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98-605: Some of the earliest memoirs of captivity known in the English-speaking world were written by white Europeans and later Americans , captured and sometimes enslaved in North Africa by local Muslims, usually Barbary pirates . These were part of a broad category of " captivity narratives ". Beginning in the 17th century, these included accounts by colonists and later American settlers in North America and

196-453: A Bermuda-born woman and slave discusses her deep connection with her master's wife and the pity she felt for the wife as she witnessed the "ill-treatment" the wife suffered at the hands of her husband. Prince was taught to read by Moravian missionaries. Literacy, however, was not a common theme for all enslaved women. The life story of "old Elizabeth" was transcribed from her oral account at the age of 97. As slavery has been practiced all over

294-706: A Rocky Cave (1787), Narrative of the Remarkable Occurrences, in the Life of John Blatchford of Cape-Ann (1788), and A Narrative of the Captivity and Sufferings of Mr. Ebenezer Fletcher, of Newipswich, Who Was ... Taken Prisoner by the British (1798) provided American reading audiences with new narratives. In some accounts, British soldiers were the primary antagonists. Seven captivity narratives are known that were written following capture of colonists by

392-665: A different way of life than the secular majority, but that way of life may have merits within its own context. Spiritual beliefs, rituals, and customs are not necessarily inferior simply because they differ from the secular mainstream. Anti-cult captivity narratives which attempt to equate difference with abuse, or to invoke a victim paradigm, may sometimes be criticized as unfair by scholars who believe that research into religious movements should be context-based and value-free. Beliefs, rituals, and customs which we assumed were merely "primitive" or "strange" may turn out to have profound meaning when examined in their own context. Just as Where

490-634: A distinct and essential element in how travel narratives formed the American character. In comparison to North American and Caribbean slave narratives, the North African slave narratives in English were written by British and American white slaves captured (often at sea or through Barbary pirates ) and enslaved in North Africa in the 18th and early 19th centuries. These narratives have

588-614: A distinct form in that they highlight the "otherness" of the Muslim slave traders , whereas the African-American slave narratives often call slave traders to account as fellow Christians . Narratives focused on the central themes of freedom and liberty which drew inspiration from the American Revolution. Since the narratives include the recurrence of themes and events, quoting, and relying heavily upon each other it

686-633: A five-year interval. However, the book has been extensively debunked, and is now considered most notable for its role in contributing to the Satanic Ritual Abuse scare of the 1980s, which culminated in the McMartin preschool trial . Captivity narratives, in addition to appealing to adults, have been attracting today's children as well. The narratives' exciting nature and their resilient young protagonists make for very educational and entertaining children's novels that have for goal to convey

784-615: A genre of their own, including, from the First World War , Ernst Jünger ( Storm of Steel ) and Frederic Manning 's Her Privates We . Memoirs documenting incarceration by Nazi Germany during the war include Primo Levi 's If This Is a Man , which covers his arrest as a member of the Italian Resistance Movement , followed by his life as a prisoner in Auschwitz ; and Elie Wiesel 's Night , which

882-527: A literary work of art or historical document, are emerging as a personal and family responsibility. The Association of Personal Historians was a trade association for professionals who assisted individuals, families, and organizations in documenting their life stories. It dissolved in 2017. With the expressed interest of preserving history through the eyes of those who lived it, some organizations work with potential memoirists to bring their work to fruition. The Veterans History Project , for example, compiles

980-406: A person claims to have developed a new awareness of previously unreported ritual abuse as a result of some form of therapy which purports to recover repressed memories , often using suggestive techniques. Michelle Remembers represents the cult survivor tale at its most extreme. In it, Michelle Smith recounts horrific tales of sexual and physical abuse at the hands of the " Church of Satan " over

1078-508: A polemical term in connection with the so-called " culture war ". Not all anti-cult captivity narratives describe physical capture. Sometimes the capture is a metaphor, as is the escape or rescue. The "captive" may be someone who claims to have been "seduced" or "recruited" into a religious lifestyle which he/she retrospectively describes as one of slavery. The term "captive" may nonetheless be used figuratively. Some captivity narratives are partly or even wholly fictional, but are meant to impart

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1176-790: A resident of North America was that of Abraham Browne (1655). The most popular was that of Captain James Riley , entitled An Authentic Narrative of the Loss of the Brig Commerce (1817). Jonathan Dickinson 's Journal, God's Protecting Providence ... (1699), is an account by a Quaker of shipwreck survivors captured by Indians in Florida. He says they survived by placing their trust in God to protect them. The Cambridge History of English and American Literature describes it as, "in many respects

