NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS

By the end of this unit, students will be able to: identify the writing conventions of autobiography, memoir and journalism; trace the development of Frederick Douglass’s character from childhood to manhood, noting how and why he reached his life crisis and chose to act; analyze antagonists and their role in Douglass’s life and narrative; identify and analyze the effective use of literary elements such as impressions, understatement, sarcasm, analogy, allusion, symbols, personification, irony, paradox, parallel structure, antithesis, persona and internal monologue; identify and analyze techniques and examples of logic and argument, including logical fallacies; analyze the effect of word choice and sentence structure to express meaning, tone and theme; analyze the depiction of women in the book; analyze the development of religion in the book; analyze the relationship between Douglass’s purpose and audience and his narrative’s elements and structure; and offer a close reading of Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass and support interpretations and assertions using evidence from the text and knowledge of his biography, literary allusions, and period history. 68 pages. ©2009.