STUDY GUIDE FOR HARRIET TUBMAN: THE CHOSEN ONE PERFORMED BY GWENDOLYN BRILEY-STRAND “Am I not a man and a brother?” (Woodcut rare book collection – detailed of broadside John Greenly Whittier’s Our Countryman in chains 1837). Photograph Library of Congress See The Fruits, Inc. PO Box 44322 Fort Washington, MD 20749-4322 Educational Programming Teaching Guidelines "Harriet Tubman The Chosen" uses the art form of theater to promote the "big idea" of The Power of ONE. Demonstrating the endurance of the human spirit. Leaving the audience with the essential question, "what can you as one person do to make this world a better place". Its services grade levels three through adult The program will give the students Experience with an art form developed by a professional artist and the opportunity to interact with the art form and the artist. a) Experiencing live theatre. b) Experiencing the emotions of a fugitive slave. c) Hearing and learning the Secret Language of the Spirituals. d) Meeting Harriet Tubman. The program will give students Understanding and illuminate the art form through its cultural context, creative processes and the role of the artist and artistic expression. a) Students will understand an actor's job to use their body, voice and imagination. b) Students will learn that even with minimal sets and props they can create a different world. c) Students will understand the importance of theatre edict. d) Students will understand the privilege of Freedom and the power of ONE. The program will engage student participation in the process of Creating. a) Students will have the opportunity to become actors themselves. b). Students will create visually, the scenery of the play by using their imagination. c) Within themselves they are creating the emotion's of being a disenfranchised people d) Students are re-creating a moment in history The program will enable and encourage participants in Connecting the program content to personal experiences, other academic learning and/or life skill development. a). Connecting them with historical information in the curriculum b) how the characters in the play are connected to their own value system. c). Connecting your ancestry as a source of pride and respecting the ancestry of others. d). Connecting intellectually and emotionally the importance of not taking freedom for granted. Harriett Tubman The Chosen One Synopsis Harriet Tubman The Chosen One is a forty-five minute performance about the life of the great abolitionist Harriet Ross Tubman Davis. Gwendolyn Briley-Strand is an accomplished actor who will take you along with her on one of Ms. Tubman's many journeys on the Underground Railroad. She transforms into over a dozen different characters right before your eyes, transporting you to a time you've only read about. Ms. Briley- Strand's captivating performance makes every audience member search within their own hearts to see how they can continue the work of this great woman Harriet Tubman The Chosen One starts with the audience in real time. Ms. Briley-Strand gives her audience a brief description of who Harriet Tubman was and why we celebrate her as a great American hero. She then teaches the audience Ms. Tubman's signature song, Go Down Moses. She explains the significance this and many of the Negro spirituals had in the lives of enslaved people and the significance these songs had in the secret workings of the Underground Railroad. Next Ms. Briley-Strand asked her audience to close their eyes and travel back in time with her as she becomes Harriet Tubman and as they become runaway fugitives. Together they travel, on the Underground Railroad, to freedom in the North. Throughout the play, you will meet many people that both helped and hindered Harriet Tubman throughout her journeys. You'll meet Harriet Tubman's father, Benjamin Ross and hear how he teaches her how to use her senses to discern her environment, as she travels through the woods and swamps. You'll meet Ms. Tubman's masters and the white people her masters rented her out to. You'll meet her husband, John Tubman and some of her brothers. You'll meet some of the abolitionists, both white and black that helped her along the way. The costuming and props in Harriet Tubman The Chosen One are a vital part of the performance. Watch as Ms. Briley-Strand uses hats, pipes, glasses, shawls, handkerchiefs and whips to change into many different characters. Harriet Tubman The Chosen One allows you, the audience to have an educational experience you will remember for years to come. See The Fruits, Inc. PO Box 44322 Fort Washington, MD 20749-4322 VOCABULARY Quarter – The area on