The Charioteer Daily News

Keywords Uncle Tom, characterization, Dialect, Education, Tom, Slavery, Perspective, Uncle Tom's Cabin, Impact, Racial Issues, George, Underground Railroad, Civil War, Harriet Beecher Stowe, abolition

Summary Harriet Beecher Stowe's Cultural Lenses in Uncle Tom's Cabin

The author analyzes Harriet Beecher Stowe's use of cultural lenses in her novels, particularly Uncle Tom's Cabin and Palmetto Leaves.

Stowe's perspective as a white woman from New England influenced her portrayal of slavery and African American characters.

The author argues that Stowe's characters may be seen as romanticized or stereotyped due to her lack of real-life experiences with slaves.

Uncle Tom Characterization

Uncle Tom characterization is not beneficial for black people.

White northerners expected black people to adopt Uncle Tom's characteristics.

Uncle Tom is portrayed as religious, self-sacrificing, and willing to give up dreams of freedom for the sake of family.

Comparison of Tom and George's Actions

George escaped to Canada with his family through the underground railroad when faced with the threat of being sold.

Tom, in a similar situation, chose to be traded and sold to protect his family.

The story highlights the different choices made by the two men in the face of adversity.

Tom's Tragic Fate: A Tale of Suffering and Redemption

Tom, a Christ-like figure, bonds with another righteous character.

Sold and bought at a slave auction, Tom endures unimaginable cruelty.

Whipped to death, Tom finds freedom only in the afterlife, mirroring Jesus' crucifixion.

Discussion on Slavery

The novel presents a negative perspective of the South.

Slavery was a systematic issue, not limited to individuals.

Slaves had no freedom and their entire lives were defined by their enslavement.

Uncle Tom's Cabin: Exploring Character Traits and Dialect

Uncle Tom's character is often criticized for being too passive and lacking pride.

George and Eliza's primary focus is securing their son's future.

The unique use of dialect and accent in the novel requires some adaptation for readers.

Dialect and Education of Tom

Tom and George switch between Appalachian and Southern dialects.

Tom is well-educated and can write, manage, and organize slaves.

His language choices become easier to read when not translated.

Impact of Uncle Tom's Cabin

The success of Uncle Tom's Cabin, published in a newspaper, was remarkable in the 19th century.

It had a significant impact, particularly in the United States and Europe.

The book's influence lies in its ability to open people's eyes to racial issues, despite its potential biases and cultural lens.

The Impact of Harriet Beecher Stowe's Writing on Slavery

Harriet Beecher Stowe's writing brought attention to the horrors of slavery and the need for abolition.

Her work influenced people in the Americas, the Caribbean, Latin America, Europe, and Africa.

Stowe's writing helped to shape the abolitionist movement and spread the idea of freedom.

Critique of a Book's Perspective on Slavery

The book highlights the urgency to abolish slavery, but its perspective is flawed due to the author's privileged position as a white woman.

The author's lack of acknowledgement of her privilege affects the overall analysis of the Civil War and Reconstruction period.

The book offers a unique female perspective on a black issue, but its limitations should be considered.

Analyzing Uncle Tom's Cabin from a Modern Perspective

Uncle Tom's Cabin is significant for taking a step towards addressing racial issues, but it should not receive excessive credit.

The novel's portrayal of Tom is limited and requires critique from diverse perspectives.

It serves as a platform for marginalized voices to express their experiences and challenge societal norms.

TRANSCRIPT:

Speaker 1 (00:01) Having finished reading uncle Tom's cabin by Harriet Beatrice style, I have a lot of thoughts ranging from the effect of cultural lenses that style used to write her novels including uncle Tom's cabin as well as palmetto, leaves the use of these cultural lenses from her perspective, as. A white woman from New England. Um, having actually interacted with slaves.

Speaker 1 (00:40) But not having used any real lived stories to base her characters off of such as uncle Tom, it really leads to a sort of tinted lens ER romanticized, our stereotyped, really if you wing up these characters, some would argue that this perspective. Of it being romanticized is because it's a novel. Obviously you know, novels are supposed to be interesting and this is one so why not have interesting compelling characters that are over exaggerated?

