During the course of African American history, students will be exposed to the context and particulars surrounding slavery, however to expose students to the actual experiences of slavery this assignment allows students to dive into one slave narrative to gain a deeper understanding of the impact of slavery and how these experiences have shaped America.

As historical documents, slave narratives chronicle the evolution of white supremacy in the South from eighteenth-century slavery through early twentieth-century segregation and disfranchisement. As autobiographies these narratives give voice to generations of black people who, despite being written off by white southern literature, still found a way to bequeath a literary legacy of enormous collective significance to the South and the United States. Expected to concentrate primarily on eye-witness accounts of slavery, many slave narrators become eye-witnesses as well, revealing their struggles, sorrows, aspirations, and triumphs in compellingly personal story-telling.

The Slave Experience Paper should answer the following questions/prompts:

How does the former slave describe life before emancipation? What did individual slaves do before the Civil War and afterward? How does the former slave describe the role of their slaveowner?
Did emancipation change his life? If so, how?
How does this narrative support or contradict themes addressed by Blassingame? Be sure to compare the role of Mr. Washington’s family, the role of the slaveowner, and the general childhood experience of Mr. Washington.
Describe the role of education in Mr. Washington’s childhood and early life?
What question does this narrative raise?