1. Slavery. Back then people thought it was okay to own slaves. By this you can tell that they probably just didn't feel like doing the work. When you think about it they didn't even need slaves.
2. Life on the river - class - passage on river. The most used boat was probably the good old raft. The boats that people traveled on showed there class also. For instance, the rich and wealthy probably rode on ferry's and big boats. Where as slaves and the lower classes traveled on either rafts or canoes.
3. Class systems - eduaction - physical labor - $. The main classes were the rich and powerful, the people who where fairly wealthy, peasants or the poor, and slaves. Slaves were not allowed to be educated. Until they were free, maybe there were a couple who had been educated before. Also the slaves were doing most of the physical work. The white's did some but less then the black's did. They were treated terrible, they were whipped if they made a mistake, most of the time. Money seperated the classes big time. Servants and slaves are different in this matter, servant's were paid, but slaves, no way. Slaves didn't have any, except for every now and then. The rich people however could by anything they wanted.
Luke,
ReplyDeleteJust a couple of comments. I would like for you to stick to what you know from Huck Finn. If you have read another book about slavery or that covers this time period, and you want to cite an example from that source please let me know where your information is coming from.
Some of what you said is indeed very true, but some other things are not as clear cut and dried as you think. Did people need slaves? It is a very big question and the answer is a bit of a tangle. The economy of the US at this time and especially in the south was an agricultural one. It took a lot of manpower to keep the economy going - much of that manpower is now done by technology. This was begun even when the US was still a group of colonies and they had quotas of goods that they were required to ship back to England.
Sometimes slaves were paid and sometimes servants were not. They were often 'paid' by room and board. There were records of blacks owning slaves, and although it is not often discussed - while they did make up the majority of the slave population, blacks did not make up the entirety of the slave population.
And because there was an abolitionist movement that Huck mentioned in the book we know that not everyone thought it was ok to own slaves.
Where you are really on to something is the link between education and money and class and education. And whether we like to think of it or not, our economy sill relies on a majority of our populaiton working for much lower wages than our wealthiest citizens.
One of the things I want you to think about as you read Huck Finn is how have things changed, and how have things stayed the same?
Good thinking, hope that wasn't overwheling. I just want you to make a clear distinction between your opinions and things that you have read.
Mrs. Amber