H.W - Essay Example

Sultan Alqahtani Dr. Graham AFA, 202 09.16.14 How did African Americans resist slavery? In many cases, the slaves would simply not do the work that was assigned to them. In other cases, they would actively sabotage the raw material or the machinery that was required for the work to be performed on. In a few instances, slaves rose in rebellion or simply escaped the plantation in search of a better life elsewhere. The fact of the matter was that resistance was not quite as common as many historians might otherwise note. One of the major culprits of this had to do with the fact that the slaves that worked on plantations came from a variety of different backgrounds; some originally from Africa, some born in the United States.
2) What did the Declaration of Independence mean to African Americans?
The Declaration of Independence ultimately had little direct impact on the life of the slave. Naturally, the indirect impact of this document and stance was that slaves began to question their innate rights and whether or not the process of slavery was in keeping with the tenets of the new Republic. As a further result of the fact that the African American slaves were introduced to the rights of man, the ingrained way in which almost all of the slaves had viewed their own plight began to slowly shift towards a greater understanding. Moreover, it was also understood that the philosophy of refusing injustice and fighting for one’s rights was to be an essential component of what the American point of view and approach to life would consist of. Read More