Speaker 1 (01:27) You see those in stories all the time, however, modern perspectives will tell us that this characterization, especially of uncle Tom. Dude no favors for black folk, former slaves and freed slaves and blacks living in the North, really never really benefited from the stereotype of an uncle Tom type character, um, especially because 2 white northerners, they sort of expected black people to adopt characteristics of uncle Tom. That is you know, Christ like very.

Speaker 1 (02:18) Very religious deep in their faith. Willing to self. Be self sacrificial to put others before themselves to you know, give up dreams of freedom for the you know, character, not characterization, the sustainability or us another synonym for that concept for their family so while reading.

Speaker 1 (02:46) I noticed comparisons between. Tom and George and his wife, Eliza and their son when George was faced with the threat of being sold or traded as a sleeve in Kentucky, he and he took his wife and his son and they ran they escaped, they went to Canada through the underground railroad and we're able to make it to freedom. By the end of the story.

Speaker 1 (03:21) But when Tom was faced with the exact same situation, he didn't do that. He was faced with a situation of being traded himself or possibly multiple of his family members being treated instead, so he um very righteously and um with composure, agreed to be traded and sold um and went from. The Plantation in Kentucky to the family of Evangeline and her father, which if it had ended, there would have.

Speaker 1 (04:00) It's been a nice enough story, but it doesn't Eva is a character. Tom meets who is just as you know, Christ like and righteous sense of sacrificing as Tom they're very, very similar and they bond over this. They're very pure hearts in the story of people who are not or who are less than and Tom unfortunately, is then sold from one home to another.

Speaker 1 (04:34) He's auction at a slave auction house and bought by sign on the green, who is just a horrendous man Tom's story. Ends with him being whipped to death, which has. You know the biblical um analogy of Jesus being whipped 39 times before being hanged on the cross, Tom was whipped until he died, he was bleeding and he only ever found his freedom in death.

Speaker 1 (05:15) So there's a lot that can be taken away from this. The portrayal of the South, especially in Simon Legree's character. Was not applauded by anyone, especially if they were from the South, many southerners at the reactions too.

Speaker 1 (05:37) This novel were of course negative they didn't. They thought it was a you know, heretical perspective, that's not true, that's not what the South is like you know that's just one bad apple. That doesn't mean we're all like that, but because you know it's a system it, it doesn't just happen with 1 person like Tom had to have been a slave.

Speaker 1 (06:02) Yeah, either his whole life or he was, you know, detained for by whatever means and was that you know a slave? Until he died, and for a lot of slaves. There was no freedom.

Speaker 1 (06:20) There was no other option. You know, you were born a slave and you didn't have the means to which to escape by then you would die a slave and then your whole life would just be that. So I think the comparison between how someone within this situation may find their freedom.

Speaker 1 (06:42) It's certainly worth you know, speculating, you know, looking into contemplating, but then there's the the modern take you know, like looking back on it. Now, a lot of black people do not like uncle Palm's character, he's too passive. He doesn't really hold his own he Hey you know he's a dignified man.

Speaker 1 (07:08) He has good morals, but. There's no pride in it, whereas with George and Eliza, they have their son to look after and so they need to you know, carve out a future for him. It's also interesting.

Speaker 1 (07:33) The use of tone indicators like dialect and accent you, it took some getting used to after a while instead of trying to dissect it and. You know, try to translate it in my head while reading it cause it really is it's it's its own tongue at times there's some paragraphs I couldn't make up or down heads or tails of while reading but it's interesting. Her more eloquent and seemingly educated slave characters.

Speaker 1 (08:13) That was being Tom and George kind of sway back-and-forth between this Appalachian. Southern dialect that would have been common among you know, lower class folks and actually being like very you know. Well, worded and educated Tom is shown in the beginning to be able to write.

Speaker 1 (08:39) He can write, he can manage slaves, he can organize them and he, he has some amount of education which. Leeds one to wonder how that came to be, but her her use of language choices became a little easier to read through when instead of trying to translate them into something, you know, they're actual word instead of saying Massa to master. I just read his mass like that's, that's A.

