Nat Turner Slave Liberator

From the comic book Nat Turner by Kyle Baker, we get a sense of what like during the slave revolt, which Nat led himself. Kyle Baker decided to describe the setting through the use of illustrations and pictures. By doing so, it has a huge impact on how someone might interpret what was going on during that time period. Nat Turner was an American slave. He formed and led the slave rebellion which turned out to be a major turning point in slave and American history.

Nat Turner is considered an important individual in which he freed many black slaves from their slavery. In order for him to be able to help free the black slaves, he needed to do something to prove that they deserved to be free people and be free from slavery. From this came the idea of the slave rebellion. The reason he chose to lead the revolt was because he clearly described that it was a sign from god to do so.

We can see this through page 76, when he’s on his knees praying to god. In addition to that, we also see this directly through the image ad caption where he describes that he “saw white spirits and black spirits engaged in battle…” (Baker, 102).

I would totally assign this comic book to my history class, as there are many strengths and weaknesses to using images to describe a scene. The use and purpose of a sketch or image can really help people in understanding what events are going on at a specific moment or scene in time.

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Through Nat Turner and Baker’s use of illustrations, we, as readers, can get an understanding and comprehense how a specific moment in time (Nat praying) can lead to further conclusions (praying led him to start a revolution that had a major role and change in both the history of slaves and history or America.

Furthermore, through the use of images comes good and bad qualities. First, by using a picture, it conveys different details about people, places and other important information regarding the events and objects. On the other hand, a picture might not be as clear as an actual source would be. This can lead to misinterpretation or can even lead to changes based on the deciphering of the image. In addition, a picture does give readers a visual record of the specific moment or time. However, based on that, while a person is reading a book and trying to understand the image to go along with it, the reader also has to think through and take into account that the picture could be based on the perspective of the illustrator or photographer.