Rhetorical Analysis of Frederick Douglasss How I Learned...

Rhetorical Analysis of Douglass In the excerpt â€Å"Learning to Read and Write†, Frederick Douglass talks about his experiences in slavery living in his masters house and his struggle to learn how to read and write. Frederick Douglass was an African American social reformer, orator, writer, and statesman. Some of his other writings include â€Å"The Heroic Slave†, â€Å"My Bondage and My Freedom†, and â€Å"Life and Times of Frederick Douglass†. In this excerpt, Frederick Douglass uses an empathic tone, imagery, certain verb choice, contrast, and metaphors to inform African Americans of how important it is to learn to read and write and also to inform a white American audience of the evils of slavery. I find Frederick Douglass to†¦show more content†¦As far as the white audience goes, he likely chose this audience to make slave owners and non-slave owners look at slavery a different way. The way he portrays slavery in my eyes is almost as a force that turned this woman (his mistress) into something that she is not. It makes slavery look like a disease spread on white Americans that makes them horrible people. Another audience that might be included are poor white children and/or teenagers. Throughout the excerpt, Douglass explains how he would use the poor white children as instructors to teach him how to read and write in exchange for food. In the excerpt he writes â€Å"Have not I as good a right to be free as you have? These words used to trouble them; they would express for me the liveliest sympathy†¦Ã¢â‚¬  He could have chosen this audience because he knows that the children hold the future. This would be his way of convincing the younger kids to look down upon slavery. That could change the lives of African Americans forever. There could be a number of different audiences that Frederick Douglass was referring to, but the least likely would be extremely racist slave owners. Racist slave owners probably wouldn’t even pick up some thing an African American wrote, let alone care what he had to say. The Logos in this excerpt has a structure of Frederick Douglass’s events going in chronological order. He opens thisShow MoreRelatedSlaves Narratives: Frederick Douglass, Olaudah Equiano Essay1477 Words   |  6 PagesSojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, and Olaudah Equiano all have extremely interesting slave narratives. During their lives, they faced plenty of racist discrimination and troubling moments. They were all forced into slavery at an awfully young age and they all had to fight for their freedom. In 1797, Truth was born into slavery in New York with the name of Isabella Van Wagener. She was a slave for most of her life and eventually got emancipated. Truth was an immense women’s suffrage activist. She