The Purpose of Omission

Upon reading the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, and discussing it in lecture and with peers in this course, we all realized something Douglass did in his novel. He tended to “silence” people and leave out certain aspects of his experiences from his audiences. Professor Fahs and Professor MacMillan pointed out that perhaps because of this omission, Douglass was unable to exactly put into words what he truly experienced, after all, it is indeed hard to write down all of the details of traumatic experiences we encounter. Aside from all the speculations, perhaps Douglass used the method of omission to shape and focus his story on the larger goal: reveal the horrific truths of slavery and help abolish the cruelty. Douglass believed that through his credibility as a slave and experiences he surmounted, he ultimately had the opportunity to tell his tales and shock the American public with what was really going on with slavery. Once the public knew of the treatment that was projected onto slaves there would be a potential chance to halt any further practice of the cruelty. Moreover, Douglass focused his novel primarily on slavery. He could not afford to distract his audiences through personal matter or reveal any significant people who provided “illegal” assistance for both his and their safety.

Slavery was introduced to America due to the failure of the eighteenth century indentured servitude system (a labor system established amongst the British colonies in North America). Young people, mainly poor British and German people, who desired to go to the New World  had to pay through labor on land. This resulted in endless debts and a failure in the system. They went to new extents to solve their financial problems by choosing to enslave Africans and have  them do endless labor in order to bring income and ultimately pay their debts. Therefore, they “justified” the idea of enslavement and purpose of working for white supremacy. Through the easy enslavement and manipulation, slaves were perceived by whites as naïve, ignorant, and incapable of having a proper education. Furthermore, African Americans were denied education to prevent them from realizing that slavery was not a natural state of life and ultimately revolting from white supremacy. Douglass resisted and learned to the alphabet while living in the Hugh Auld's household for seven years. Mrs. Auld tutored him but soon stopped as she later became hardened and cruel. However, Douglass's education did not stop there. With his prior knowledge of the alphabet, he was determined to read and write. He accomplished literacy by giving bread to poor little boys in exchange for reading lessons. As a result, he learned to successfully write and was determined to acknowledge their help. However, he decided to exclude their names in order to prevent their punishments but still gave them credit for their useful teachings. This is why omission at the time was crucial for both Douglass and for the sake of protecting lives.



 
 
 
Additional silences Douglass made were that of his personal life and slaves whom were affiliated and a part of the Underground Railroad. Mentioning that type of information would pave a way of punishments and potential deaths for those that were involved. As far as his personal life, he mentioned that he had a wife but left out their relationship and marital process. Perhaps including personal experience and love affairs would distract readers and stride his audience away from the harsher reality at that time. After all, Douglass's main objective was to tell primarily the details of slavery rather than entertain his readers on his marriage. Ultimately, the silences and omissions helped to shape the genre of the book as strictly a narrative on the horrors of enslavement.


After reading his narrative, I was left with several curiosities and questions that begged to be answered. Some of them are: How was your relationship with your wife? Are there any other experiences that you chose to leave out and why? Do you feel accomplished?




Source Image(s)
http://loc.gov/exhibits/books-that-shaped-america/1800-1850/Assets/ba0017_enlarge.jpg

http://www.mrdowling.com/images/710slaves2.png

 http://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/trevinwax/files/2014/11/Marriage.jpg