Society has evolved in so many ways after American slavery. Although isolated cases of racism still prevail in some places, African Americans are now enjoying the same rights and privileges that everyone else from different races have. African Americans, even women, now hold important positions in companies and government organizations. But perhaps the ultimate proof of recognition and acceptance that they were once completely stripped of is having an African American as President of the strongest nation in the world. However, despite the liberty and the success they were able to achieve in the society, female African Americans still bear the scars of slavery.
In the autobiography Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Harriet Jacobs tells of the horrors that she had to put up with as a slave. Both men and women slaves were made to suffer extreme physical pain from their slaveholders, at times leading to deaths that were merely shrugged off by the masters. For women slaves, however, their trauma did not stop on the occasional beatings. They lived in constant fear of a threat unique to their sex, the danger of being sexually abused by their master. Harriet Jacobs specifically related this in her autobiography, stating that “Slavery is terrible for men, but it is far more terrible for women” (66).
History validates that the trade of slaves between Africa and Europe started in the middle of the 1t5th century. In what was called the “Outward Passage”, African slaves were transported from Europe to the African West and Johnson coast, then to America (PORTCITIES Bristol). For female slaves, their initiation to this life of bondage started with rape. As soon as they arrived in Virginia after the infamous “Middle Passage” that usually killed about 10-20% of the slaves on board, female slaves were stripped naked and put on display on auction blocks for the inspection of their prospective slave owners. Buyers scrutinize their bodies to ensure that they will be able to withstand the hard labor and beatings that they will be subjected to.
Slaves were bereaved of any rights and in order to drive this point, slave owners subscribe to occasionally punishing their slaves. This was a means for the owners to assert authority over their slaves, assuring that they will be obeyed at all times. Male slave owners also claimed complete influence on the female slaves, forcing them to submit to their master’s sexual advances or prohibit sex should they master wish to. In some instances, female slaves were loaned or gifted to their master’s male relatives and/or friends. Hine in his study states that historians believe that at least 58% of enslaved women aged 15-30 were raped by their owners or overseers (qtd. in West and Johnson). Even being married did not save them from this nightmare as marriages between slaves were not recognized. This was one of the reasons why male slaves preferred marrying women from other farms. As was related in his narrative by the American slave Bibb in reference to his wife Melinda, “ to live where I must be eye witness to her insults, scourings and abuses, such as are common to be inflicted upon slaves, was more than I could bear”(“The Narrative of the Life and Adventure” 42). Mistresses of the house were sometimes besieged with jealousies over these licentious relationships between the husbands and the female slaves which drove them to severely punish the slaves even when heavy with child.
Jacobs’ autobiography presented that female slaves also suffered by being emotionally
and verbally wronged. She described the incident when Dr. Flint, her master who was fiercely possessive of her, had her emotionally and verbally wronged. Jacobs, who used the pseudonym LindaBrent in the autobiography in order to protect her identity, got pregnant for the second time. Upon knowing, Dr. Flint flew on a rage and sheared her glorious hair that she always took pride on (Jacobs 77). It was cut so close to her head, a vindictive act for not submitting to his sexual whims willingly like she did to their neighbor, Mr. Sanders.
When importation of slaves was outlawed in 1807, female slaves were sexually exploited in order to produce a “perpetual labor force” (West and Johnson) in a practice termed “slave breeding” (West and Johnson). Male slave owners chose healthy female slaves to copulate with in order to increase the probability of having healthy children who could withstand hard labor. This redefined the lives of the female slaves, from being workers and sex providers to producers of the future labor force. An article by Simkin indicates that female slaves were promised their freedom after they bore 15 children.
Children born to a slave mother were still slaves regardless if they were fathered by Whites. However, mother slaves did not have the option of keeping their children as slave masters held the rights to sell them. This separation of mother from her children had resulted to psychological trauma that slave mothers endured until they got the chance to find them, should they be lucky enough (jmu.edu . 1). When children were not sold, mother slaves suffered the more tormenting experience of seeing their daughters suffer the same fate they had, that of being tortured and raped.
