Racism and Huck Finn : Some Historical Background

1. Racism and Huck Finn: Some Historical Background

2. Real Name: Samuel Clemens • Grew up in Missouri: a slave state on the border • Spent summers on his uncle’s farm, who kept slaves • Listened to their stories and felt like they were family • At the same time, he saw slaves chained at marketplace and said they “were the saddest faces he had ever seen” • Witnessed the brutal murder of a slave by a white man for “doing something awkward.” The white man was not charged. Mark Twain

4. Slavery

5. In the early 1800s, slavery was abolished in the North • More industrialized • South: 1 in 4 Southern families still held slaves • It was a more agrarian society (South’s economy dependent on crops). This also meant more physical work to be done in the fields.

6. Declared that all runaway slaves were, upon capture, to be returned to their masters. • Police fined if they did not uphold the law/ entitled to a bonus if they did uphold the law Fugitive Slave Law of 1850

7. Network of secret hiding places and safe houses to help black slaves escape to the North • Formed before Fugitive Slave Law, but reaches its peak after it Underground Railroad

8. Semi-freedom: Northerners still not ready to treat blacks as citizens or even humans! • Segregation • Forced out of skilled professions; denied rights they had previously held (right to vote), restrict how many blacks could live in a state, violence In the North

9. He and his wife Harriet Scott were slaves • Had lived with his master Dr. John Emerson in states and territories where slavery was illegal • United States Supreme Court said that neither he nor any other person of African ancestry could claim citizenship in the United States Dred Scot Decision: 1857

10. American Civil War: 1861-1865 Civil War

11. North is angry at South for the costly war • South is angry at North for not allowing slavery • South still wants to establish dominance over the freed slaves…but how to treat them? • White southerners argued that blacks were dependent children or savage beasts and therefore needed the guidance of whites After the War

12. Blacks are kept down: • Refused the right to vote • Segregation • Forced into low-paying jobs After the War

14. It is obvious that Huckleberry Finn is concerned with race, from its very first pages. Through Huck and Jim’s relationship Twain is going to explore the nature of racism and race relations--- but more than that, just a human relationship between these two characters!

15. There is an academic debate over Huckleberry Finn: some argue that Jim is a stereotype of a Southern black in the 1880’s. • Before we can address that question, we have to think about what exactly a stereotype is!

16. With a partner (or in groups of 3), choose one of the following “types” or groups of people and list the characteristics that “define” them: Geeks Jocks Hipsters Irish