Speaker 1 (09:12) New word you know, and it means what it means. I don't need to translate it. It's fine.

Speaker 1 (09:17) But overall, I think the success of uncle Tom's cabin, especially in the 19th century for a book published through a newspaper first is a 2 part series. It's a unbelievable success in the United States and in Europe. Especially, but what I think the greatest impact of it all ISIS.

Speaker 1 (09:48) Just opening people's eyes like it's Harry beacher style does not have a very accurate perspective, so we have to go until reading this book. As it is going to be skewed, it is going to be biased. That is the cultural lens that she has there's no getting rid of a cultural bias that you're born with, especially when it comes to race.

Speaker 1 (10:13) However, the captivating nature of how she writes her characters and how she depicts the horrors of slavery and what had to be endured by Tom before, he was finally able to feel the release of death and freedom in that um it, it really brought a lot of people to the side for UP to this from the. Undecided middle ground of just being like anti-war, but not necessarily antislavery or antislavery, but not necessarily abolitionist, to being more set in. An abolitionist mindset and not even just in the Americas, but to spread that perspective throughout the Caribbean throughout Latin America and Europe and Africa, any anywhere that there was a literate population.

Speaker 1 (11:12) This book was translated into, and it really brought the need and the urgency to. You know, abolish slavery slavery isn't right, but then we also have to think that her perspective is flawed because she's white and she is privilege. She's writing from a place of privilege that she doesn't seem to acknowledge at least not very forthrightly bye overall, I think within the.

Speaker 1 (11:45) Larger frame of. You know, the Civil War and then the reconstruction period afterward, it Stans is really a really unique SnapShot of this time, because we're looking at a feminist, not feminist but female perspective, we're looking at a white perspective on a black issue that it's it's hard to. Really?

Speaker 1 (12:14) Look at from a modern lens because of how different it is. We've come so far since the Civil War like is sure since the emancipation proclamation, slavery was abolished, but black people didn't have the same rights as white people, there was segregation constant racism even even today, like up until the 80s, 90s, not. Not long ago at all was differences and we still see them today we still see them today in academia in politics in pop culture in you know, movies and portrayals of black struggles we still see all of this so it's it's far from over, but I think that looking at this book.

Speaker 1 (13:05) And especially at the character of Tom. It. It was one baby step in the right direction.

Speaker 1 (13:15) I don't think as much credit should be granted to it as some 19th century reviewers would like to give it, but it's certainly it. It's in the right place, but it's sort of I'm hoping set the stage for you know, minorities too comment on it. And critique it and use it to have their voices.

In this article, writer Elif S. Armbruster argues that in Stowe's subsequent novel Palmetto Leaves, which she wrote after the Civil War had ended and she had moved to Florida where she saw the aftermath of the war, that Stowe's perspective on racial inequality is heavily skewed due to her cultural lenses clouding her possible motives, such as being a white woman who would benefit from the racial hierarchy still being implemented, even though slavery itself would have been abolished at this point. Armbruster states that Stowe's portrayal of the south in Palmetto Leaves "reveals the complications of being a White woman writer looking at the South from the perspective of a New Englander" and being of the majority that "saw the benefits of, and helped enable, a racially hierarchical society during the period of Reconstruction" (Armbruster, 2).

Armbruster argues that "Stowe ultimately eschews new frontiers in Palmetto Leaves and instead seems to embrace racially regressive views, which were typical of White women writers of the time" (3), views such as that Africans are the "natural laborer of the tropical regions" (2).

The writer of this article, titled "The Possible Amelioration of Slavery", begins with a sentence which I now am able to truly understand as I write these very words: "It is quite too late in the day to review Uncle Tom's Cabin; but it is not too late to speak of the subject to which it relates..." (The North American Review, 466). This writer describes the social effect that Mrs. Stowe's book produced as a result of its success, namely the influence of the opinion of people who were merely complacent to the institution of slavery. Where Stowe was able to "turn their thoughts towards [slavery] again, in the hope of finding some middle course, or of suggesting some plan which might have an effect to alleviate the evil which it seemed impossible to eradicate" (466), her words shifted the overall mindset of many a Northern moderate by illustrating the sheer horror of the South for blacks and garnering their sympathy for the cause of emancipation.

