Fallacy

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl

by Harriet Jacobs

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl: Fallacy 2 key examples

Chapter One: Childhood
Explanation and Analysis—Person and Property:

In Chapter 1, Jacobs describes the precarious position her grandmother was in when she loaned her hard-earned money to her enslaver. Jacobs states a fallacy that lies at the heart of the legal system propping up the institution of slavery:

She had laid up three hundred dollars, which her mistress one day begged as a loan, promising to pay her soon. The reader probably knows that no promise or writing given to a slave is legally binding; for, according to Southern laws, a slave, being property, can hold no property. When my grandmother lent her hard earnings to her mistress, she trusted solely to her honor. The honor of a slaveholder to a slave!

Chapter Thirteen: The Church and Slavery
Explanation and Analysis—Dark Corners:

In Chapter 13, Jacobs remarks on the situational irony of white Americans sending Christian missionaries abroad when Americans at home are kept "in the dark" about Christianity:

They send the Bible to heathen abroad, and neglect the heathen at home. I am glad that missionaries go out to the dark corners of the earth; but I ask them not to overlook the dark corners at home. Talk to American slaveholders as you talk to savages in Africa. Tell them it is wrong to traffic in men. [...]

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