In her recent book White Rage, Carol Anderson explores various time periods of progress made and how subsequently they each were met with by the history of white supremacist reaction, or white rage, to the African American fight for justice. Since the passing of the Thirteenth amendment to the Civil Rights movement to the election of President Barack Obama, white rage has fueled deliberate roll back to these achievements of African Americans.…
“Let’s stop believing that our differences make us superior or inferior to one another”- Don Miguel Ruiz. The novel “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett is a controversial and heart-wrenching story that depicts the cruel brutality and inequality that African Americans faced in Jackson, Mississippi during the early 1960’s. In the novel, Stockett shows the inequality between races, how Caucasian Americans believed they were superior, and the bigotry between social classes through the characterization of the main characters and bringing forth facts from that time setting. These issues have changed over the years but are yet still here in a more subtle way.…
Anne’s own growth and maturation are symbolic of the growth and maturation of the civil rights movement. In this book, Anne Moody talks extensively about the civil rights movement that she participated in. It dealt with numerous issues that had to do with racism and that many people did not agree with. Moody also include many contemporaries that would either make or break her equal right fight. “Coming of Age in Mississippi” gives the reader a first-hand look at the efforts that many people did to gain equal rights.…
Maria W. Stewart delivered an emotionally charged lecture that expressed her views regarding African American freedom and treatment in America. Stewart addresses many other positions and logically appeals to them. Stewart was trying to send the audience a message of awareness to the continued injustices and mental barriers America is facing. She uses allusions, pathos, and anecdotal evidence to effectively portray her position.…
Audre Lorde’s piece “The Uses of Anger” is written in direct reference to the racism colored women face, specifically black women. Her main argument is that black women are angry about the ample ways they are mistreated and ignored and how black women should use that fuel of anger to stand together, act, and create change in our society. This piece was written in 1981, a period of time where new policies were placed to make African American women with children dependent on public assistance, furthermore meaning that they didn’t have sufficient funds to partake in extracurricular activities such as conventions. This is relevant because Lorde references that by stating how the convention advocates for responding to racism however they refuse…
The first thought that comes to mind when talking about racism is the separation of two races based on skin tone. “In 1960, when a six-year-old girl enrolled in a white school in New Orleans, parents withdrew their white children in her class. She was the only child in her classroom for over a year.”(Baughman et. al.). In the 1960s, African Americans were mistreated in the US, mostly in the south. Kathryn Stockett, the author, assumed that society wouldn’t be as understanding in her writing The Help, because many wouldn’t clasp the fact that the nation was discriminating.(Stockett). For her, though, it was convenient to write about the other side of the situation in this era. “I don’t have to think about the dialect. It wasn’t hard for me to get that musicality on the page because I started writing the voice of Demeitre and she sounded exactly the way I wrote her.”(Stockett). Growing up, she had an African American maid,Demeitre, in which she got close with, and being accustomed to her always being around, it later got her to write Aibileen’s parts in the…
One afternoon his mother gave him money to purchase groceries from the market at the corner of the street. A gang of boys spotted Ricard with money in his hand. They saw him as an easy target and repeatedly beat him, stealing his money. Despite this, his mother would not allow Richard to set foot in the house until he had the groceries. She just gave him more money and sent him off again to buy groceries for the family. Richard, fearful that the boys will injure him, grabs a wooden stick as a weapon for self defense. The boys hastily confront Richard only to be brutally beaten by his wooden stick. For the first time in his life, Richard is prideful and joyful of such an accomplishment. However, he is fearful that he will be beaten in the future, causing Richard to act differently around his peers and engage in violence. This fear affects Richard because he is not acting like himself around others. He is constantly worrying about survival, not quality of life. Next, Richard chooses not to eat breakfast with his employer. This puts Richard in an uncomfortable situation that he chooses not to engage in. He does not want to eat with the white employer because he is fearful that something terribly wrong will happen. Also, Richard feels as if he will be put into a trap and forced to say something unruly and hurtful. It is intelligent of Richard to to disengage from such situation. This is especially true because he does not repeatedly act white. Richard is chastised by his employers for acting in such way. For example “You think you’re white, don’t you? ... No, sir. You’re acting mighty like it” (188). This clearly shows that the opinions and actions of the south deeply affect Richard’s behavior. Richard’s confusion leads him to be fearful because he does not yet know where he fits in with society. Due to this fear, he is extremely cautious in the way…
