UNIT 3 · HARRIET JACOBS · ALL SECTIONS
Seminar 3 reading guide
Friday, November 20, 2026
Chapters XXII–XXXI · “Christmas Festivities” through “Incidents in Philadelphia”
Assignment schedule · Complete primary text · Read inside this site · Essay requirements
DUE TODAY: Finish the assigned selection before your section meets. Bring your required print Dover copy and located passages. Emergency online access does not count as being prepared for class. Begin with a five-minute, five-question paper reading quiz (5 points), distributed in class and answered briefly from memory, then use your book for discussion. This guide prepares you for discussion; it is not an additional packet of written homework.
Central question: How did information, family networks, and secrecy create a path toward escape, and what costs did that path carry?
Prepare while you read
- Track the people below and distinguish the narrator’s account from another person’s claim.
- Mark three passages: one purposeful action; one constraint, cost, or failed attempt; and one justification for enslaving power that Jacobs challenged.
- For each passage, note the chapter, the exact page in your print Dover copy, and a brief annotation in your book or notebook.
- Choose two discussion questions from this guide and prepare an initial thought. You do not have to write answers to every question.
Agency: purposeful action within conditions a person did not necessarily choose or control. Autonomy: room to direct some part of one’s life. Legal freedom: a recognized legal status. These concepts overlap, but they are not interchangeable.
Character and voice guide
| Name in this reading | Role and issue to track | Chapters |
|---|---|---|
| Linda Brent / Harriet Jacobs | Narrator, mother, worker, freedom seeker, and author. Distinguish the conditions she experienced from the later act of telling her story. | XXII–XXXI |
| Benny / Benjamin and Ellen | Linda’s son and daughter. Benny is not the uncle Benjamin from IV. Follow the children’s locations and the family’s incomplete reunification. | XXVII |
| William | Linda’s brother. His own efforts to obtain independence offer a parallel rather than an identical path. | XXVI |
| Grandmother, Uncle Phillip, and Peter | A network of family and trusted helpers. Peter helped arrange correspondence; Phillip assisted concealment; Grandmother sustained family connections. Identify the contribution in each passage. | XXV; XXIX–XXX |
| Aunt Nancy | Her life and death exposed how service to an enslaving household consumed time, health, and family possibilities. | XXVIII |
| Mr. Sands | Track decisions about Ellen and distinguish a promise of protection from secure legal rights. | XXIV; XXVII |
| Dr. Flint | His attempts to regain control continued across distance; later inheritance carried the claim beyond his own life. | XXIV–XXV |
Names: Jacobs used pseudonyms in the narrative. Use the book’s names consistently and identify Linda Brent as Jacobs when helpful. This guide does not invent real-name identifications or assume that every person called “Aunt” or “Uncle” was a biological relative.
Historical context and reading cautions
Authorship and information as power
In XXV, Linda used a newspaper, letters, and a reliable messenger to manipulate what Dr. Flint believed. Compare this with VIII’s information control and with Northup’s attempts to find trustworthy communication. Primary-text starting point: XXV
Collective escape
The correspondence and journey required trusted people, planning, secrecy, and opportunities Linda could not create alone. Describe each helper’s contribution and risks. Primary-text starting point: XXV; XXIX–XXX
Labor and family costs
Aunt Nancy’s service and funeral reveal the distance between public displays of affection and the effects of exploitation. Ask whose account of the household Jacobs challenged. Primary-text starting point: XXVIII
Arrival was not complete freedom
In Philadelphia, assistance and mobility offered new possibilities. Evaluate what had changed by XXXI without assuming that arrival itself extinguished ownership claims or reunited the whole family. Primary-text starting point: XXXI
How did white authorities justify enslaving power?
The statements below identify claims to investigate, not claims this course endorses. Distinguish enslavers (people asserting ownership), overseers (people supervising and enforcing labor), clergy, political authorities, and other allies of slavery. Dr. Flint’s role should not be reduced to “overseer.” A claim about one actor is not automatically a claim about all white people.
| Claim or assumption to test | Evidence to examine | Analytical question |
|---|---|---|
| A contented servant demonstrated the kindness of slavery. | XXVIII: compare the account of Aunt Nancy’s labor with the appearance of affection at her funeral. | How could a public display of care conceal exploitation and losses the observer did not witness? |
| Control over information protected enslavers’ authority. | XXV: trace the letters, their route, and Flint’s mistaken belief. | How did Linda use knowledge to challenge an enslaver’s control? |
| Promises could substitute for secure rights. | XXVII: examine the account of Ellen’s removal and Linda’s expectations. | Who could decide where a child went, and what could a mother control? |
Useful distinctions: A justification is an argument that presents domination as legitimate. A method of control is an action—such as a threat, a search, withholding information, or punishment. Explain how a justification made a method seem acceptable to the person using it, then examine how Jacobs challenged that reasoning.
