chattel

This term is used by Jacobs in "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" and carries with it an assortment of implications. In the first instance the term was used to refer to cattle however very soon it began to used increasingly for slaves. In the first instance the implication was to suggest that slaves were to be treated as "property" without any rights whatsoever ( as Dr. Flint so eloquently points in reference to the $300 which Linda's grandmother lent her mistress).

Secondly and perhaps more importantly it also attributed to slaves the same status as that of cattle i.e devoid of any feeling. Thus slaves could be tretaed with extreme cruelty, forced into submission and generally be thought of as objects because they were no more than the cattle that their masters owned.

This is in turn also leads to another consequence which is the hindering of intellectual development as a result of this treatment. Denied the right to education, slaves were forced to continue in a vicious cycle where they were separated from their children, had no power in any sphere and looked forward to each new day with dread for like cattle - it may very well be their last.


- Dione Joseph