Blog 10

After reading Frances EW Harper’s poem, “Learning to Read” I realized how important learning to read and write was to slaves and to the newly freed African Americans. Throughout the poem, Harper talks about how the southerners hated the thought of African Americans learning to read because it was against their “rule” (Harper, 1) and how unhappy they were with northerners for coming down to the south to teach the newly freed people to read and write.  The poem also tells readers that slave masters tried to keep slaves from learning to read and write, but some slaves, like “Mr. Turner’s Bell, Who heard the children spell, and picked the words right up by heart, and learned to read ‘em well. (Harper, stanza 6), were fortunate enough to find creative ways around the system and acquire the skills needed to read.  This poem really helped me see the importance of reading and writing from a different perspective.  For most slaves and freed African Americans, reading and writing was a luxury and it was a privilege to have to opportunity to be taught these skills.    Today students feel burdened when teachers and professors assign reading assignments from a text book or ask us to write a paper on something we have recently read.  We tend to forget that not everyone has the ability to read and write and not everyone is fortunate enough to attend a school that has the resources to teach students the proper way to read and write.  What seems like a simple, daily task is a struggle for many people around the world today, even in the United States.  This poem really helped me see that my peers and I are truly privileged and that we should not take the ability to read and write for granted.  Instead we should encourage others to continue to read novels and write their own novels or poems, to ensure that the art will not die.