1274-640: A response by white Southern writers , such as William Gilmore Simms and Mary Eastman , who published what were called anti-Tom novels . Both kinds of novels were bestsellers in the 1850s. From the 1770s to the 1820s, slave narratives generally gave an account of a spiritual journey leading to Christian redemption. The authors usually characterized themselves as Africans rather than slaves, as most were born in Africa. Examples include: Some more recent narratives, such as Petro Kilekwa 's Slave Boy to Priest: The Autobiography of Padre Petro Kilekwa (1937), followed

1372-579: A revival of interest in the 1780s. Other popular captivity narratives from the late 17th century include Cotton Mather 's "A Notable Exploit: Dux Faemina Facti, " on the captivity of Hannah Duston , as well as his account of Hannah Swarton 's captivity (1697), both well-known accounts of the capture of women during King William's War , and Jonathan Dickinson 's God's Protecting Providence (1699). American captivity narratives were usually based on true events, but they frequently contained fictional elements as well. Some were entirely fictional, created because

1470-676: A sentimental account of plantation life and ended with the narrator adjusting to the new life of freedom. The emphasis of writers shifted conceptually toward a recounting of individual and racial progress rather than securing freedom . Examples include: During the Great Depression of the 1930s, the New Deal Works Projects Administration (WPA) employed writers and researchers from the Federal Writers' Project to interview and document

1568-543: A separate event John Witherspoon was captured at Annapolis Royal during the French and Indian War and wrote about his experience. During the war Gamaliel Smethurst was captured; he published an account in 1774. Lt. Simon Stephens, of John Stark's ranger company, and Captain Robert Stobo escaped together from Quebec along the coast of Acadia, finally reaching British-controlled Louisbourg and wrote accounts. During

1666-424: A similar theme. From the mid-1820s, writers consciously chose the autobiographical form to generate enthusiasms for the abolitionist movement. Some writers adopted literary techniques, including the use of fictionalized dialogue. Between 1835 and 1865 more than 80 such narratives were published. Recurrent features include: slave auctions, the break-up of families, and frequently two accounts of escapes, one of which

1764-401: A strong moral lesson, such as the purported dangers of conversion to a minority faith. Perhaps the most notorious work in this subgenre is The Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk , a fictional work circulated during the 19th century and beyond, and used to stoke anti-Catholic sentiment in the U.S. (see main article: Maria Monk ). She claimed to have been born into a Protestant family, but

1862-499: A taboo for a long time – especially since many denied and still deny the existence of slavery. Given the participation in the 19th century of abolitionist editors (at least in the United States), influential early 20th-century historians, such as Ulrich B. Phillips in 1929, suggested that, as a class, "their authenticity was doubtful". These doubts have been criticized following better academic research of these narratives, since

1960-405: A way to record and publish their own account of their public exploits. Authors included politicians or people in court society and were later joined by military leaders and businessmen. An exception to these models is Henry David Thoreau 's 1854 memoir Walden , which presents his experiences over the course of two years in a cabin he built near Walden Pond . Twentieth-century war memoirs became

2058-412: A white abolitionist friend of the narrator (William Lloyd Garrison, Wendell Phillips) or by a white amanuensis/editor/author actually responsible for the text (John Greenleaf Whittier, David Wilson, Louis Alexis Chamerovzow), in the course of which preface the reader is told that the narrative is a "plain, unvarnished tale" and that naught "has been set down in malice, nothing exaggerated, nothing drawn from

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2156-502: Is a very religious, but also brutal man). According to James Olney, a typical outline looks the following way: A. An engraved portrait, signed by the narrator. B. A title page that includes the claim, as an integral part of the title, "Written by Himself" (or some close variant: "Written from a statement of Facts Made by Himself"; or "Written by a Friend, as Related to Him by Brother Jones"; etc.) C. A handful of testimonials and/or one or more prefaces or introductions written either by

2254-434: Is any nonfiction narrative writing based on the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobiography since the late 20th century, the genre is differentiated in form, presenting a narrowed focus, usually a particular time phase in someone's life or career. A biography or autobiography tells

2352-465: Is based on his life prior to and during his time in the Auschwitz, Buna Werke , and Buchenwald concentration camps. In the early 1990s, memoirs written by ordinary people experienced a sudden upsurge, as an increasing number of people realized that their ancestors' and their own stories were about to disappear, in part as a result of the opportunities and distractions of technological advances. At

2450-433: Is believed by scholars that the main source of information was other narratives more so than real captivities. Female captives were depicted as Gothic fiction characters clinging to the hope of freedom thus more relatable to the audience. Examples include: Narratives by enslaved women include the memoirs of Harriet Jacobs, Mary Prince, Mattie J. Jackson, and " old Elizabeth ," among others. In her narrative, Mary Prince,

