Spirituals: Social Science

Spirituals

This song is "Wade in the Water" it is a song that informs slaves how to escape because if they go in the water they cant be caught.

What is a spiritual: A spiritual is a song that was used to help slaves with things like how to escape and people still use it today to show the culture and background of black Americans. They were used heaps and sung throughout the day when slaves were hard at work. Nowadays you may hear them anywhere including in popular rap songs and from popular brands.

Who is Harriet Tubman? Harriet Tubman is known for helping slaves escape from the owners. As an ex-slave, she was used to the song that was sung and used music to help escape. The way they did this was to use an underground railroad that when all around and through the slave states. These railroads were kept secret and slave owners did not know about it.

Spiritual songs were sung by African slaves to give them hope and sometimes give secret messages to help them communicate without having the bad people listen. They used songs like 'wade in the water' so they can tell the people when they run go to the water and so the dogs can't track them when they run. These songs were also used by Harriet Tubman who was an enslaved woman who escaped and that used these songs to tell others that it's safe and to go to a certain place. She used the underground railway to which was a connected tunnel and safe house that was used to move more slaves up north where they would be free. Wade in the water is a popular one now for it was sung a lot. 'You don't believe I've been redeemed, Wade in the water, Just so the whole lake goes looking for me, God's gonna trouble the water'