Summary:
Alienation, class, and hegemony are three important terms defined in Raymond Williams' "Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture of Society." These terms apply in both Frederick Douglass's Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave and Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto.
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Alienation, class, and hegemony are three important terms defined in Raymond Williams' "Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture of Society." These terms apply in both Frederick Douglass's Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave and Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto.
Alienation, as defined by Williams, has two meanings. He first describes the term as "an act of estrangement, normally in relation to a 'cutting-off' or being cut off from God, or to a breakdown of relations between a man or a group and some received political authority." The second definition Williams gives for alienation is "the act of transferring the ownership of anything to another, and especially the transfer of rights, estates, or money. Alienation is a major concept in Marx's Communist Manifesto. Marx argues that class struggle causes the formation of all historical developments. He identifies alienation as the main cause of class inequality. The two class rivals in Marx's Manifesto are the bourgeoisie, or middle class, and the proletariat, or wage-laborers. According to Marx, the proletariat was alienated.
Frederick Douglass also faces extreme alienation through the practice of slavery. During this time in American history, black slaves were considered property rather than human beings. They didn't have any of the rights or privileges of their white masters. Frederick Douglass explains that he, like most other slaves, was separated from his mother as an infant. He believes that the slaveholders do this to eliminate any affection between mother and child. Douglass barely recalls the times when he mother traveled twelve miles in the middle of the night to lay with him in bed for a very short amount of
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time before she had to travel back to her plantation before sunrise. She died when he was seven years old. After Douglass escapes to freedom, he is still alienated and persecuted by whites. Up North, Douglass
Class is another significant term, vital to understanding both Marx's Communist Manifesto and Douglass's Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Williams distinguishes between the two definitions of class. The first general meaning of the term is any grouping. The second explains class as "a would-be specific description of a social formation."
The two rival classes in Marx's Manifesto are the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. The proletariat is the working class. According to Marx, the proletarians live only if they can find work. Marx describes the proletarian as both a solider and a slave. They are exploited by their employers, their landlords, and other middle class men that control their lives. Marx claims that it is the proletariat that will rise up in revolution and destroy the bourgeoisie.
Frederick Douglass says a lot about class and class struggle throughout his narrative. The obvious division of class is between blacks and whites. Yet there is another division between light-colored blacks and dark-colored blacks. It was believed by the white masters that the very dark-skinned blacks were the most wild and barbaric, and therefore posed the most threat. Darker colored slaves usually worked out in the fields, while the lighter colored slaves worked in or around the home, doing domestic jobs. Douglass knew that his father was a white man, making him a light-skinned black. However, he explains that this was a terrible situation for a slave to be in. The
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slaveholder's wife, insulted by the existence of her husband's mulatto children, makes sure that these slaves are constantly suffering or even sold off. Douglass had started out as a well-behaved, domestic slave but as the years passed, he became more unruly and was sent to work in the fields. Douglass describes many of the horrible living conditions that he and other slaves endured. His first master was Captain Anthony, who worked under Mr. Plummer on a large plantation in Maryland. Plummer owned between three hundred and four hundred slaves. Each slave received one set of linens for the entire year, and monthly rations of corn meal and either pork or fish. Adult slaves received one blanket, but no bed to sleep in. These conditions are similar to those of animals, and prove how cruelly slaves were actually treated. Douglass vividly describes the inhumane beatings that Mr. Plummer gave to his Aunt Hestor. He hid himself in a closet so he wouldn't have to watch (Douglass 21). Eventually, Douglass comes to realize that his issues are not about race, but rather about class. He sees a few wealthy black men who are not persecuted or treated as less than a human being. In order to survive, Douglass holds on to the belief that once he escapes to the North and makes his own living, he will have achieved both freedom and class equality.
Williams considered hegemony to be a very important historical and cultural term. Hegemony plays a major role in both Marx's Manifesto and Douglass's Narrative. Hegemony is defined by Williams as a "sense of a political predominance, usually of one state over another." Marx uses hegemony to describe the political supremacy of the bourgeoisie over the proletariat.
In his narrative, Douglass clearly expresses his knowledge that he is inferior to his
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white masters. In order to achieve hegemony over these cruel men, and to ultimately reach freedom, Douglass uses passive forms of resistance. He negotiates receiving reading and writing lessons with bread as payment. With his education, Douglass feels more powerful and ready to plan his escape. He also begins to manipulate some of his masters. For instance, while working on Auld's plantation, Douglass occasionally lets Auld's horse run away. Douglass goes to fetch the horse and then enjoys a full meal at a neighboring farm. Eventually, Auld rents Douglass to a slave-owner named Edward Covey, who has a reputation for taming unruly slaves. Douglass describes his time with Covey as the worst form of slavery he has witnessed. He's exhausted from working the fields and from Covey's cruel beatings. Douglass considers both killing himself and killing Covey, but he is restricted by fear (Douglass 63). One day as Covey is approaching Douglass in the stable for a beating, Douglass fights back and grabs his master by the throat. After this incident, Covey never touches Douglass again (Douglass 69). In this moment, Douglass has achieved hegemony over a brutal slave-owner.
Alienation, class, and hegemony are three important terms defined and discussed in Raymond Williams' "Keywords." They each apply to Marx's Communist Manifesto and Douglass's Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. In the Manifesto, the proletariat and the bourgeoisie are rival classes. The proletariat is competing with and struggling for power or hegemony over the dominating middle class, or bourgeoisie. The proletariat experiences alienation, class struggle, and hegemony as does Frederick Douglass and most black slaves. The class division between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie is very similar to those of the race division between blacks
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and whites in 19th century America in the aspects of alienation, class, and hegemony.
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