2548-551: Is extremely rare in Western nations for religious or spiritual groups to hold anyone physically captive. Like captivity narratives in general, anti-cult captivity narratives also raise contextual concerns. Ethnohistoric Native American culture differs markedly from Western European culture. Each may have its merits within its own context. Modern theorists question the fairness of pitting one culture against another and making broad value judgments. Similarly, spiritual groups may adopt

2646-594: Is successful. As this was the period of the forced migration of an estimated one million slaves from the Upper South to the Deep South through the internal slave trade , the experiences of auctions and separation of families were common to many. Examples include: Following the defeat of the slave states of the Confederate South , the authors had less need to convey the evils of slavery. Some gave

2744-754: Is the free memoir , a form of nonfiction that, in presenting the past, deviates from factual and literal accuracy. This play of truth distinguishes the free memoir from the memoir per se, the word 'free' meaning what it does in free translation , that is, 'not literal or exact.'” The term 'memoir' is used in some academic contexts to describe an essay on a learned subject. Examples include explanatory texts accompanying geologic maps . Captivity narrative Captivity narratives are usually stories of people captured by enemies whom they consider uncivilized, or whose beliefs and customs they oppose. The best-known captivity narratives in North America are those concerning Europeans and Americans taken as captives and held by

2842-577: Is to document every single fate and hence approach the taboo of slavery, and keep the memory of the slaves alive through these videos. The Underground Railroad by National Book Award winner Colson Whitehead takes place in an alternative version of the 19th century. Cora, a slave on a cotton farm in Georgia escapes via the Underground Railroad . The novel was well received. It was said to possess "the chilling, matter-of-fact power of

2940-514: The Krishna temple in Potomac, Maryland. She subsequently filed a lawsuit claiming that her freedom of religion had been violated by the deprogramming attempt, and that she had been denied due process as a member of a hated class. Among anti-cult captivity narratives, a subgenre is the Satanic Ritual Abuse story, the best-known example being Michelle Remembers . In this type of narrative,

3038-597: The Mi'kmaq and Maliseet tribes in Nova Scotia and Acadia (two other prisoners were future Governor Michael Francklin (taken 1754) and Lt John Hamilton (taken 1749) at the Siege of Grand Pre . Whether their captivity experiences were documented is unknown). The most well-known became that by John Gyles , who wrote Memoirs of odd adventures, strange deliverances, &c. in the captivity of John Gyles, Esq; commander of

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3136-792: The Middle Ages , Geoffrey of Villehardouin , Jean de Joinville , and Philippe de Commines wrote memoirs, while the genre was represented toward the end of the Renaissance , through the works of Blaise de Montluc and Margaret of Valois , that she was the first woman to write her Memoirs in modern-style. Until the Age of Enlightenment encompassing the 17th and 18th centuries, works of memoir were written by Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury ; François de La Rochefoucauld , Prince de Marcillac of France; and Louis de Rouvroy, duc de Saint-Simon , who wrote Memoirs at his family's home at

3234-520: The Narrative 's tale of misfortune but on the youthful optimism of Susanna Johnson's largely imagined younger sister, Miriam. This article references captivity narratives drawn from literature, history, sociology, religious studies, and modern media. Scholars point to certain unifying factors. Of early Puritan captivity narratives, David L. Minter writes: First they became instruments of propaganda against Indian "devils" and French "Papists." Later, ...

3332-594: The Petitcodiac River Campaign , the Acadian militia took prisoner William Caesar McCormick of William Stark 's rangers and his detachment of three rangers and two light infantry privates from the 35th. The Acadian militia took the prisoners to Miramachi and then Restogouch. (They were kept by Pierre du Calvet who later released them to Halifax.) In August 1758, William Merritt was taken captive close to St. Georges (Thomaston, Maine), and taken to

3430-750: The Raid on Lunenburg (1756) by the First Nations (Maliseet/Wolastoqiyik) in the French and Indian War . On route to Quebec, John and his siblings were adopted by the First Nations in present-day New Brunswick but were reunited with their mother in Quebec about seven months later. In the spring of 1760, after the British victory at the Battle of the Plains of Abraham in 1759, the family sailed back to Nova Scotia. In

3528-554: The "American characteristics of resourcefulness, hopefulness, pluck and purity". Elizabeth George Speare published Calico Captive (1957), a historical fiction children's novel inspired by the captivity narrative of Susannah Willard Johnson . In Rewriting the Captivity Narrative for Contemporary Children: Speare, Bruchac, and the French and Indian War (2011), Sara L. Schwebel writes: Johnson's Narrative vividly describes Susanna Johnson's forty-eight-month ordeal –

