Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl

E21830

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl is an 1861 autobiographical slave narrative by Harriet Jacobs that exposes the sexual exploitation and brutal realities of slavery from a Black woman’s perspective.


Statements (47)
Predicate Object
instanceOf autobiographical slave narrative
book
memoir
addresses Northern white female readership
aimsTo mobilize abolitionist sentiment
author Harriet Jacobs
centralTheme freedom and self-determination
intersection of race and gender oppression
maternal love and sacrifice
sexual vulnerability of enslaved women
countryOfOrigin United States
editor Lydia Maria Child
featuresCharacter Aunt Martha
Dr. Flint
Mr. Sands
focusesOn family separation under slavery
psychological trauma of enslavement
sexual harassment by slaveholders
strategies of resistance by enslaved women
genre African-American literature
autobiography
slave narrative
women's literature
hasNotableEpisode seven years hiding in a garret
hasPseudonymousAuthorName Linda Brent
influenced later Black feminist thought
scholarship on slavery and gender
language English
literarySignificance major work of African-American women's literature
one of the first slave narratives written by a Black woman
mainSubject fugitive slaves
life of an enslaved Black woman
motherhood under slavery
resistance to slavery
sexual exploitation of enslaved women
slavery in the United States
movement abolitionism
narrativePerspective first-person
placeOfPublication Boston
publicationDate 1861
publisher Thayer & Eldridge
recognizedAs classic of American literature
setting Edenton, North Carolina
New York City
structure episodic narrative
timePeriod antebellum period
early 19th century

Referenced by (5)
Subject (surface form when different) Predicate
Harriet Jacobs
Harriet Jacobs
notableWork
Harriet Jacobs
describedBySource
Jacobs ("Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (author Harriet Jacobs)")
hasNotableBearer
Harriet Jacobs
subjectOf

Please wait…