[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ admin_label=”section” _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
_________________________________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”1_2,1_2″ admin_label=”row” _builder_version=”4.23.1″ background_size=”initial” background_position=”top_left” background_repeat=”repeat” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”1_2″ _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_padding=”|||” global_colors_info=”{}” custom_padding__hover=”|||”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/the-watchman\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/118\/2023\/11\/Watchman-11-Sept-12-1829.jpg” title_text=”Watchman 11 (Sept 12, 1829)” _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_2″ _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_padding=”|||” global_colors_info=”{}” custom_padding__hover=”|||”][et_pb_text admin_label=”Text” _builder_version=”4.23.1″ background_size=”initial” background_position=”top_left” background_repeat=”repeat” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
The third letter to the editor, seen at the end of the first page and the start of the second page, discusses the ethics of a slaveholder being able to send a slave away to a different Workhouse. This letter is the only one that the Editor addresses directly and debates shortly \u201cA Subscriber.\u201d This dialogue identifies the use of news as a platform to express and inform controversial opinions, representing the Watchman with a freedom of the press that was often censored in slave societies like Jamaica.1<\/sup> The Editor argues that while it is not illegal by law to send a slave to a distant workhouse, it is not customary to do so, especially for reasons such as a slave going to a Sectarian Place of Worship, and thus deserved to be publicly criticized. According to the University of Cambridge, a workshop, or sugar house, in this context is a site of punishment that epitomized the brutality of enslaved people, and, for a time, also free black people.2<\/sup> The importance of freedom of the press, especially in terms of black literature, is to keep consolidating one branch of information or opinion from gaining a monopoly over available news. <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1. The Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica, \u201cJamaica: British Rule,\u201d Encyclop\u00e6dia Britannica. Accessed November 25, 2023, <\/span>https:\/\/www.britannica.com\/place\/Jamaica\/British-rule<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n \u00a02. Jeff Strickland, \u201cThe Slave Workhouse (Chapter 2) – All for Liberty,\u201d Cambridge Core, December 9, 2021, https:\/\/www.cambridge.org\/core\/books\/all-for-liberty\/slave-workhouse\/53B83C88BEF4A8C8D591E46CF8027D2C<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n _________________________________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”1_2,1_2″ _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”1_2″ _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.23.1″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Starting at the bottom of the second column of the second newspaper scan, the Watchman Editors discuss the new position of liberty that the Courant Editor seems to have taken up, which is the unjust treatment free peoples of colour have experienced under the American Government. Though the Courant Editor is \u201ccoming down a peg\u201d with the realities of slavery and discrimination, the Watchman Editors exclaim that this is \u201cOld News\u201d and not a new foresight that they can take credit for. The Watchman Editors will not let the Courant\u2019s long history of \u201ctrimming between two opinions\u201d be forgotten and they certainly won\u2019t let them receive a reward for a subject they should have been writing in support of long ago. The Watchman does not refrain from freely discussing and reporting about the discrimination both enslaved and free peoples of colour experience, and through their confrontational writing, they create an \u201coppositional public sphere.\u201d3<\/sup> This establishes diversity by going beyond the majority through challenging the typical anti-emancipatory stance many newspapers reported on within Jamaica. These newspapers were primarily written by pro-white planter editors and were the main audience that challenged the Watchman\u2019s writing.4<\/sup> By exposing the unjust principles written within print media, such as the Courant Editors ignorance, the Watchman disrupted the pro-slavery and discriminatory stance the majority of editors wrote about. They instead created a newspaper of black agency and free discourse that sought to uplift black voices.5<\/sup><\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\nBlack Agency<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n