Representations of Women
The concept of slavery in America has engendered a great deal of scholarship. During the four decades following reconstruction, despite the hopes of the liberals in the North, the position of the Negro in America declined. After President Lincoln's assassination and the resulting malaise and economic awakening of war costs, much of the political and social control in the South was returned to the white supremacists. Blacks were left at the mercy of ex-slaveholders and former Confederates, as the United States government adopted a laissez-faire policy regarding the "Negro problem" in the South. The era of Jim Crow brought to the American Negro disfranchisement, social, educational and occupational discrimination, mass mob violence, murder, and lynching. Under a sort of peonage, black people were deprived of their civil and human rights and reduced to a status of quasi-slavery or "second-class" citizenship (Foner). Strict legal segregation of public facilities in the southern states was strengthened in 1896 by the Supreme Court's decision in the Plessey vs. Ferguson case. Racists, northern and southern, proclaimed that the Negro was subhuman, barbaric, immoral, and innately inferior, physically and intellectually, to whites -- totally incapable of functioning as an equal in white civilization (Elliott).
However, it is not as typical in academic scholarship to discuss the roles of women during this pre-Civil War and Reconstruction period, at least not until the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s. In these intervening years, and between the Compromise of 1877 and the Compromise of 1895, the problem facing Negro leadership was how to obtain first-class citizenship for the Negro American. Such a simple, and one sided question caused considerable debate among Negro leaders. Some advocated physical violence to force concessions from the whites, a few urged a radical and immediate return to Africa. The majority, however, suggested that African-Americans use peaceful, democratic means to change undesirable conditions. Some black leaders emphasized becoming skilled workers, hoping that if they became indispensable to the prosperity of the South, political and social rights would be granted to them. Others advocated struggle for civil rights, specifically the right to vote, on the theory that economic and social rights would follow. Most agreed that solutions would come gradually (Litwak). Black women had an even more tragic paradigm -- they were a double minority, and often were treated poorly by both Blacks and Whites. However, the role of Black women cannot be underestimated -- particularly in both the economic nature of the slave experience and the socio-cultural experience of future generations. So much of the research shows that work was a central aspect of slave life- and male and female children had substantially different work experiences. In fact, one analysis showed that the net earnings of a slave (value of their labor less maintenance costs) indicated that females were far more productive than males, and thus had a greater influence on the tangible, and then intangible, aspects of slave culture (Steckel).
Harriett Jacobs- Jacobs (1813-97) was an American writer who escaped from slavery and became a dedicated abolitionist and reformer. She published one book, in 1861, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, under the pseudonym Linda Brent which was one of the first autobiographical works solely focusing on the struggle for freedom by women slaves and a frank account of the sexual harassment and abuse they endured under the institution of slavery. Jacobs could no longer endure the abject cruelty of her situation so, at the age of 22 she escaped and hid in a crawlspace attic for seven years prior to finally arriving in the North. However, all was not safe for her and she endured a number of tribulations until in 1853 she began to write about her life in various newspapers until she found a sympathetic audience and publisher in 1861 (Harriet Jacobs, 1813-1897).
Frederick Douglass- (1818-1895) -- Douglass was one of the most prominent early leaders of the abolitionist movement and became a well-known American social reformer, orator, writer, and statement. He was one of the greatest orators of the late 1800s, so much so in fact that many Northerners found it difficult...
Globalization and Social/Human Injustices Human slavery/sex trafficking The menace of slavery and trafficking for purpose of sexual exploitation is a menace that greatly neglected or not talked about by the high and mighty yet it is a problem that ravages families on a daily basis. Across the globe, there are people who benefit from the modern day slavery and there are countries that act as source, most of them being the underdeveloped
Nonetheless, Lu sees some hope for transgressive representations of Asian women in media, particularly in those films which actively seek to explode stereotypes regarding Asian women not simply by fulfilling the desires of a white, patriarchal society but rather by demonstrating full-fledged, unique characters whose Asian and female identity is only one constituent part of their personality and whose expression is not limited to the roles prescribed for Asian
Under these circumstances, an ethical dilemma is born. Should society control its development or leave it to chance? And in the case that it should control it, which categories should it help? If the person in the above mentioned example is helped, we could assume that in a certain way, the person who was not helped because he or she already disposed of the necessary means, the latter one might
woman's rights were little recognized. As a creative source of human life, she was confined to the home as a wife and mother. Moreover, she was considered intellectually, emotionally and spiritually inferior to man (Compton's 1995), even wicked, as in the case of mythical Pandora, who let loose plagues and misery in a box. This was the early concept of woman in the West as an adjunct to man,
149-150). References Balu, R. (Fall 1995). History comes alive: How women won the right to vote. Human Rights, 22(4). Retrieved March 23, 2005, from Academic Search Premier database. Colorado: Popularism, panic and persistence. (No date). Retrieved March 23, 2005, at http://www.autry-museum.org/explore/exhibits/suffrage/suffrage_co.html. Marilley, S.M. (1996). Woman suffrage and the origins of liberal feminism in the United States, 1820-1920. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Suffrage appeals to lawless and hysterical women. (30 May 1913). New York
The stereotype that "the exotic is the erotic" has fueled the demand for foreign women to enter prostitution, further inflating the demand for trafficked women. This has been a traditional marketing angle in the sex industry, dating back to Roman times when the hetaerae, or foreign women, commanded the highest prices for sexual services. Today, there is an even broader selection of source countries for recruitment. War or a military conflict
Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.
Get Started Now