Phillis Wheatley

i feel her work shows the intellegent that Africans would have if the whites allowed them to become educated and ended slavery. she has great penmenship, and expresses her opinions openly. one poem i found interesting what To the university of Cambridge in New England. She is telling the audience how to live life. Most people become shocked at this because she was a black women; however, her higher status and christian faith allowed to to state her feelings openly. She starts off by talking in a physical sense and then leads to the spiritual. Like stated in class, Wheatley knows how to appeal to her audience and make them accept her. there were many critics i bet at the time of her writing just because she was a black women. they didnt feel she should be able to write and publish her works. I think her writing gives the white people of the time knowledge of how educated people of a difference race could become if given the chance.

Columbus

Columbus takes great interest into the living styles and location of native settlements when coming to America. i find it extremely intersting that he writes in detail days, senery, people, and traditions. one example is when they first came across the natives, they thought the white men were from heaven. they beg the white men to land on their shore because they feel blessed just by seeing them for they see them as Gods spoken people. thinking about it now, what would i have thought if coming across something so completely different then anything i have ever seen. The natives didnt know what a ship was, why they wore the clothes they did, or even their language. Columbus takes notice to this a discusses how valued the white people felt just being around the natives. However, Columbus ended leaving some of his men there when he returned to England but when he returns they are al dead. that speaks volumes about the two races living together. they over look the incident and move onto the native land and over power them. other things Columbus took notice too was the people. he states how in one tribe the married women where cotton shirts, while the others dont. Also, there are no more then fifteen houses in one area, which explains their seludedness from other tribes about them. The writings of Columbus are extremely informational about the new land he comes acrross. he clearly was well educated which allows him to make such a clear image.

Crevecoeur

Crevecoeur had many segments in his writings but one that struck me as most interesting was, A Singular Punishment. When he discusses the encounter with the African who was hanging in a tree, it brought out the most emotion for me compared to the other parts in his writings. How difficult would it have been to live in a society where people took it in their own hands to punish one another. Im not saying that the man shouldnt have killed his owner, but i bet that he didnt have a trial or case. While thinking about the story i thought to myself, if i lived in that time period and came accross the same man, what would i have done? It is true that our beliefs are completely different then back when slavery existed, but how would have incident have affected me. It just seemed like such a cruel way for another person to have to die, with the birds eating away at him.
i also feel the sotry tells about the government. the white man oviously felt that he didnt have the right or authority to truly help the African. While the scene startled him at first, he was calm and rash about it, then went into town and discussed it with his friends. Who does that, but thats all he really could do. If he would have helped and saved that mans life then the governemt would have come after him and the African and punished them both to death. To me, it feels as if a extremely controlled society where the citizens have little or no say in their own actions.