Customer Reviews

Breaking the Chains

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"Breaking the Chains: African-American Slave Resistance" is a book filled with stories of how black slaves dealt with their servitude. It gives examples of the horrible conditions they faced everyday and uses primary sources, such as interviews with former slaves, to give a accurate picture of their lives. Using many different methods, such as rebellions, running away, or sabatoging the plantations, the slaves did what they could to escape the bonds that tied them to their masters. "Breaking the Chains" gives first hand accounts from run away slaves, and it offers many details that keep the reader's interest. It tells how many slaves were willing to risk their life for their own freedom and the freedom of fellow slaves. They fought to get away from their hard plantation life, controlling masters, and to remain with their families. It also tells of the religious fervor held by the black slaves that gave them hope to carry on. Even after they were not allowed to gather together for any reason outside of work and faced severe punishment if caught, slaves continued to congregate to sing and pray for salvation from their oppression. Katz leaves out his own opinion and uses facts and interviews of other people, which allows the reader to form his or her own opinion. This book shows the restless spirit possessed by blacks during this time period that made them continue the struggle to be free.

Breaking the Chains was a well written book by a former middle school social studies teacher named William Loren Katz. It was organized in a very easy and understanding manner. This book was very interesting in that, it told about a lot more slavery issuses than a high school like myself has learned about. It brought to life many historical figures that influenced the institution of slavery on both sides if the issue. It talked about the slaves daily toils and struggles, to the fights and rebellions. It also takes you to their march to freedom. This book would be good for anyone who wants to know more about American slavery. It demonatrates how slavery in America was finally defeated through the sacrifices and rebellion of the slaves themselves. Breaking the Chains is a book that keeps your attetion from cover to cover. Katz lets the facts and truth of slavery known to man in this book.

There is a certain amount of revisionist history floating around that the slave/master relationship was one of benefits to both slave and master. Katz puts this to bed by saying resistance was fairly common and the master/slave relationship was one of exploiter/exploited. Not only did slaves take over ships (Amistad), but they escaped to the North and Canada, started slave rebellions, and resisted in the plantation, factories, and homes of the slave holders. Slaves also destroyed the plantation economy of Santo Domingo and hung their slave masters.
Katz relays in this thin book about how slavery debased humanity for both the black and white population. This is a good short book about why slavery needed to end and answers the charges of the revisionist historians.

Breaking the Chains was a well written book by a former middle school social studies teacher named William Loren Katz. It was organized in a very easy and understanding manner. This book was very interesting in that, it told about a lot more slavery issuses than a high school like myself has learned about. It brought to life many historical figures that influenced the institution of slavery on both sides if the issue. It talked about the slaves daily toils and struggles, to the fights and rebellions. It also takes you to their march to freedom. This book would be good for anyone who wants to know more about American slavery. It demonatrates how slavery in America was finally defeated through the sacrifices and rebellion of the slaves themselves. Breaking the Chains is a book that keeps your attetion from cover to cover. Katz lets the facts and truth of slavery known to man in this book.

"Breaking the Chains: African-American Slave Resistance" is a book filled with stories of how black slaves dealt with their servitude. It gives examples of the horrible conditions they faced everyday and uses primary sources, such as interviews with former slaves, to give an accurate picture of their lives. Using many different methods, such as rebellions, running away, or sabatoging the plantations, the slaves did what they could to escape the bonds that tied them to their masters. "Breaking the Chains" gives first hand accounts from run away slaves, and it offers many details that keep the reader's interest. It tells how many slaves were willing to risk their life for their own feedom and the freedom of fellow slaves. They fought to get away from their hard plantation life, controlling masters, an dto remain with their families. It also tells of the religious fervor held by the black slaves that gave them hope to carry on. Even after rules were made making it wrong for blacks to gather together for any reason outside of work facing severe punishment if caught, slaves continued to congregate to sing and pray for salvation from their oppression. Katz leaves out his own opinion and uses facts and interviews of other people, which allows the reader to form his or her own opinion. This book shows the restless spirit possessed by blacks during this time period that made them continue the struggle to be free.

In reading the novel "Breaking the Chains," itchanged my aspects on the black history were they began to treat theirmasters as extremely dum people. They had many dialects to hid their dances, the get togethers, and other activities that they were engade with durning their life of terror.