First Mandatory Task (of Three)

Your first task: read the assigned literary content: (1) two Irish speeches (Cork and Belfast) by Frederick Douglass; (2) one Irish letter by Frederick Douglass; (3) one Irish speech (“The Cincinnati Address”) by Daniel O’Connell. You may recall that O’Connell is the individual whose statue Gabriel Conroy addresses in James Joyce’s “The Dead.” Despite its name, O’Connell’s speech was NOT delivered in Cincinnati, Ohio. Instead, it occurred before a live audience, plus newspaper reporters, at the Corn Exchange, a large hall in central Dublin. The year was 1845. Due to its clarity and force, the speech became popular internationally, sometimes circulating as a discrete, bound volume. Douglass’s speeches occurred during his extended sojourn in Ireland, an outcome that he chose in order to avoid the possibility of assassination in the United States. After the publication of his 1845 memoir, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Douglass found himself with many white American enemies.

You can access Frederick Douglass’s letter and two speeches, plus O’Connell’s speech, in the form of a printable PDF by clicking the icon above. Alternatively, you can access the PDF by clicking here.

 Second Mandatory Task (of Three)

Your second task: complete and submit — via Folio, before the deadline — the single Write Now (i.e. written homework) exercise about the focal literary text. Refer to your syllabus and/or the course Folio page to check the submission deadline. No late work is accepted.

There are 10 questions, presented in reading order. In other words: the questions chronologically track the PDF that contains the assigned reading: Selected Anti-Slavery Polemics by Frederick Douglass and Daniel O’Connell. When attempting the questions, it’s advisable NOT to begin with Folio but instead to answer the questions, one after the other, in a Microsoft Word document, which you should save as you proceed. That way, you’ll always have proof that you completed the exercise, even if Folio goes down or otherwise doesn’t cooperate. When you have finished the entire Write Now exercise, you should review it carefully, save it again, and then submit it via Folio — either as a Microsoft Word document or a PDF — before the firm deadline. The ability to submit ceases at that time, and effort not received before the deadline earns a grade of zero. Another way of saying the above: late submission isn’t possible. Remember, please, that your grade depends not just on correct responses but also: complete sentences; good grammar; accurate spelling; and clear expression. You can access the Write Now questions either by clicking here or by engaging with the green bar immediately below.

Please be very mindful of the following statements, which appear on the course syllabus.

Do your own work. Students may not collaborate on the production of responses to Write Now quizzes (i.e. homework exercises). When grading, we pay close attention to similarities between submissions. A student found to have copied or otherwise relied on another student’s work (on even one occasion) — or found to have committed plagiarism — will receive an “F” for the entire course and, in addition, will be reported to the University for a hearing that may result in suspension or expulsion from GS.

Third Mandatory Task (of Three)

Your third task: study the instructional content. In order to render the lectures as clear as possible, your instructor has captured their essential material in written form, presented immediately below as a couple of PDFs: Written Account (Phase One) and Written Account (Phase Two) of Douglass & O’Connell Material. Consider these documents your primary resource when studying the focal text. Terms that have particular importance appear in highlighted form.

EXAM WORDS

When preparing for your exam about this work of literature, ensure that you are fully up to speed with the following data (all of which receive explanation in the written accounts):

Springtime of the Peoples ••• Slavery Abolition Act (1833) ••• Maoris ••• United Kingdom Jewry; Isaac Goldsmid ••• Westminster ••• Catholic Emancipation (also known as Catholic Relief) ••• Act of Union: January 1, 1801 (created United Kingdom) ••• Repeal of the Union (Repeal Association/Clubs) ••• St. Patrick’s Cross (on Union Jack) ••• British statesman who deemed O’Connell the “greatest popular leader” ever ••• Irish political philosopher who coined the term “inalienable rights” ••• two-word terms: (1) what the Irish call the potato famine that devastated their country in the 1840s; (2) what the contemporary media called O’Connell’s large-scale rallies; (3) Dublin building in which O’Connell delivered the Cincinnati Address ••• diaspora ••• Lynn ••• official (three-word) name of the Quakers ••• significance in O’Connell’s speech of Jamaica ••• significance in Douglass’s speech (or speeches) of: Cambria; Madison Washington (Creole) ••• Douglass’s book The Heroic Slave ••• religious denomination Douglass targeted in his Belfast speech ••• Edward Williams Clay’s cartoon: O’Connell’s Call and Pat’s Reply ••• anti-slavery campaigners: gradualists versus immediatists ••• “most hideous crime that has ever stained humanity” ••• title of William Lloyd Garrison’s newspaper ••• appeal to rationality; appeal to affectivity ••• thinker associated with notion of “doing the greatest possible good to the greatest possible number” ••• World Anti-Slavery Convention (London, 1840) ••• Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott ••• James Buffum ••• Richard Webb; Hibernian Anti-Slavery Society ••• Joseph Poole (Wexford, Ireland) ••• The Columbian Orator, edited by Caleb Bingham ••• Richard Brinsley Sheridan ••• misunderstanding about phrase “a fine young Negro” ••• mobocrats ••• what Georgia’s Slave Code did or did not permit as regards teaching enslaved persons to read and write