3626-542: The 18th century, there was a revival of interest in captivity narratives. Accounts such as A Narrative of the Capture and Treatment of John Dodge, by the English at Detroit (1779), A Surprising Account, of the Captivity and Escape of Philip M'Donald, and Alexander M'Leod, of Virginia, from the Chickkemogga Indians (1786), Abraham Panther's A Very Surprising Narrative of a Young Woman, Who Was Discovered in

3724-526: The Caribbean wrote accounts of their lives, and over 100 book-length accounts were published from formerly enslaved people worldwide. Before the American Civil War , some authors wrote fictional accounts of slavery to create support for abolitionism. The prime example is Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) by Harriet Beecher Stowe . The success of her novel and the social tensions of the time brought

3822-476: The Maria Monk work has been exposed as a hoax , it typifies those captivity narratives which depict a minority religion as not just theologically incorrect, but fundamentally abusive. In Rape-Revenge Films: A Critical Study , Alexandra Heller-Nicholas writes: The basic structure of the captivity narrative concerns the rescue of "helpless" maidens who have been kidnapped by "natives"[.] [They are] rescued at

3920-624: The North American narratives useful in analyzing how the colonists or settlers constructed the "other". They also assess these works for what the narratives reveal about the settlers' sense of themselves and their culture, and the experience of crossing the line to another. Colley has studied the long history of English captivity among other cultures, both the Barbary pirate captives who preceded those in North America, and British captives in cultures such as India or East Asia, which began after

4018-799: The Saint John River and later to Quebec . North America was not the only region to produce captivity narratives. North African slave narratives were written by white Europeans and Americans who were captured, often as a result of shipwrecks, and enslaved in North Africa in the 18th and early 19th centuries. If the Europeans converted to Islam and adopted North Africa as their home, they could often end their slavery status, but such actions disqualified them from being ransomed to freedom by European consuls in Africa, who were qualified only to free captives who had remained Christians. About 20,000 British and Irish captives were held in North Africa from

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4116-631: The Spirit Lives may be viewed as a "reverse" captivity narrative concerning Native peoples, the story of Donna Seidenberg Bavis (as recounted in The Washington Post ) may be viewed as a "reverse" captivity narrative concerning new religious movements . The typical contemporary anti-cult captivity narrative is one in which a purported "victim" of " cult mind control " is "rescued" from a life of "slavery" by some form of deprogramming or exit counseling . However, Donna Seidenberg Bavis

4214-601: The Sudan. "Another Slave Narrative", a film series, was launched by filmmaker Michelle Jackson on December 18, 2016. Jackson, inspired by an interview with a former slave, decided to present the stories of previously enslaved people in a series of short films. A cast of 22 actors of mixed sex, race, and age, read out individual slaves' interviews from the Slave Narrative Collection which includes more than 2,300 interviews conducted from 1936–38. Jackson's aim

4312-578: The Sufferings (1750), Indian barbarities are blamed on the teachings of Roman Catholic priests. During Queen Anne's War , French and Abenaki warriors made the Raid on Deerfield in 1704, killing many settlers and taking more than 100 persons captive. They were taken on a several hundred-mile overland trek to Montreal. Many were held there in Canada for an extended period, with some captives adopted by First Nations families and others held for ransom. In

4410-611: The United States who were captured and held by Native Americans . Several well-known captivity narratives were published before the American Revolution , and they often followed forms established with the narratives of captivity in North Africa. North African accounts did not continue to appear after the Napoleonic Era ; accounts from North Americans, captured by western tribes migrating west continued until

4508-399: The battle against slavery. There is no consensus about what exact type of literature slave narratives are, whether they can be considered as a proper genre, comprised in the large category captivity narrative , or are autobiographies , memoirs , testimonials , or novels ; nonetheless, they play a big part in keeping up the memory of slavery and in approaching a topic that was considered as

4606-497: The beginning of the 17th century to the middle of the 18th, and roughly 700 Americans were held captive as North African slaves between 1785 and 1815. The British captives produced 15 full biographical accounts of their experiences, and the American captives produced more than 100 editions of 40 full-length narratives. In his book Beyond Geography: The Western Spirit Against the Wilderness (1980), Frederick W. Turner discusses

4704-421: The best of all the captivity tracts." Ann Eliza Bleecker 's epistolary novel , The History of Maria Kittle (1793), is considered the first known captivity novel. It set the form for subsequent Indian capture novels. American Indian captivity narratives, accounts of men and women of European descent who were captured by Native Americans , were popular in both America and Europe from the 17th century until

