Thitirat Pongprajuc (Nuch)

Professor Lori Motzkus Wilkinson

History 1700 Midterm Paper Question#5
17 November 2015
Rhetorical Persuasion in Frederick Douglass Autobiography
Narrative of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, is an autobiography written by a
former slave, Frederick Douglass. He reveals the cruelty of slavery during the time that slavery
was still legal in the southern states of America. He tells his story from the time he was born, the
difficulties he faced as a slave, and his eventual escape from slavery. At that time, most slaves
could not read and write because their slaveholders did not want the slaves to have any
education, but to obey his master (78). However, the door of literacy opened to Douglass
because he had opportunities to learn how to read and write. Seven years after his escape, he
published his narrative in 1845. He portrayed many horrors he went through as a slave. Although
a slave was not believed to be literate enough to write his own autobiography, Douglass
demonstrated his writing skill in his narrative. Douglass utilizes the rhetorical techniques of
familial persuasion to persuade his reader.
Douglass desires his reader to sympathize emotionally with slave life by using familial
language about his denied parentage. He begins with telling the story of his unhappy childhood
and then discusses his relationship to his parents. He explains that his mother had dark skin, but
his father was a mystery white man. He says, the opinion was also whispered that my master
was my father; but of the correctness of this opinion, I know nothing (48). Even if he does not
directly state that his master is his father, the reader can conclude from his explanation that he
was. The whisper that my master was my father, may or may not be true (49). He suspects his
master has the double relation of master and father (49). Moreover, the children of enslaved
women would follow the condition of their mothers by law. He seems to accept that he would

never know the truth. However, he produces the curiosity in these paragraphs to make the reader
sympathize that Douglass never had any chance to confirm who his father was.
Besides the mystery father, Douglass utilizes familial language as a rhetorical device
regarding the tragic story of himself and his mother. According to Douglass, My mother and I
were separated when I was but an infantbefore I knew her as my mother (48). The reader
comprehends that he grew up without being nurtured by his mother. The separation assures that
Douglass was too young to remember and develop familial bonds with his mother. From these
statements, Douglass persuades his reader to realize how immoral the separation of children from
their slave mothers was.
Douglass does not have only the confusion and sad memories about his parents, but also
the memories of relative inhumanely brutalized. When he was a child, he also perceived the
violence that his master, Captain Anthony, brutalized Aunt Hester. Douglass explains:
I have often been awakened at the dawn of day by the most heart-rending shrieks of an
own aunt of mine, whom he used to tie up to a joist, and whip upon her naked back till
she was literally covered with blood. I was quite a child, but I well remember it. I never
shall forget it whilst I remember any thing. It was the first of a long series of such
outrages, of which I was doomed to be a witness and a participant (51).
Douglass description of Aunt Hesters whipping shakes the reader feelings by portraying that
Douglass had to be there and watch the horrible exhibition (51). The reader is forced to
consider why a little boy have to watch his family member being whipped. It is too barbaric for a
child. He expresses his dreaded feeling in the paragraph specifically: I was doomed to be a
witness and a participant. Douglass indicates that he was overwhelmed and loathed to see his
aunt being cruelly mistreated.
Aunt Hester was not Douglass only relative horribly mistreated. He utilizes familial
language to persuade the reader is the pathetic finality of his mother and grandmothers lives. He
remarks:

I was not allowed to be present during her illness, at her death, or burial. She was gone
long before I knew any thing about it. Never having enjoyed, to any considerable extent,
her soothing presence, her tender and watchful care, I received the tidings of her death
with much the same emotions I should have probably felt at the death of a stranger (49).
Douglass words are the most heartbreaking of his tragic experience with his mother. He uses the
words soothing and tender to create tension in the readers imagination and feeling that he
had never felt or received any form of nurture from his mother except that sometimes when she
would walk at night from another plantation to sleep with him. When she was sick, his master
prevented Douglass from taking care of his mother. Douglass did not have the chance to see his
mother for the last time the day she died and was buried. Douglass brings tears to the readers
eyes by displaying the broken bonds in slave families.
Broken familial bonds are described with Douglass grandmothers death. If any one
thing in my experience, more than another, served to deepen my conviction of the infernal
character of slavery, and to fill me with unutterable loathing of slaveholders, it was their base
ingratitude to my poor old grandmother (91). From this statement, Douglass influences the
readers feelings that his poor old grandmother was neglected alone when she was useless for
her master. He continues to reveal that his grandmother had served her master for her whole life,
but she received nothing in return when she was decrepit. He remarks, they took her to the
woods, built her a little hut, put up a little mud-chimney, and then made her welcome to the
privilege of supporting herself there in perfect loneliness; thus virtually turning her out to die!
(92). Douglass convinces the reader to sympathize with his grandmother because she was put to
death when she no longer had value to the slaveholders.
At this time, this most needful time, the time for the exercise of that tenderness and
affection which children only can exercise towards a declining parentmy poor old
grandmother, the devoted mother of twelve children, is left all alone, in yonder little hut,
before a few dim embers. She standsshe sitsshe staggersshe fallsshe groans
she diesand there are none of her children or grandchildren present, to wipe from her

wrinkled brow the cold sweat of death, or to place beneath the sod her fallen remains.
Will not a righteous God visit for these things? (93).
Douglass makes the reader to commiserate on his grandmother circumstances. He neither has a
chance to take care of his mother when she was sick and died, nor his grandmother who raised
him when he was an orphan due to his separation from his mother. The life of his grandmother
also opposes the American Dream that if individuals work hard, they will be successful in the
future. In contrast, Douglass grandmother worked hard as a slave for life; she was abandoned
and eventually died alone in the woods. She never received any rewards for her dedication.
In conclusion, Frederick Douglass portrays the cruelty of slavery in three areas: he was
denied parentage, brutality on relative and gloomy death of family members. He is successful at
making people feel emotionally engaged in his narrative. Therefore, his autobiography was
valuable for the abolitionist movement in the nineteenth century and historically value to our
generation. Nowadays, familial language is used in public speaking to persuade people in order
to agree with the speakers. For instance, most of the presidential candidates would tell their
family backgrounds and explain their campaigns by frequently mentioning to posterity by using
the words our children or our descendants to influence their audience. Sometimes, the
audience might assent to the persuasion without analyzing information. Therefore, before making
any decision, individuals should carefully evaluate the information they perceive without any
interference of the rhetorical persuasion in order to get the core content from the speakers.

Works Cited
Douglas, Frederick, and Houston A. Jr. Baker. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an
American Slave. Penguin Classics ed. New York: Penguin Group, 1986. Print.