Frederick Douglass: Oratory from Slavery

by David B. Chesebrough

Overview

Frederick Douglass, once a slave, was one of the great 19th century American orators and the most important African American voice of his era. This book traces the development of his rhetorical skills, discusses the effect of his oratory on his contemporaries, and analyzes the specific oratorical techniques he employed.

The first part is a biographical sketch of Douglass's life, dealing with his years of slavery (1818-1837), his prewar years of freedom (1837-1861), the Civil War (1861-1865), and postwar years (1865-1895). Chesebrough emphasizes the centrality of oratory to Douglass's life, even during the years in slavery. The second part looks at his oratorical techniques and concludes with three speeches from different periods. Students and scholars of communications, U.S. history, slavery, the Civil War and Reconstruction, and African American studies will be interested in this book.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780313302879
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	01/26/1998
Series:	Great American Orators , #26
Pages:	200
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.62(d)

About the Author

DAVID B. CHESEBROUGH is Assistant Chair, Graduate Faculty, Department of History at Illinois State University. He is the author of three previous books: God Ordained This War: Sermons on the Sectional Crisis, 1830-1865 (1991), No Sorrow Like Our Sorrow: Northern Protestant Sermons and the Assassination of Lincoln (1994), and Clergy Dissent in the Old South, 1830-1865 (1996).

Table of Contents

Series Foreword
Introduction
The Development of an Orator
The Years of Slavery (1818-1837)
The Prewar Years of Freedom (1838-1861)
The War Years (1861-1865)
The Postwar Years (1865-1895)
Rhetorical Techniques and Speeches
Rhetorical Techniques
Speeches
Chronology of Selected Speeches
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

Chesebrough (history, Illinois State U.) sketches the important events and oratorical experiences in Douglass' life. He discusses the rhetorical techniques the great speaker employed, and particularly those techniques that relate to ethos, pathos, an d parallelism. He provides a chronology of selected speeches, and extensive passages from three speeches: "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" (1852), "Negroes and the National War Effort" (1863), and "The Lessons of the Hour" (1984). Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

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