Student Worksheet: Slavery in America - First-hand Accounts from Former Slaves

Real World Learning Objects: Language Arts

Print...


Name:_________________________	Date:___________________________

Slavery in America - First-hand Accounts from Former Slaves

INSTRUCTIONS
For this RWLO, you will read and listen to narratives and interviews of former slaves recorded and archived by many sources including the Federal Writers' Project (FWP) of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and the Library of Congress' American Folklife Center's Archive of Folk Culture and American Memory collection Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938. These unique documents provide an unprecedented opportunity to learn what life was really like for a slave based on differing first-hand accounts. As an optional activity, your teacher may ask that you also compare and contrast these narratives and interviews with the way slave life is described in a novel you're reading.

Slavery in America: First-hand Accounts from Former Slaves
Select and read and/or listen to a minimum of two former slave narratives/interviews from either collection below. You may find it helpful to download and print your selected narratives to highlight and take notes of certain passages.

Faces and Voices from the Presentation from the Voices from the Days of Slavery: Former Slaves Tell Their Stories collection (http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/vfshtml/vfssp.html); and
American Slave Narratives: An Online Anthology from the American Studies Hypertexts at the University of Virginia (http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper/wpa/index.html).

First Narrative/Interview
Respond to the following questions based on your review of the first narrative/interview:
Second Narrative/Interview
Respond to the following questions based on your review of the second narrative/interview:
1. Write a brief biography about the former slave you selected. Include as much information provided in the narrative such his/her name, age at time of interview, family, work and life history, etc.
2. How does he/she describe daily life as a slave?
3. How does he/she describe the working and living conditions at the time?
4. How does he/she describe freedom? For example, what did he/she do differently? what was the experience like?, etc.
5. What was the most compelling or interesting thing you discovered about the person's life? Why?
Differing Accounts
Respond to the following questions based on your review of each of the selected narratives/interviews:
1. What aspect or aspects of slavery were shared by these men and women? Cite examples.
2. What aspect or aspects of slavery were different by these men and women? Cite examples.
3. OPTIONAL: How do these narratives and interviews compare or contrast with the way slave life is described in the novel you're reading? List at least two (2) similarities and two (2) differences.
  SIMILARITIES:
  DIFFERENCES: