Background for understanding: (The idea of “The cult of True Womanhood,” or “the cult of domesticity,” sought to assert that womanly virtue resided in piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity- The attributes of True Womanhood, by which a woman judged herself and was judged by her husband, her neighbors, and her society could be divided into four cardinal virtues - piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity... Without them.... all was ashes. With them she was promised happiness and power.).
True Women were to hold the four cardinal virtues:
1. Piety - believed to be more religious and spiritual than men
2. Purity - pure in heart, mind, and body
3. Submission - held in "perpetual childhood" where men dictated all actions and decisions
4. Domesticity - a division between work and home, encouraged by the Industrial Revolution; men went out in the world to earn a living, home became the woman's domain where a wife created a "haven in a heartless world" for her husband and children.[1]
Aim: How is Linda Brent portrayed as an unconventional heroine who portrayal as slave challenges the cult of true womanhood while struggling to reclaim her status as a woman, and reconstructing the ideals of women in nineteenth century America?
Do Now: Write a sentence in your notebook starting with I believe that of the four virtues ________ still holds true in today’s society because….
I believe that of the four virtues, purity still holds true in today's society because girls/women in general who are still virgins till the end are labeled as pure. I think that girls now are still a little bit looked down upon if one has sexual intercourse before marriage or at a young age (foolishly). A guy/men might have a lifetime of girlfriends in his life, is acceptable. But for the girl/women if she has more than a limited amount of boyfriends you are looked down upon.
Comprehension Check:
“Sketches of Neighboring Slaveholders”
What dehumanization/degradation do we see in Mr. Conant, Mrs. Wade’s?
Mrs. Wade had a special place, the barn to whip and dicipline her slaves when they are bad. Mr. Conant just hangs his slaves by the waste up in a tree infront of the house. Half naked with no clothes and no food or water for a certain amount of time.
What happened to James the slave? (48-49)
He was put into the cotton gin, being starved and dehydrated. One particular slave brung him bread and water. Then for a few days the water was always left untouched--she reported it to her master and found out that he was dead. The rats were eating the food and his body.
According to Linda Brent, what value do women hold? (49)
They hold no value unless its to increase their owners stock. To bread slaves to the owner; to reproduce.
What happened to the “kind mistress/orphan woman” who took inherited a woman and her six children? (50-51)
She had remarried to another white man and he would claimed the slaves as his property. He would take advantage of the female slaves, and so would his brother. He would sell off the offsprings (mulatto) and the mothers away so he wouldn't see them.
Explain:
“The poor worm shall prove her contest vain. Life’s little day shall pass, and she is gone! (52)
Resistance is futile. Slave masters will always have their way and their virtue will be taken away. There is no point in resisting.
Explain: According to Linda Brent, “slavery is a curse to the whites as well as to the blacks.” (53)
Slavery is a curse to the whites as well as the blacks. The blacks get the physical abuse and the scars. While the whites are also blackening their minds with this kind of power, this type of control over another human being.
“A Perilous Passage in the Slave Girl’s Life”
Comprehension Check:
What was Dr. Flint’s new plan for Brent? (53)
Dr. Flint's new plan for Linda is to build a house just for her a few miles away from the mother house.
How old is Linda in this chapter? (55)
She is 15 years old in this chapter.
Literary Analysis:
Characterize Mr. Sands
Hes honorable, generous, kind, educated, eliquite, white, unmarried.
Interpretive:
What did Linda Brent do “with deliberate calculation?” (54-55)
She lost her virtue.
Identify Brent’s use of rhetoric in “Perilous Passage” (54, 56)
In her rhetoric, Brent addresses her readers as “O virtuous reader…” why? (56)
Where do we see hypocrisy of the church? (50)
The church lectures on about how slaves should obey their masters, that is who they are, what they were born to do, and if not--they were sent to hell.
According to Brent, “I feel that the slave woman ought not to be judged by the same standard as others”- Why? (56)
I think Linda meant that because woman slaves have a harder life than men do. The woman slaves have to put up with abuse, sexual abuse most of all. Having to give birth to their children of whom they did not love, and also could not speak who the father was. Slave woman were very restricted about/in a lot of things, that cannot be judged the same as others.
Why did Aunt Marty/Linda’s grandmother ostracize Linda and tell her that she would “rather see you dead than to see you as you now are [pregnant]. You are a disgrace to your mother”? (57)
Because Linda became someone that she and her mother never thought she would turn out to be. Giving in, and doing things the easy way, sleeping with a man that she did not love but just used to try and give her some hope of escape. Her aunt and mother would've wanted to see her fight till the end, even if it meant her death, that was better than Linda being the way she is now.
Critical Thinking: Using the four cardinal virtues
Which of the four cardinal virtues do you think is the most important and why?
What does Linda do that challenges the “cult of true womanhood?”
According to the cardinal virtues that makes the nineteenth century woman a “true woman” is Linda a true woman? Why or Why not?
No, if i were to follow the cardinal virtues that makes her a "true woman" I cannot say she is a "true woman". Linda was not domesticated, she did not believe in religion more than a man would've. She also did not remain virtuous.
Cooperative Learning: Form your Groups and write in your notebooks the following as a header:
Slavery was terrible for both men and women, but one can say that it was far more terrible for women.
Then say if you agree or disagree with this quote and why.
Finally, cite your sources using citations from the text and page numbers.
We agree with this statement because in the book she has given many situations about slave women suffering. On page 84, "the child shall follow the condition of the mother," saying how the mother has to hold grief for bringing in a child and yet the child has to bear the life the mother went through.
Homework:
Answer the following question in a paragraph:
How does she struggle to reclaim her status as a woman and reconstruct the ideals of women in the nineteenth century?
Read chapters: XII, XIII, XIV, and XV. Your first test will be held on: October 27th. Based on chapters 6-15.
Vocabulary Words to know:
IX:
Depredations (46) - the act of preying upon or plundering; robbery; ravage
Inducement (46) - to lead or move by persuasion or influence, as to some action or state of mind
Interred (47) - to place (a dead body) in a grave or tomb; bury
Divested(47) - To deprive, as of rights or property; dispossess
Cessation (47) - a temporary or complete stopping; discontinuance
Manumit (50) - to release from slavery or servitude
Inculcated (51) - to implant by repeated statement or admonition; teach persistently and earnestly
Licentiousness (51) - sexually unrestrained; lascivious; libertine; lewd
X:
Abyss (54) - a deep, immeasurable space, gulf, or cavity; vast chasm
Eloquent (55) - having or exercising the power of fluent, forceful, and appropriate speech
Sophistry (55) - a subtle, tricky, superficially plausible, but generally fallacious method of reasoning
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