4802-521: The case of Frederick Douglass highlights. The narratives are very graphic to the extent as extensive accounts of e.g. whipping, abuse and rape of enslaved women are exposed in detail (see Treatment of slaves in the United States ). The denunciation of the slave owners, in particular their cruelty and hypocrisy, is a recurring theme in slave narratives, and in some examples denounced the double standards (e.g. in Douglass's narrative, his slave owner Hopkins

4900-431: The castle of La Ferté-Vidame . While Saint-Simon was considered a writer possessing a high level of skill for narrative and character development, it was not until well after his death that his work as a memoirist was recognized, resulting in literary fame. Over the latter half of the 18th through the mid-20th century, memoirists generally included those who were noted within their chosen profession. These authors wrote as

4998-502: The close of the United States frontier late in the 19th century. Mary Rowlandson 's memoir, A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson , (1682) is a classic example of the genre. According to Nancy Armstrong and Leonard Tennenhouse, Rowlandson's captivity narrative was "one of the most popular captivity narratives on both sides of the Atlantic." Although the text temporarily fell out of print after 1720, it had

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5096-402: The colonies, ransoms were raised by families or communities; there was no higher government program to do so. The minister John Williams was among those captured and ransomed. His account, The Redeemed Captive (1707), was widely distributed in the 18th and 19th centuries, and continues to be published today. Due to his account, as well as the high number of captives, this raid, unlike others of

5194-467: The cult survivor meme has become a popular one. A recent American sitcom , Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt , is premised on the notion of "cult survivor" as a social identity. It is not unusual for anyone who grew up in a religious and culturally conservative household – and who later adopted secular mainstream values – to describe themselves as a "cult survivor", notwithstanding the absence of any abuse or violence. In this sense, "cult survivor" may be used as

5292-510: The decades-long struggle between whites and Plains Indians in the mid-19th century, hundreds of women and children were captured. Many narratives included a theme of redemption by faith in the face of the threats and temptations of an alien way of life. Barbary captivity narratives, accounts of English people captured and held by Barbary pirates , were popular in England in the 16th and 17th centuries. The first Barbary captivity narrative by

5390-647: The early North American experience. Certain North American captivity narratives related to being held among Native peoples were published from the 18th through the 19th centuries. They reflected an already well-established genre in English literature, which some colonists would likely have been familiar with. There had already been numerous English accounts of captivity by Barbary pirates. Other types of captivity narratives, such as those recounted by apostates from religious movements (i.e. "cult survivor" tales), have remained an enduring topic in modern media. They have been published in books and periodicals, in addition to being

5488-708: The effect of those accounts in which white captives came to prefer and eventually adopt a Native American way of life; they challenged European-American assumptions about the superiority of their culture. During some occasions of prisoner exchanges, the white captives had to be forced to return to their original cultures. Children who had assimilated to new families found it extremely painful to be torn from them after several years' captivity. Numerous adult and young captives who had assimilated chose to stay with Native Americans and never returned to live in Anglo-American or European communities. The story of Mary Jemison , who

5586-441: The end of the 19th century. Given the problem of international contemporary slavery in the 20th and 21st centuries, additional slave narratives are being written and published. The development of slave narratives from autobiographical accounts to modern fictional works led to the establishment of slave narratives as a literary genre . This large rubric of this so-called "captivity literature" includes more generally "any account of

5684-617: The experience or the effects of enslavement in the New World. The works are largely classified as novels , but may pertain to poetical works as well. The renaissance of the postmodern slave narratives in the 20th century was a means to deal retrospectively with slavery, and to give a fictional account of historical facts from the first-person perspective. Examples include: Memoir A memoir ( / ˈ m ɛ m . w ɑːr / ; from French mémoire [me.mwaʁ] , from Latin memoria  'memory, remembrance')

5782-579: The first half of the 19th century, the controversy over slavery in the United States led to impassioned literature on both sides of the issue. To present the reality of slavery, a number of former slaves, such as Harriet Tubman , Harriet Jacobs , and Frederick Douglass , published accounts of their enslavement and their escapes to freedom. Lucy Delaney wrote an account that included the freedom suit waged by her mother in Missouri for their freedom. Eventually some 6,000 former slaves from North America and

5880-432: The form of captivity narratives. This in turn provides justification for anti-cult groups to target religious movements for social control measures like deprogramming . In The Politics of Religious Apostasy , Bromley writes: [T]here is considerable pressure on individuals exiting Subversive organizations to negotiate a narrative with the oppositional coalition that offers an acceptable explanation for participation in

5978-479: The former organization are vigorously resisted and are taken as evidence of untrustworthiness. Emphasis on the irresistibility of subversive techniques is vital to apostates and their allies as a means of locating responsibility for participation on the organization rather than on the former member. "Cult survivor" tales have become a familiar genre. They employ the devices of the captivity narrative in dramatic fashion, typically pitting mainstream secular values against

