In the YouTube web series Ask a Slave<\/i>, the creator Azie Dungey comically portrays a slave living on George Washington\u2019s plantation in the late 18th<\/sup> century. Using her historical knowledge of the time period, and an extremely dry wit, she sarcastically answers real questions posed to her by individuals she encountered while working as an historical reenactor at Mt. Vernon. Azie, under the alias of the slave Lizzie Mae, admirably illustrates with humor the shocking lack of knowledge that many Americans possess about early American history.<\/p>\n Dungey\u2019s video really highlights a collective ignorance in America about slavery in the United States. Many of the questions posed to Azie where simply shocking to me. Some of the more outrageous questions and statements included the following: \u201cSlavery wasn\u2019t that bad!,\u201d \u201cDo you have any white friends?,\u201d and \u201cWhat does George Washington think about Abraham Lincoln freeing all of his slaves?\u201d In my opinion, the questions posed to Azie are just absurd. Moreover, It\u2019s disconcerting to me that people would still think that \u201cslavery isn\u2019t that bad,\u201d particularly because it still exists as an underground institution in today\u2019s society. I found myself wishing that the person who made this statement could face the conditions that early slaves did, if only for a couple of days. Perhaps this would allow them to see what a deplorable, degrading, and dehumanizing practice slavery is.<\/p>\n I feel as if the author of the post Ask a Slave\u2019s Critique of the American Education System <\/i>made an extremely important point when stating that we cannot let Azie\u2019s message get lost in her humor. Azie\u2019s comedic influence in her work is certainly valuable. It makes her videos more accessible and interesting to her audience, and I feel it is a major factor in why they have achieved such recognition and success. However, it\u2019s all too easy to allow ourselves to just take that humor at face value, instead of looking past it and trying to understand why Azie actually made these videos. \u00a0I don\u2019t think Azie is just making her videos because these questions are ridiculous or funny. She\u2019s purposely illustrating a rather shocking and sad ignorance about our nation\u2019s history among the general populace<\/p>\n Overall, I feel as if Ask a Slave<\/i> is an important web series. Dungey\u2019s videos are witty, sarcastic, and supremely funny. More important, however, is the fact that they highlight a real lack of knowledge about the early history of the United States. I feel that we as Americans have a responsibility to learn about the history of our country. While this country is certainly one of the greatest on this earth, many mistakes were made along the way to reach the point where we are now. It\u2019s important to learn about them. We don\u2019t want them to happen again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In the YouTube web series Ask a Slave, the creator Azie Dungey comically portrays a slave living on George Washington\u2019s plantation in the late 18th century. Using her historical knowledge of the time period, and an extremely dry wit, she sarcastically answers real questions posed to her by individuals she encountered while working as an … <\/p>\n