Response to Nico Colomer's Blog

       I agree that Colomer says there’s actually no difference between the U.S. slavery and Latin American slavery. In Colomer’s blog, she argues: “When Tannenbaum says that there was a difference between the Anglos and Spanish slave system, I disagree” (Colomer Blog). On one hand she writes about how people suffer in this country, she says they think the country is hopeless. On the other hand, she quotes Tannenbum’s argument about that African American’s cognition in the text:"An American, a white man with a black face" referring to the African Americans gaining a sense of recognition for learning the ways of the Americans and with that recognition came the honor of being called an American (Tannenbaum 41). Colomer thinks it is a contradiction because the Negro had gained the recognition as their labors not as their own person. As Tannenbum says in the text: “Wherever we had slavery, we had a slave society, not merely in the blacks, but for the whites not merely for the law, but for the family, not merely for the labor but for the labor system, but for the culture—the total culture” (Tannebum 117).  If the slavery is in the total culture, I think it would be no difference between the U.S. slavery and the Latin America Slavery. Tannenbum wrote thousands of words to tell us there are some differences in between slaveries, but he toppled his own thesis at the end of the book.

The Second Week in LAGCC

Last week was the second week I study in LAGCC, we are still reading Frank Tannenbum’s “Slave and Citizen”. I am getting familiar with the college classes, although sometimes I couldn’t understand what teachers said in the class, I got many helps from my classmates and I want to thank them here. I also want to thank my teachers, they know that I have problems and to shy to tell them, so they always try to help me. I learn American culture from the book, while I also learn some American culture from my classmates and teacher.

   I was surprised that we are going to do a film project for LIB101. I learned film making before I came to New York, and I am so glad I still remember how to do it. Diane, Stefan, Joel and I is in one group, we decided to meet every Friday to do the project, and we have had the whole story so far. Next step is just making a “script table” and preparing all the things we need, like camera and costumes, pops. Actually I am not really into the film making business, but I think doing the project with my American classmates will be fun. I think we have become friends now.

  Well, get back to the text, I am still working on the “claims”, I think I am going to focus on the slaves ‘ “rights”. Since Grandpa Tannenbum’s book is about the slavery’s difference between the United States and the Brazil and Latin America, I think the rights they got in these different areas is different. Therefore, I am going to do some research on the web, and try to find more information in the text.

A moral difference of slavery in the United States

Tannenbaum's argument in Slave and Citizen is that Negro slaves' adventure in United States is different with in other parts of the hemisphere (page 42). On the one hand, he argues that the Emancipation may legally free a Negro. A Negro maybe can live like a freeman in the country. On the other hand, he argues that the shadow of slavery is still cast ahead of the white people.  The main different is that although they freed a Negro in a legal way, he still cannot live in the country like other free white people , because he didn’t accept by the society.  That’s why he wrote ,”The Emancipation may have legally freed  the Negro, but it failed morally to free the white man, and by that failure it denied to Negro the moral status requisite for the effective legal  freedom.”

     Then he argues that other part of the New World’s slavery “was developed by in a different moral and legal setting”, it helps him to explain why the slavery’s development is different in the United States. He argues that the United States slavery situation was separated in a moral way with the other parts of the New World. He gives several facts to prove it in the following text.

let's tweet!

 I have gotten a class twitter account. My class teitter is @yanpingeng101, and I have also follow some of my classmates. I was impressed that I read NAJARA's tweet.Nayara Bottaro ‏@NayaraLagccProtected account

It's so sad to here how African Americans were haggled like about like any cattle.They were treated like animals, sold, and then branded.  I agree with that. That 's sad........

The Frist week in college

      Hi, everyone. This is the first week I study in LAGCC, and I feel very happy to meet new people in the class. Since I am the only Chinese in the class,  it's a little bit lonely but  it also feels good to be different. 
      We learn race and culture this semester, and have to read several books about slavery. I think it's very impressed to learn that slaves were treat as not human at that time. I learn something about slaves trade in our history class when I was in high school. Actually, I thought people at that time they’ve known that slave trade is an evil thing, they just did this for the great profit. However, Frank Tannenbaum gives us several facts make us know something about the real slavery.
     Another interesting thing I found in the text is that the slaves built the New World. In the high school history I learn some knowledge about American’s history, it’s says that some Europeans came here to built their new home. Except the American Indian lost their land during the New World development part, we didn’t learn anything about that slaves built the New World. I thought that slaves was sold in Southern America as servants, because I read about that on “gone with the wind” when I was in middle school.
    Anyway, I think although it’s a little bit hard for me to read such many pages text in a week, but race and culture is interesting, I’ll try my best!

    The article is talking about a Negro’s double consciousness of himself: being a Negro and an American. On the one hand, the article says a Negro has a peculiar feeling that he can only see himself through the revelation of the world. I think that means a Negro maybe doesn’t know who himself is, the way he sees himself is feeling how people treat him in his daily life. He probably will be insulted or pitied by the others. It always makes him remember he’s a Negro. He is special.  In the article, the writer talks about that a Negro actually doesn’t feel bad about being a Negro.  The writer wrote that a Negro knows that his Negro blood has a message for the world. He would not bleach his Negro soul. So I think that means a Negro has strong self-consciousness. He doesn’t want to change his Negro soul.

   On the other hand, an American Negro, he lives in the country of liberty, he has his desire of being an American, which means he wants to be one of the members of the American society.  He wants to get the freedom of his soul. In the second paragraph of the article, the writer wrote:  “he simply makes wishes to make it possible of being a Negro and an American, without being cursed and spit upon by his fellows, without having the door of opportunity closed roughly in his face.”  Therefore, I think a Negro really wants to be an American but if he does, he would be boycotted by his Negro fellows, besides, he is not accepted by the American society, he can’t get opportunity fairly as the other Americanism. This two situation make a Negro feel twist, he simply want both of these things, but he couldn’t .That‘s why he has double consciousness of himself.