the plantation where the slaves lived The Big House – Where the plantation owner and his family lived Fugitive – A runaway slave Patterollers – Patrols that hunted down runaway slaves for a bounty a slave or prevent his arrest. In 1850 the Clay Compromise was enacted, strengthening the 1793 Fugitive Slave Act. Federal officers were now offered a fee for the slaves they caught Manumission – A slave owner could free his slaves after his death in his will The Underground Railroad – A secret and illegal network of Anti-Slavery activist, that consisted of conductors, stationmasters, fugitives and free blacks. The Philadelphia Vigilance Committee – An organization, formed to assist fugitive slaves. It was managed by two of the Underground Railroad’s busiest “station masters” white clergyman James Miller McKim and William Still, a freeborn black Pennsylvanian. See The Fruits, Inc. PO Box 44322 Fort Washington, MD 20749-4322 Harriet Tubman (1820 - 1913) A run away slave herself, Harriet Tubman helped lead many slaves to freedom on the “Underground Railroad”. Served the Union Army as a nurse and a spy. Harriet Tubman is often thought of as a figure in the distant American past, yet she lived into the twentieth century. She is shown here in a photograph taken shortly before her death in 1913. See The Fruits, Inc. PO Box 44322 Fort Washington, MD 20749-4322 When its lantern was lit this Faithful Groomsman hitching post welcomed fugitives to the Underground Railroad station in New Hope Northern escape routes. Pennsylvania Southern escape routes. See The Fruits, Inc. PO Box 44322 Fort Washington, MD 20749-4322 Go Down, Moses D A D When Israel was in Egypt's land; Let my people go D A D pressed so hard they could not stand; Let my people go G D Go down Moses - 'w ay down in Egypt's land, B D A D tell ole - Pharao - let my people go Thus spoke the Lord, bold Moses said, let my people go If not I'll smite your first born dead, let my people go. Go down, Moses . Your foes shall not before you stand, let my people go. And you'll possess fair Canaan's land, let my people go Go down, Moses . You'll not get lost in the wilderness, let my people go, with a lighted candle in your breast let my people go. Go down, Moses . No more shall they in bondage toil, let my people go. Let them come out with Egypt's spoil, let my people go. Go down, Moses . Oh let us all from bondage flee, let my people go. And let us all in Christ be free. Go down, Moses . See The Fruits, Inc. PO Box 44322 Fort Washington, MD 20749-4322 Many Thousand Go 2. No more driver's lash, for me. 4. No more hundred lash for me' 8. No more pint o' salt for me. 6. No more mistress' call for me. See The Fruits, Inc. PO Box 44322 Fort Washington, MD 20749-4322 Harriet Tubman’s Song of Freedom “When dat ar ole chariot comes, I’m gwine to lebe you, I’m boun’ for de promised land, Frien’s, Im gwine to lebe you.” “I’m sorry, frien’s, tolebe you, Farewell ! Oh, farewell ! But I’ll meet you in de mornin’, Farewell ! oh, farewell !” “I’ll meet you in de mornin’, When you reach de promised land; On de oder side of Jordan, For I’m boun’ for de promised land.” These are Harriet Tubman’s words that she sang as she escaped from the plantation on which she was enslaved in Dorchester Co., Maryland. They were printed in HARRIET TUBMAN: THE MOSES OF HER PEOPLE, by Sara Bradford. See The Fruits, Inc. PO Box 44322 Fort Washington, MD 20749-4322 BOOKS: Harriet Tubman – Myth, Memory, And History, by Milton C. Sernett, Duke University Press Harriet Tubman – The Road To Freedom, by Catherine Clinton, Little, Brown & Company Harriet Tubman – The Life and the Life Stories, by Jean M. Humez, The University of Wisconsin Press A Picture Book of Harriet Tubman, by David A. Adler, New York Holiday House 1992 Harriet Tubman: The Moses of Her People, by Bradford, Sarah New York: Citadel 1961 Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad, by Ann Lane Petry, New York: Crowell 1955 Harriet Tubman – A Biography, by James A. Gowan and William C. Kushatus Harriet Tubman Bound For The Promise Land, by Kate Clifford Larson Harriet Tubman Imagine A Life, by Beverly Lowry MUSIC: “Music and the Underground Railroad,” The Kim and Reggie Harris Group, 1984, Ascension Records, Box 18871 Philadelphia PA 19119. VIDEO: “Harriet Tubman: The Chosen One” An award winning documentary adapted from the one-woman play. Available online at www.seethefruits.com, or See The Fruits, PO Box 44322, Fort Washington MD 20749 “A Christmas Journey To Freedom” An award winning video produced by Day of Discovery. Available online at www.dod.org, or www.seethefruits.com. See The Fruits, Inc.