Uncle Tom's Cabin- Personal Synthesis

                Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe, is a common title that is well known around America.  When I think of the story of Uncle Tom’s Cabin I think about the life struggles of an African American. How back before the Civil War, these human beings were treated as someone’s property just because the color of their skin was different.  As a person of color, they had no rights. They weren't allowed to have money, they weren't allowed to be educated, and they didn't have the right to express their religion or even have a religion. They were to work for free and do whatever was asked of them. They would get beaten for any reason, even the reason doing nothing wrong. We as readers are put into shock, when we realize how terribly people of color were treated back then, but to be honest we will never know. We hear the stories and see the examples through Uncle Tom’s Cabin, but we can never feel or come close to know the agony of discrimination and violence colored people faced.

                All this background knowledge of a story about how humans of color just wanted freedom, brings up the question to me is anyone really free? Yes, people of color got their emancipation, but honestly are they truly free?

                At the start of this spring semester, in my class we talked about the term: a single story.  The best way for me to describe a single story is as a stereotype. American’s single story is that we are all stuck up, power seeking, obese people. We think we are the dominate race.  For people of color back in the time before the civil war, even after the civil war, when they were “free,” they had a single story, of being uneducated, good for nothing, waste of space and life, and not deserving of any form of rights. To this day there are people who still believe in that single story. It is a sad fact, but it is indeed a fact.

                Harriet Beecher Stowe, in my opinion was writing what she witnessed, in her time period. Even though she was brought up not to believe in that single story, it still surrounded her world. Slavery was everywhere, the violence and wrongful acts were happening in the streets. It is still happening to this day. It certainly isn't as public or as bad as it was in the days before the civil war, but it still occurs.