self-worth

One of the remarkable attributes of American slaves was how little each of them appeared to have internalized a lack of her or his self-worth. The sense of value in the self kept alive their hopes for release from undeserved bondage and fueled the fires of their efforts to struggle against slavery. For slave women their realization of the interlocking nature of race and gender oppression forced them to greater self-dependency in order to survive. Central to the will to survive was the knowledge that others, especially children, could not survive unless they did. This sense of responsibility for the future of the race, handed down from one generation of women to the next, together with the support that emanated from within the women's community, was among the most important of internal resources on which slave women drew to sustain themselves and help those who depended on them.

--Nellie Y. McKay, "The Narrative Self: Race, Politics, and Culture in Black American Women's Autobiography"