- [David] Hey, readers.
This video is about historical context.
Let's get into what that is.
Have you ever heard a joke from a friend
and you didn't find it very funny and your friend goes,
"Ah, you had to be there."?
That's historical context.
We can't be there, right?
It's over.
You can't get there from here, pilgrim.
Studying historical context
allows us to get the joke,
as it were.
It allows us to understand the environment
that a writer was operating in.
The political, social, cultural,
geographical factors that all play into how or why
someone might be writing at a particular period.
It's like asking your friend to explain the joke.
Historical context helps you better understand the text.
So, with that in mind,
I'm going to read you an excerpt from
the Autobiography of Frederick Douglass
before giving you any historical context.
"I have never approved the very public manner
in which some of our Western friends
have conducted what they call the Underground Railroad,
but which, I think,
by their open declarations has been made most emphatically
the upperground railroad.
I honor those good men and women for their noble daring.
Upon the other hand,
I see and feel assured that those open declarations
are a positive evil to the slaves remaining
who are seeking to escape.
They do nothing towards enlightening the slave,
whilst they do much towards enlightening the master.
They stimulate him to greater watchfulness
and enhance his power to capture his slave."
So, let's get into this.
If you are unfamiliar with Frederick Douglass,
it is my privilege to present him to you,
and to give you a little context on his life.
One of America's premier orators and writers
was the honorable Mr. Douglass.
The excerpt I just read came from his 1845 memoir,
"Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass,
an American Slave".
Here's some context on Frederick Douglass.
He grew up enslaved in Maryland.
In 1838, he escaped and traveled first to New York,
and then to Massachusetts, where slavery was illegal.
This helps me understand where Douglass is coming from.
He escaped slavery himself.
The network of people, free Black folks,
white abolitionists, Quakers,
and others who helped ferry enslaved people
along secret routes to freedom,
were known collectively as the Underground Railroad,
and it's important to know that Douglass did not himself
use this network to escape slavery.
with only a handful of friends,
courage and unbelievable good luck,
Douglass escaped enslavement.
So, what is he getting at in this passage?
What's he saying with all this upperground railroad stuff,
and how does the context of his life,
how does that context help us answer these questions?
Because it kind of sounds like he's saying
he doesn't like the Underground Railroad, right?
He has never approved of it,
which if we know anything about Douglass,
sounds like it doesn't make sense.
Why would a man who slavery himself
dislike the Underground Railroad?
It's not that he doesn't like the route to freedom,
how could he not?
And he says as much,
quote, "I honor those good men and women
for their noble daring",
but he doesn't like their open declarations
of what they're doing.
He wants it to remain secret.
Douglass is approaching this from a position of empathy
with those people who are still enslaved.
"The open discussion of the Underground Railroad
endangers everyone", he argues.
"Rather than enlightening the slave,
it enlightens the master", he says here.
It educates him and makes him aware.
If the enslaver is aware
that there is a network of abolitionists
ferrying people out of bondage,
that's valuable information to the enslaver.
That's information that Douglass
doesn't want that person to have.
He himself doesn't give details
about how he escaped in his autobiography.
He wouldn't come clean about how he did that
until well after the end of the Civil War,
when slavery was illegal everywhere,
and he was out of danger.
Knowing that Douglass was also wary
about giving away too many details of his own escape,
because legally, in 1845,
the family that enslaved him could have just hired somebody
to kidnap him back into slavery.
Knowing that gives us the context
to better understand his discomfort
with what he calls the upperground railroad,
the open and advertised effort to liberate enslaved people.
He wants to maximize the number of people freed,
which means keeping the Underground Railroad a secret.
So, I hope the context I provided
informed your understanding of the passage.
Remember, when reading a historical text, ask,
who was writing, what was happening while they were writing,
and why might they have said or written what they did?
Those details can help grow your understanding,
not just of historical texts, but of contemporary ones too.
Thanks for watching.
You can learn anything.
David out.