The declaration of the Emancipation was supposed to liberate female slaves from the atrocious treatment that they were given. However, this executive order failed to protect them from the sexual assaults enforced on them by another group of perpetrators, the Ku Klux Klan. Slaves were attacked, their properties tore down, and women were gang raped. It seemed that there was no end to the nightmares that overwhelmed these women.
Black women have gone through a lot over the course of American slavery. These experiences that occurred in the lives of female slaves could only be described as callous and appalling. To assume that the survivors, and even their descendants, have completely gotten past the pain and the trauma would be tricky. In fact, in a paper by West and Johnson, they related that the trauma female slaves endured were “intergenerational and continues to live in the collective memories of contemporary African American women”. The fear of rape as a consequence of their race is specifically dreaded by these women. This is corroborated by a study done by Wyatt describing rape as “something that could happen to a Black woman just because she is Black and female” (qtd. in West and Johnson).
The National Violence Against Women Survey reported an 18.8% of Black women who were raped in their lifetime. Although most of these cases were Black-on-Black assaults, Black women were still the victims. Husbands, acquaintances, strangers, and employers were identified as the perpetrators, while the victims were generally impoverished Black women. An alarming 42% of Black women living in low-income housing development were sexually assaulted, citing that they were forced under threat of physical force. A study by Honeycutt, Marshall, and Weston also concluded that 67% of low-income and welfare dependent Black women already experience sexual assault in the past (qtd. in West and Johnson). Women who were sexually abused when they were children or teenagers showed high probability of being sexually assaulted in their adult years. These assaults were also attributed to the perpetrators’ use of physical force. It can only be concluded that Black women who were victims of sexual assault recognized and accepted their weakness against the threat of stronger force as the primary reason behind their attacks.
African American women to this day continue to carry the Jezebel stereotype, the connotation that Black women are naturally promiscuous or hypersexual. This is the same rationale used by the criminal legal system during slavery which influenced its decision to exclude hearing cases of rape between Black men and women. With this stereotype casted among Black women, they become targets of sexual abuse. As a result, people blamed them instead of getting sympathy and support. This leads to Black women having low self-esteem, a trait that bears debilitating ramifications to their lives.
Because people already have them judged as promiscuous, some Black women resort to precarious sexual practices that include prostitution. This puts them on the perils of acquiring sexually transmitted diseases. There were also records of some Black women who avoided relationships with men, be it sexual or otherwise, and these are still attributed to their low self-esteem. Men took advantage of this weakness and used them to exploit Black women.
Just years after slavery ended, matriarchal family pervaded. This was characterized by having the mother take sole responsibility in raising the family. Black men started leaving their families in order to get employment in the cities. With the hardships brought about by being a single parent, children of African ancestry had limited opportunities in life. Stereotypes perpetuated by the Whites everywhere in America further crippled the chances of African American women of finding better jobs and be able to elevate the lives of their families. This created a cycle which put African American women to the state of poverty, a situation that exposes them to the perils of getting sexually assaulted.
Slavery has traumatized African American women, and this mark is carried by these women from generation to generation. It is a matter of great consequence to understand and realize these lasting effects of slavery among African American women to determine the best course of action that should be taken in order to grant them complete liberty.
Works Cited
Primary Sources:
Jacobs, Harriet. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. Clayton: Prestwick House, 2006. Print.
“The Narrative of the Life and Adventure of Henry Bibb , An American Slave 1849.” Slavery
and the Making of America. Educational Broadcasting Corporation. 2004. Web.
Secondary Sources:
jimu.edu. “The Effects of Slavery on the Psyche of Motherhood”. Web.
PORTCITIESBristol. “The Middle Passage.” Web.
Simkin, John. “Slave Marriages”. Spartacus Educational. Web.
West, Caroline M. and Jaqueline Johnson. “Sexual Violence in the Lives of African American
Women: Risk, Response, and Resilience”. VAWnet.org. 2010. Web.
