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| Enslaved African Americans and Expressions of Freedom |
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Procedures/Pivotal Questions
(1) Either prior to the lesson or in a computer lab, students
should be directed to the website: http://www.history.org/Experience/african03_calendar.cfm
to view the painting, The Old Plantation. The students
should be told that the painting is possibly from South
Carolina between 1790 and 1800, and the artist in unidentified.
The following questions may serve as a guide to an analysis
of the painting:
- What seems to be happening in the painting?
- Is this a religious ceremony? A wedding celebration?
How do you know?
- Some say that the musician at the right is playing
a Yoruba gudugudu, a hollow piece of wood over which
an animal skin is stretched to form a drumhead, which
is then tapped by lightly twisted strips of leather.
The stringed instrument may be a Yoruba molo, a precursor
to the banjo. What does this indicate about custom
and tradition?
- What information does the clothing give you?
- The teacher should define the terms "explicit
meaning" and "implicit meaning." Then
the students can be asked: Which of the conclusions
that you drew are explicit? Which tell us about the
implicit meaning of the painting?
- How does this painting illustrate the ability of
enslaved people to maintain their cultural traditions?
- How would the painting support the view that freedom
was important to enslaved people?
(2) The students receive an Analysis Chart for Slave Spirituals
based on John Lovell's book, Black Song, the Forge
and the Flame (New York: Macmillan, 1972). Students
are divided into groups and each group is given one of
the spirituals to analyze based on the categories of the
worksheet. A concluding discussion should focus on:
- What are the explicit and implicit meaning of the songs?
- How do the songs express community? Individuality?
- Are the songs a means of survival? Why? How?
- Do the spirituals indicate a revolutionary spirit? Why or Why not?
- How is the desire for freedom reflected in each of the spirituals?
(3) An excerpt from Frederick Douglass's Narrative (on the Covey battle)
is distributed to the class. For a more comprehensive
selection on the fight with Covey, teachers might visit:
www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/black_voices/voices_display.cfm?id=69
Ask the students the following questions:
- Why does Frederick Douglass challenge Covey?
- How did the fight change their relationship?
- Why did Douglass refer to this incident as "a turning
point in my life?"
- Why would slaveholders have suppressed this book?
- Is there a connection between Douglass's Narrative
and the slave spirituals? Why or why not? Explain.
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