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6076-595: The garrison on St. George's River (1736). He was captured in the Siege of Pemaquid (1689) . He wrote about his torture by the Natives at Meductic village during King William's War . His memoirs are regarded as a precursor to the frontier romances of James Fenimore Cooper , William Gilmore Simms , and Robert Montgomery Bird . Merchant William Pote was captured during the siege of Annapolis Royal during King George's War and wrote about his captivity. Pote also wrote about being tortured. Ritual torture of war captives

6174-490: The genre with suspicion because of its ideological underpinnings. As a result of new scholarly approaches since the late 20th century, historians with a more certain grasp of Native American cultures are distinguishing between plausible statements of fact and value-laden judgments in order to study the narratives as rare sources from "inside" Native societies. In addition, modern historians such as Linda Colley and anthropologists such as Pauline Turner Strong have also found

6272-411: The historical truth transmitted in these accounts, but slave narratives were primarily the tool for fugitive or former slaves to state their independence in the 19th century, and carry on and conserve authentic and true historical facts from a first-person perspective. They go further than just autobiographies, and are moreover "a source for reconstructing historical experience". The freed slaves that wrote

6370-426: The imagination"—indeed, the tale, it is claimed, understates the horrors of slavery. D. A poetic epigraph, by preference from William Cowper. E. The actual narrative: F. An appendix or appendices composed of documentary material bills of sale, details of purchase from slavery, newspaper items-, further reflections on slavery, sermons, anti-slavery speeches, poems, appeals to the reader for funds and moral support in

6468-490: The indigenous peoples of North America. These narratives have had an enduring place in literature, history, ethnography, and the study of Native peoples. They were preceded, among English-speaking peoples, by publication of captivity narratives related to English people taken captive and held by Barbary pirates , or sold for ransom or slavery. Others were taken captive in the Middle East. These accounts established some of

6566-587: The last possible moment by a "hero." Commonly, this "hero" is rewarded through marriage. For James R. Lewis , the nineteenth century captivity narrative was intended to either entertain or titillate audiences, or to function as propaganda. Like James R. Lewis , David G. Bromley is a scholar of religion who draws parallels between the propaganda function of 19th century captivity narratives concerning Native peoples, and contemporary captivity narratives concerning new religious movements . Bromley notes that apostates from such movements frequently cast their accounts in

6664-499: The late 20th-century historians have more often validated the accounts of slaves about their own experiences. Slave narratives by African slaves from North America were first published in England in the 18th century. They soon became the main form of African-American literature in the 19th century. Slave narratives were publicized by abolitionists , who sometimes participated as editors, or writers if slaves were not literate. During

6762-401: The life, or a major portion of the life, of a fugitive or former slave , either written or orally related by the slave himself or herself". Whereas the first narratives told the stories of fugitive or freed slaves in a time of racial prejudice, they further developed into retrospective fictional novels and extended their influence until common days. Not only maintaining the memory and capturing

6860-695: The major elements of the form, often putting it within a religious framework, and crediting God or Providence for gaining freedom or salvation. Following the North American experience, additional accounts were written after British people were captured during exploration and settlement in India and East Asia. Since the late 20th century, captivity narratives have also been studied as accounts of persons leaving, or held in contemporary religious cults or movements, thanks to scholars of religion like David G. Bromley and James R. Lewis . Traditionally, historians have made limited use of many captivity narratives. They regarded

6958-530: The memoirs of those who have served in a branch of the United States Armed Forces – especially those who have seen active combat. Memoirs are usually understood to be factual accounts of people's lives, typically from their early years, and are derived from the French term mémoire , meaning "reminiscence" or "memory." However, some works, which may be called free memoirs, are less strictly bound to remembered facts: "One type of life story

7056-575: The mid-1970s, represents a special case. She was initially captured by a domestic U.S. terror group called the Symbionese Liberation Army in February, 1974. About a year later, she was photographed wielding a machine gun, helping them rob a bank. Was she an "assimilated captive" or was she only cooperating as a matter of survival? Was she " brainwashed " or fully conscious, acting with free will? These questions were hotly debated at

7154-424: The narratives are considered as historians, since "memory and history come together". These accounts link elements of the slave's personal life and destiny with key historical phenomena, such as the American Civil War and the Underground Railroad . In simple, yet powerful storylines, slave narratives follow in general a plot common to all of them: starting from the initial situation, the slave in his master's home,

