“Some Memoirs of the Life of Job” written by Thomas Bluett was very interesting for me, and something I found really interesting was that this was written by a close acquaintance of the subject rather than himself. Additionally, the prayer-like introduction was another aspect I was a bit confused about, who is this “prayer” directed towards, God, Solomon, Job? As this reading continued Bluett began to recall the captivity of Job and being taken to America, Maryland to be exact. Reading this in terms of this course this reading reminded me that there are many situations in which ‘immigration’ is not how we perceive immigration. When I hear this term I think of people willingly move from one place to another but this put this whole course in a new perspective immediately as I started reading this. This was an interesting look at the difficulties due to language barriers and that as high status as Job was he was still taken captive due to language barriers.
The Diary Of John Harrower immediately is different than the first reading considering Harrower actually wrote this himself. Harrower was an indentured servant in America, we as readers learn early on that John left his wife and children in Lerwick Scotland. I was struck by the fact that his wife was from a “leading family” (pg.66) as described but he left Scotland and enter servitude. This related back to the point I made earlier about not all immigrants immigrating out of choice but out of necessity. This reading gave a great account of the possible average experience of an indentured servant from Scotland and similar countries to America.
3 thoughts on “Week 2 Readings Emma Monaghan”
I also thought it was interesting that “Some Memoirs of the Life of Job” was written by Bluett and not Job himself, and I wondered whether that affects its credibility in entirety, as it was filtered through Bluett’s thoughts and experiences, providing us the perspective of two people. I did not pick up on Harrower’s wife being from a leading family, but that is very interesting! I think that speaks to the economic troubles of the time, and I wonder if financial resources were limited to her because of her gender.
Both of these readings are very interesting in the sense that they provide a closer look at these immigration experiences, as you mentioned in your post, we don’t often look at how many people migrate by force or how this changes people’s experiences with these events. The Bluett piece being written by an outside perspective does bring a variety of questions, especially in regards to how Job felt regarding what was happening to him at the time. In contrast, reading John’s diary is very different since we know his thoughts and can see his obstacles clearly, especially when he doesn’t have enough money to pay for his necessities.
I liked how you mentioned force migration because I feel like that is something that isn’t really talked about. Forced because those who are taken cannot have a say, especially how you mentioned the language barrier. Along with mentioning religion and prayer, I believe it set a tone for the reading, maybe like a cry for help or just wanting to reassure.