Ready-to-read seminar passages
Start discussion with these supplied selections. No passage search is needed in class. You may annotate these ahead of time and add another passage from your reading. Full-source links are optional for context; bring your print Dover book and complete the entire assigned reading.
Jacobs: redirecting the search
Dr. Flint had not given me up. Every now and then he would say to my grandmother that I would yet come back, and voluntarily surrender myself; and that when I did, I could be purchased by my relatives, or any one who wished to buy me. I knew his cunning nature too well not to perceive that this was a trap laid for me; and so all my friends understood it. I resolved to match my cunning against his cunning. In order to make him believe that I was in New York, I resolved to write him a letter dated from that place. I sent for my friend Peter, and asked him if he knew any trustworthy seafaring person, who would carry such a letter to New York, and put it in the post office there. He said he knew one that he would trust with his own life to the ends of the world. I reminded him that it was a hazardous thing for him to undertake. He said he knew it, but he was willing to do any thing to help me. I expressed a wish for a New York paper, to ascertain the names of some of the streets. He run his hand into his pocket, and said, “Here is half a one, that was round a cap I bought of a pedler yesterday.” I told him the letter would be ready the next evening. He bade me good by, adding, “Keep up your spirits, Linda; brighter days will come by and by.”
My uncle Phillip kept watch over the gate until our brief interview was over. Early the next morning, I seated myself near the little aperture to examine the newspaper. It was a piece of the New York Herald; and, for once, the paper that systematically abuses the colored people, was made to render them a service. Having obtained what information I wanted concerning streets and numbers, I wrote two letters, one to my grandmother, the other to Dr. Flint. I reminded him how he, a gray-headed man, had treated a helpless child, who had been placed in his power, and what years of misery he had brought upon her. To my grandmother, I expressed a wish to have my children sent to me at the north, where I could teach them to respect themselves, and set them a virtuous example; which a slave mother was not allowed to do at the south. I asked her to direct her answer to a certain street in Boston, as I did not live in New York, though I went there sometimes. I dated these letters ahead, to allow for the time it would take to carry them, and sent a memorandum of the date to the messenger. When my friend came for the letters, I said, “God bless and reward you, Peter, for this disinterested kindness. Pray be careful. If you are detected, both you and I will have to suffer dreadfully. I have not a relative who would dare to do it for me.” He replied, “You may trust to me, Linda. I don’t forget that your father was my best friend, and I will be a friend to his children so long as God lets me live.”
Optional chapter map for further evidence
| Chapter / direct link | Locate this episode | Agency or power lens |
|---|---|---|
| Chapter 25 | The misleading letters | Knowledge, planning, collaboration, and deception. |
| Chapter 26 | William’s attempt to obtain independence | A family member’s distinct strategy. |
| Chapter 28 | Aunt Nancy’s service and funeral | Sentimental appearances versus labor, bodily cost, and family loss. |
| Chapter 30 | The departure from the South | Trust, danger, planning, and dependence on helpers. |
| Chapter 31 | Arrival and assistance in Philadelphia | New opportunities with continuing uncertainty. |
Discussion questions
- How did the letter strategy in XXV reverse the information control described in VIII? What knowledge and allies made the reversal possible?
- Compare Linda’s path with William’s. How did gender, family obligations, and opportunity shape the differences?
- Why did Jacobs include Aunt Nancy’s life and funeral? How did that chapter challenge a sentimental white observer’s account of enslaver benevolence?
- How did the Christmas chapter contrast celebration with the realities of enslavement?
- What did the news about Ellen in XXVII reveal about the limits of promises and Linda’s control?
- Trace two concrete contributions made by helpers to the escape. Why does collaboration strengthen rather than erase an argument about Linda’s agency?
- What changed when Linda reached Philadelphia, and what remained unresolved by the end of XXXI?
- Compare Linda’s communication strategy with Northup’s. Which resources, risks, and outcomes differed?
Seminar moves: Begin with the supplied selections; identify the words supporting your interpretation. Distinguish “Jacobs reports” from “I infer.” Build on or challenge a classmate’s explanation with evidence. Ask what the source cannot tell us. Do not treat success, suffering, or willingness to take a risk as a measure of a person’s worth.
Carry the seminar into your essay
Save a passage about collaboration and one about its limits or costs. Record exact Dover page numbers in your book annotations or notebook and explain how a network made an individual strategy possible.
HOMEWORK / PREPARATION: Seminar self-reflection due Monday, November 30, at 3:25 p.m. (finish with class time after Thanksgiving break) on Canvas. Explain one contribution, one idea you developed after listening, and one specific improvement for the next discussion. Plan, draft, and revise the hybrid essay in the same shared Microsoft Word file. No Word log is required.