Our author then continues their opinions of the novel in question as they acknowledge the insufficient perspective of Mrs. Stowe when she wrote the book, but then corroborates her words with their own when describing her characters by saying that characters like "Eva and Tom are dreams, the one is a saint, the other an angel" and that "these characters are both exaggerated; but to color and idealize is the privilege of romance..." (467). The writer's mentioning of the inaccuracies of Stowe's characterization of her creation does not necessarily invalidate the impact that these characters have on the audience. For many, these characters' over exaggerated qualities are what make them so compelling to read, but it certainly leaves something to be desired by modern readers.

This article is interesting as it begins with Shoup regaling the never before seen success of Stowe's novel, including success overseas, saying that the "spontaneous and enthusiastic commendations given it by those beyond seas... proved that there was something in the book which raised it far above the local issue that gave it birth" (Shoup, 89). It a show of historic irony, Shoup then makes the comment that "... with the slavery issue long since dead, it has as many readers as ever" (Shoup, 89). Looking back on this acclaim through the cultural lens of a 21st century academic, it's plain to see just how short-sighted people were towards the social issues that black people faced in a post-slavery America, as the emancipation of slaves with the end of the Civil War was far from the end of their troubles. Until the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964, an entire 142 years after Uncle Tom's Cabin was published, the fight for true social and political equality among races was far from achieved, with segregation being its own war in and of itself.

Shoup then comments on the inaccuracies of Stowe's writing, describing it as "indisputably faulty, showing a lack of elegance at all points, and too surely telling of its New England origin by numerous solecism peculiar to that part of the world..." (Shoup, 90), though he then commends Stowe's rhetorical and moving writing style that he believes makes the book truly worth reading despite the lack of a presence of slavery in America. Shoup describes the method through which Stowe was able to dig deep into her heart's deepest fury and put pen to paper regarding the issues of slavery, ignoring all contest of Constitutional or territorial rights and expansion of governmental power. According to the article, Stowe would imagine herself as a slave working the cotton fields of a Southern plantation somewhere far off and then interview this hypothetical idea of herself to truly get to the root of the question, "How do you feel about all of this?" Stowe then turned her newfound anger into the character of Uncle Tom in an attempt at reaching the hearts of her fellow Northerners. Stowe was quite successful in this particular endeavor, however, one must ask one's self if this was the morally correct path for her to have taken her research upon herself. Could she not have simply talked with one of the slaves that she knew personally about her perspective on the matter? Would it have been so difficult to model her character of Uncle Tom off of the slaves she would have had the opportunity to learn about during her years in Ohio, instead of creating a whimsicality of a man through her own imagination?

In an article written for the news blog 'The Root' titled "When 'Uncle Tom' Became an Insult", Harvard graduate Adena Spingarn aruges that "the irony of Uncle Tom's change in meaning was how far whites lagged behind" (The Root), commenting on the way that northern whites were apprehensive of the character of blacks who moved into their neighborhoods comparing them to the character of Uncle Tom and criticizing them for not being the helpless martyr that he was, as well as the southern whites who denied the legitimacy of Uncle Tom's story as it depicted the south in a rather harsh light (The Root). Spingarn says that "Southern whites didn't want Uncle Tom in their towns, but neither, as it turned out, did Northern blacks" (The Root).

Further, Spingarn argues that the distaste for blacks who moved north grew from the fact that they were taking jobs intended for whites. She says that "segregation, not slavery, was the new evil now that the slavery days had passed" and that "the Uncle Tom of the slavery past had been too subservient to whites, but the rising generation of New Negroes would more aggressively assert its rights" (The Root).

It was published as a two-volume book, with pages being published in new prints.

Was the best selling novel of the 19th century, only being passed in sales by the Bible. It sold over 1.8 million copies in its first year of publication worldwide

It has been translated into more that 70 languages

However...