7252-465: The narratives played an important role in encouraging government protection of frontier settlements. Still later they became pulp thrillers, always gory and sensational, frequently plagiaristic and preposterous. In its "Terms & Themes" summary of captivity narratives, the University of Houston at Clear Lake suggests that: In American literature, captivity narratives often relate particularly to

7350-460: The number of captives taken from the 15th through the 19th centuries are imprecise and unreliable, since record-keeping was not consistent and the fate of hostages who disappeared or died was often not known. Yet conservative estimates run into the thousands, and a more realistic figure may well be higher. Between King Philip's War (1675) and the last of the French and Indian Wars (1763), approximately 1,641 New Englanders were taken hostage. During

7448-474: The organization and for now once again reversing loyalties. In the limiting case, exiting members without any personal grievance against the organization may find that re-entry into conventional social networks is contingent on at least nominally affirming such opposition coalition claims. The archetypal account that is negotiated is a "captivity narrative" in which apostates assert that they were innocently or naïvely operating in what they had every reason to believe

7546-485: The privacy of his study. This kind of memoir refers to the idea in ancient Greece and Rome , that memoirs were like "memos", or pieces of unfinished and unpublished writing, which a writer might use as a memory aid to make a more finished document later on. The Sarashina Nikki is an example of an early Japanese memoir, written in the Heian period . A genre of book writing, Nikki Bungaku , emerged during this time. In

7644-422: The protagonist escapes in the wilderness and narrates the struggle for survival and recognition throughout his uncertain journey to freedom. After all, these narratives were written retrospectively by freed slaves and/or their abolitionist advocate, hence the focus on the transformation from the dehumanized slave to the self-emancipated free man. This change often entailed literacy as a means to overcome captivity, as

7742-402: The same time, psychology and other research began to show that familiarity with genealogy helps people find their place in the world and that life review helps people come to terms with their own past. With the advent of inexpensive digital book production in the first decade of the 21st century, the genre exploded. Memoirs written as a way to pass down a personal legacy, rather than as

7840-516: The slave narratives collected by the Federal Writers' Project in the 1930s, with echoes of Toni Morrison's Beloved " and could be considered as a modern-tale fictional slave narrative. A neo-slave narrative — a term coined by Ishmael Reed while working on his 1976 novel Flight to Canada and used by him in a 1984 interview — is a modern fictional work set in the slavery era by contemporary authors or substantially concerned with depicting

7938-602: The stories of African Americans who were former slaves. Most had been children when the Thirteenth Amendment was passed. Produced between 1936 and 1938, the narratives recount the experiences of more than 2,300 former slaves. Some interviews were recorded; 23 of 26 known audio recordings are held by the American Folklife Center of the Library of Congress . The last interview of a former slave

8036-457: The stories were popular. One spurious captivity narrative was The Remarkable Adventures of Jackson Johonnet , of Massachusetts (Boston, 1793). Another is that of Nelson Lee . Captivity in another culture brought into question many aspects of the captives' lives. Reflecting their religious beliefs, the Puritans tended to write narratives that negatively characterized Indians. They portrayed

8134-477: The story "of a life", while a memoir often tells the story of a particular career, event, or time, such as touchstone moments and turning points in the author's life. The author of a memoir may be referred to as a memoirist or a memorialist . Memoirs have been written since the ancient times, as shown by Julius Caesar 's Commentarii de Bello Gallico , also known as Commentaries on the Gallic Wars . In

8232-578: The subjects of film and television programs, both fiction and non-fiction. Because of the competition between New France and New England in North America, raiding between the colonies was frequent. Colonists in New England were frequently taken captive by Canadiens and their Indian allies (similarly, the New Englanders and their Indian allies took Canadiens and Indian prisoners captive). According to Kathryn Derounian-Stodola, statistics on

8330-516: The terror of being taken captive, childbirth during the forced march, prolonged separation from her three young children, degradation and neglect in a French prison, the loss of a newborn, a battle with smallpox, separation from her husband, and finally, widowhood as her spouse fell in yet another battle in the years-long French and Indian war. Spear borrowed heavily from Johnson's text, lifting both details and dialogue to construct her story. In pitching her tale to young readers, however, she focused not on

8428-478: The time, was remembered and became an element in the American frontier story. During Father Rale's War , Indians raided Dover, New Hampshire . Elizabeth Hanson wrote a captivity narrative after gaining return to her people. Susannah Willard Johnson of New Hampshire wrote about her captivity during the French and Indian War (the North American front of the Seven Years' War ). In the final 30 years of

8526-651: The time. Out of thousands of religious groups, a handful have become associated with acts of violence. This includes the Peoples Temple founded by Jim Jones in 1955, which ended in a murder/suicide claiming the lives of 918 people in November, 1978 in Guyana (see main article: Peoples Temple ). Members of the Peoples Temple who did not die in the murder/suicide are examples of "cult survivors", and

