonies. Other churches or religious associations, above all those based on international bodies or directed from abroad, will not be tolerated in Germany. The National Reich Church has one immutable objective, to destroy that Christian belief whose tenets conflict with the German heart and the German mentality and which were introduced into Germany in that unfortunate year 800, when Charlemagne subjugated the pagan Saxons. In the National Reich Church there will be no pastors or theologians, only the national orators of the Reich will be allowed to speak at the services which will be held on Saturday night. The orators of the national church will be state officials; none of them will be allowed to do anything to perpetuate the Christian faith. No Church or sect can possess any parcel of German soil, for it is not the Church that conquered and tilled the land, but the German people. The printing and the dissemination of the Bible, as well as of all Sunday papers with religious content are to be forbidden in the Reich, and no Bibles are to be imported. Hitlers Mein Kampf contains the principles of the racial morals under which the German people must live. By that book all Germans must live. All future editions of that book shall contain its present number of pages and contents unmodified. This most saintly book will be placed on the altars of all churches, with a sword to its left, while all Bibles and crosses have to be removed. The orators of the Church will during the services explain the contents of Mein Kampf. There will be no remission of sins and no baptisms in the National Reich Church. Parents of new born German children will swear that they are of pure Aryan descent and that they will bring up the child in the pure German spirit for the German people. At the end of each school year, on Good Friday, a day of youth shall be celebrated in the Church. Kneeling in the Church is forbidden as undignified for a German. The oath will be rendered with the right hand touching the sword on the altar. Atop of the Churches will be found no longer the Cross, but the symbol of invincible Germany, the swastika. These are briefly the tenets of the new national church as envisaged by the leaders of National Socialism. Only the future will be able to tell whether Germany has really proven invincible and whether she will live under the sign of the swastika instead of the sign of the Cross which for 1,200 years has been the foundation of German civilization as a part of the common culture of civilized mankind.

King Lear and the Pursuit of Happyness free essay sample

True power is defined as self-awareness and self-control. Shakespeare portrays this idea through symbolic blindness and parallel structuring between characters. King Lear personifies the absence of personal power at the beginning of the play as he creates a â€Å"love contest† between his daughters, revealing his need for flattery to affirm his position. It is through his lack of self-awareness that he is vulnerable to manipulation and deception despite his initial authoritative power. The film acts as the opposite of â€Å"King Lear† as Chris seeks this true personal power, measured by happiness in one’s life rather than authority or wealth. This message can be seen through the meaningful line delivery of Chris’ speech to his son: â€Å"Don’t ever let somebody tell you, you can’t do something You got a dream? You gotta protect it. People can’t do something themselves, they want to tell you, you can’t do it. We will write a custom essay sample on King Lear and the Pursuit of Happyness or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page You want something? Go get it! Period! We now understand the concept of true power as not being an outward force measured by materialistic factors or authority but an inward strength, a might that resides within us. Through Shakespeare’s characters and Muccino’s protagonist, we see what truly defines the â€Å"mightiest of power† as happiness, self- awareness and self-control. We recognise that those who seek authoritative and superficial power will never obtain true power as they haven’t mastered themselves and their own lives. â€Å"He who controls others may be powerful, but he who has mastered himself is mightier still†.