During my reading, one aspect of Stowe's tone of writing was how she portrayed her black slave characters, like Eliza, George, and Tom, with their choice of vocabulary compared to white characters, like Eva and her father, as well as Simon Legree. This is established right away in the story as Tom's family and other slaves on the Shelby plantation in Kentucky speak to one another using colloquial, plain language, such as when the slave Chloe responds to George Shelby saying, "'Mose done, Mas'r George,' said Aunt Chloe, lifting the lid and peeping in -- 'browning beautiful -- a real lovely brown. Ah! let me alone for dat. Missis let Sally try to make some cake, t'other day, jes to larn her, she said. 'Oh, go way, Missis,' said I; 'it really hurts my feelin's, now, to see good vittles spilt dat ar way! Cake ris all to one side - no shape at all; no more than my shoe; go way!" (Stowe, 26). The slave Chloe's dialect is shown when she abruptly cuts words off and combines words in a way that would not have been common among whites, so it makes her character as a slave very apparent from the get go. However, despite this, Stowe does not stay consistent in her usage of this type of language as an indicator for the race of the character speaking, as the reader may assume. Tremaine McDowell states that "... the foundation of the speech of all of Mrs. Stowe's characters is the dialect, not exactly of the New Englanders of fiction as is suggested by Krapp (The Enlish Language in America, I, 262), but the common body of folk-speech which underlies American dialects in all sections of the country" (McDowell, 322). This general indicator of class, rather than race only, does not make identifying characters by their speech any easier, as characters like Tom, Eliza, and George seem to sway very easily between the characteristic southern dialect that Stowe uses for other slaves as well as some choice usage of eloquent verbiage, a typical trait of Stowe's white characters. McDowell states simply that "[d]ue to this constant resemblance between the speech of her white and that of her blacks, Mrs. Stow is often unable to make adequate distinction between the two" (323).

It is also worth noting that in their article, McDowell begins a comparison of Uncle Tom's Cabin to some of Stowe's other literary works that followed its publication, such as her work Dred; A Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp(1856). McDowell says that "Mrs. Stowe makes no advance in her recording of negro dialect. Here, as in Uncle Tom's Cabin, slaves have little difficulty with gender or number of pronouns, they usually keep their tenses disentangles, and they even distinguish between shall and will... Such dialect is convincing only to the most uncritical reader" (324).

The beginning events of our story unfolds as we, the audience, witness a conversation of trade between two white men in Kentucky, the topic of which is the trading of one man's slave, Tom, to the other man, a slave trader, in order to settle his debts. He seems grieved at the loss of his man Tom, but not nearly enough to want to keep him. There is a great sense of irony in his melancholy described here, and in one line Stowe writes ,"Perhaps the mildest form of the system of slavery is to be seen in the State of Kentucky" (Stowe, 12), followed by the slave owner saying ,"You know your master never deals with those southern slave traders, and never means to sell any of his servants, as long as they behave well" (Stowe, 13). Setting up the Kentucky slave owner, Mr. Shelby, as a good and moral man among others is truly a quick way to set up the idea that no matter which slave state a slave may live in, he will never not be seen as property.

Continuing into chapters 2 and 3, we learn about another one of Mr. Shelby's slaves, a mother named Eliza and her young son, Harry. Eliza is frightened because she overheard Mr. Shelby say he may have to trade her son as another measure to settle his debts. Eliza shares her fears for her son with her husband, George Harris, with the statement that "as this young man [George] was in the eye of the law not a man, but a thing, all these superior qualifications were subject to the control of a vulgar, narrow-minded, tyrannical master" (Stowe, 16), which she fears for their son Harry as well. The truest form of irony is heard in a line spoken by George's owner when he says ,"It's a free country, sir; the man's mine, and I do what I please with him -- that's it!" (Stowe, 18). George and Eliza now have many more concerns to deal with now having the possibility of their son being sold and traded, but also with George possibly being forcibly separated from Eliza because they are not owned by the same person. George expresses his distress by saying ,"Don't you know a slave can't be married! There is no law in this country for that; I can't hold you for my wife, if he chooses to part us" (Stowe, 22). Therefore, George is set in his decision to run away and try to escape to Canada, where he will hopefully be free enough to buy back his wife and son.