8624-647: The trial of events as a warning from God concerning the state of the Puritans' souls, and concluded that God was the only hope for redemption. Such a religious cast had also been part of the framework of earlier English accounts of captivity by Barbary pirates. The numerous conflicts between Anglo-American colonists and the French and Native Americans led to the emphasis of Indians' cruelty in English-language captivity narratives, which served to inspire hatred for their enemies. In William Flemming's Narrative of

8722-400: The values held by some spiritual minority (which may be caricatured). As is true of the broader category, anti-cult captivity narratives are sometimes regarded with suspicion due to their ideological underpinnings, their formulaic character, and their utility in justifying social control measures. In addition, critics of the genre tend to reject the " mind control " thesis, and to observe that it

8820-704: The work, Caesar describes the battles that took place during the nine years that he spent fighting local armies in the Gallic Wars . His second memoir, Commentarii de Bello Civili (or Commentaries on the Civil War ) is an account of the events that took place between 49 and 48 BC in the civil war against Gnaeus Pompeius and the Senate . The noted Libanius , teacher of rhetoric who lived between an estimated 314 and 394 AD, framed his life memoir as one of his literary orations , which were written to be read aloud in

8918-654: The world for millennia, some narratives cover places and times other than these main two. One example is the account given by John R. Jewitt , an English armourer enslaved for years by Maquinna of the Nootka people in the Pacific Northwest . The Canadian Encyclopedia calls his memoir a "classic of captivity literature" and it is a rich source of information about the indigenous people of Vancouver Island . Maria ter Meetelen (1704 in Amsterdam – fl. 1751),

9016-488: Was a Hare Krishna devotee (member of ISKCON ) who – according to a lawsuit filed on her behalf by the American Civil Liberties Union – was abducted by deprogrammers in February 1977, and held captive for 33 days. During that time, she was subjected to abusive treatment in an effort to "deprogram" her of her religious beliefs. She escaped her captors by pretending to cooperate, then returned to

9114-612: Was a Dutch writer of an autobiography. Her biography is considered to be a valuable witness statement of the life of a former slave (1748). A contemporary slave narrative is a recent memoir written by a former slave, or ghost-written on their behalf. Modern areas of the world in which slavery occurs include the Sudan. Escape from Slavery: The True Story of My Ten Years in Captivity – and My Journey to Freedom in America (2003) by Francis Bok and Edward Tivnan, and Slave by Mende Nazer and Damien Lewis, describe from slavery experiences in

9212-452: Was a normal, secure social site; were subjected to overpowering subversive techniques; endured a period of subjugation during which they experienced tribulation and humiliation; ultimately effected escape or rescue from the organization; and subsequently renounced their former loyalties and issued a public warning of the dangers of the former organization as a matter of civic responsibility. Any expressions of ambivalence or residual attraction to

9310-628: Was captured as a young girl (1755) and spent the remainder of her 90 years among the Seneca, is such an example. Where The Spirit Lives , a 1989 film written by Keith Leckie and directed by Bruce Pittman , turns the tables on the familiar white captive/aboriginal captors narrative. It sensitively portrays the plight of Canadian aboriginal children who were captured and sent to residential schools, where they were stripped of their Native identity and forced to conform to Eurocentric customs and beliefs. The story of Patty Hearst , which unfolded primarily in

9408-625: Was common among Native American tribes, who used it as a kind of passage. Henry Grace was taken captive by the Mi'kmaq near Fort Cumberland during Father Le Loutre's War . His narrative was entitled, The History of the Life and Sufferings of Henry Grace (Boston, 1764). Anthony Casteel was taken in the Attack at Jeddore during the same war, and also wrote an account of his experience. The fifth captivity narrative, by John Payzant , recounts his being taken prisoner with his mother and three siblings during

9506-516: Was exposed to Roman Catholicism by attending a convent school. She subsequently resolved to become a Catholic nun, but upon admission to the order at the Hôtel-Dieu nunnery in Montreal , was soon made privy to its dark secrets: the nuns were required to service the priests sexually, and the children born of such liaisons were murdered and buried in a mass grave on the building's premises. Though

9604-786: Was with Fountain Hughes , then 101, in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1949. He was a grandson of a slave owned by President Thomas Jefferson at Monticello . Slave narratives inherently involved travel and form a significant type of travel writing . As John Cox says in Traveling South , "travel was a necessary prelude to the publication of a narrative by a slave, for slavery could not be simultaneously experienced and written." Where many travel narratives are written by privileged travelers, slave narratives show people traveling despite significant legal barriers to their actions, and in this way are

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