Degree Name
Master of Arts
Graduate Program
English
Advisor
Boulukos, George E.
Abstract
Slave narratives, involving enslaved persons, tell the personal accounts of the lives and struggles faced by Africans during the slave trade. From the eighteenth to the nineteenth century, the abolitionist movement evolved, resulting in anti-slavery campaigns across the United States and Europe. In this paper, I will analyze two renowned slave narratives, first Olaudah Equiano’s The Interesting Narrative and secondly, Frederick Douglass’s Narrative of the Life. I argue that in Equiano’s discourses he appeals to authority figures to advocate against slavery, however Douglass distrusts authority figures and determines that slaveowners are complicit in maintaining systems of oppression. This article addresses the economic, literary/social, and religious discourses that emerge in both slave narratives to understand the voices against the slave trade, especially pro-slavery rhetoric.