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Maya Angelou Cleanliness

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Maya Angelou Cleanliness
“Momma convinced us that cleanliness was next to Godliness.” Throughout “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”, Maya Angelou expresses motif of cleanliness both figuratively and literally. By definition, the word Literally is an adjective that means “actually, without exaggeration.” In best usage, it is used when you are speaking about something that actually happened or when you are speaking about something in an exact sense. Figuratively is also an adjective, but its meaning is quite different from literally. Figuratively is defined as based on or making use of figures of speech or something being spoken about metaphorically. In Maya Angelou’s excerpt, “Thou shall not be dirty,” is one of Grandmother Henderson commandments that the African

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