Religious Identity in Chapter Ten of Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass American Slave.

Abstract

This paper deals with a discursive alaysis of a prominent Black American slave narrative, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave. The analysis will be focused on the narrators identification of his struggle towards liberty with Christ's myth. This identification is clearly shown in chapter ten of the narrative. Like other slave narratives, Narrative of the Life of Frederic Douglass present the slavery affected through the slaveholders religious doctrine. He is conscious that soul killing through an over-awareness of sin could effectively prevent resistance. It is extremely important, therefore, that the ex-slave, who wrote the narrative of her/his life, gives a strong emphasis on the crucial quest of what Douglass said as 'the proper Christianty. He underlined the 'pure, peaceable, an impartial Christianity of Christ' as more preferable than the corrupt and hypocritical Christianity of the slave-holder. (keywords: narrative identity, liberation, national identity, slave narrative)