What is a spiritual? How would you be able to determine what a spiritual is if you don't know the meaning.meaning? Where did spirituals come from? In this essay I will explain the development of spirituals and how it wasthey were used inby slaves in every day duties and how they were able to express how they felt butby singing spirituals. You will also learn about some of the songs and what techniques slaves, and also songwriters used. Some think spirituals isare just songsongs people sing inside of a church to get the congregation involved with the preacher but once you understand where it all started you will have a better understanding.

A spiritual is a religious song that is associated with black Christians of the southern US, and thought to derive from the combination of European hymns and African musical elements by black slaves. That is the internet versiononline definition of what a spiritual is, but if you dig deeper you would be able to find the development of spirituals. Spirituals are a genre of American folk music that articulate the suffering, longing, and religious passion of African Americans during slavery and its aftermath. Religious hymns, work songs, along with traditional African rhythms and chanting styles all contributed to the development of spirituals.

A spiritual is also a form of singing that is most closely associated with the enslavement of African people in the American South. The songs proliferated in the last few decades of the eighteenth century leading up to the abolishment of legalized slavery in the 1860s1860's. The African American spiritual constitutes one of the largest and most significant forms of American folk song. In the 1960s1960's, spirituals waswere also called Negro spritualsspirituals, as “Negro” was another name for blblack people.