While King's Letter from Birmingham Jail is clear with a very direct message, Gates' In the Kitchen’s message is conveyed indirectly through subtext. Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s story is full of sensory descriptions and sentimentality. King’s essay is written to educate the reader and to instruct her how to “prepare for direct action” and “grapple with underlying causes” therefore having an instructive tone. In the Kitchen, in contrast, is a memory piece that gently, and with humor, scrapes the surface of racism and exposes what it is like to “challeng[e] follicle prestidigitation” as a black person in America. The Letter from Birmingham Jail is a vocal social cry for acceptance and “direct action”; its purpose is to school the reader and make him understand why fighting for civil rights is important at the immediate time as there is “no other alternative”. In the Kitchen shares, from personal experience, in the first person, both the realities of the daily home life of a black person and the struggles of doing one's hair; Gates' approaches racism in a way that is not obvious to a superficial reading. He delicately integrates the ideals of the black civil rights movement by telling a story of childhood experience. King's Letter from Birmingham Jail masterfully manages to confront racism head-on and urge that action be taken to uproot it without offending or disrespecting those who refuse to acknowledge the urgency of combating racism and believe action is “unwise and…
Harm has inflicted the black community and race in many ways. Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple, shows the violence put on the African American race and women during the early twentieth century. Walker demonstrates life during these hard times and how some things still haven’t changed; making the violence and harm inflicted on the black community a major theme of the story. The stereotype of violence inflicted on and in the black community, clearly shown through the characters in The Color Purple, helps achieve the author’s educating purpose.…
Racism was a harsh reality for African Americans after the American slave era and is a prominent theme in the short story “Battle Royal”. This story highlights how racism is not only a powerful tool used to keep people down but can also promote savagery. The author, Ralph Ellison, uses vivid imagery to depict the acts of savagery shown by both the slaves and the white crowd.…
In this essay written by African American Shelby Steele, he tells of the hard times of his people. He leads the reader through his experiences in the civil rights movement and compares the life of an African American in the 1960’s and one in the present day. He writes that African Americans today would have to use ever ounce of their intelligence and imagination to find reasons for them not to succeed in today’s society. He goes on to say that African Americans use the harm done for them in the past and try to use it as guilt for the white Americans. It goes on to explain the importance in fighting for a cause in a group and not breaking off as individuals.…
In this novel, Harper Lee depicts the prejudice and hate of a time period through the eyes of a young person, while portraying the contrasting ways of thinking within society. So much so, in fact, that a white boy is brought to tears because of the palpable hate emanating from community members. The book has a number of instances in which African-Americans are either displayed as inferior to or are scorned by whites. So much so that in 1935 Alabama, laws were in effect that meant blacks were legally discriminated against, albeit with a pretence of equality. The point of view of the book is of a child who doesn’t understand the concept of discrimination and has begun her climb onto the hatred bandwagon. However, the family of the main character does not support racism, and different views on the subject are on display.…
All of the characters in this book played a pivotal role in developing the themes of the book: justice, racism, prejudice, and sexism. The use of rhetorical devices allows for the author’s ideas to surface and enable the readers to encapsulate the concept of the text. Harper Lee used…
In the first part of the paper we discuss “The Welcome Table” by Alice Walker and further on in the paper we will compare this short story with Country Lovers written by Nadine Gordimer. In this short story, we will learn about how two people who loved each other were forbidden to be with each other because they were of a different race. We see how huge of issue racism was and still is in modern day times. As we read this story, one cannot help but be intrigued by how the story speaks about the elderly lady and how she has lived her life and had been treated her whole life. Both of these short stories are similar to each other because both women had to deal with racial discrimination and the difference between the two was that in Country Lovers, it was more about two people who loved each other and did not allow the color of their skin keep them from loving each other. These short stories help give the readers a look at how hard it was back in those days for people of color to live and survive…
In Michelle Alexander's “The New Jim Crow” book, Alexander challenges the belief that racism does not exist in America today. She instead, suggests that racism exists today but in a different, more subtle, way. She explores America’s history and key points the significant movements our country has gone through in regards to racial discrimination. In doing this, she offers her point of view in how those movements are still represented in our government and society today. She especially, emphasizes the idea that Jim Crow is prominent in America, just how it was in centuries before.…