On Being Brought from Africa to America: Issue of Race

Wheatly´s poem “On being brought from Africa to America” consists of two central messages. First Wheatly´s gratitude for her Christian salvation that “mercy” embodied as the enslavement brought her not only to America, but, “thaught [her] benighted soul to understand.” Second there is a subtle message, a delicate revolutionary thought, dealing with the issue of race. “Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain” describes the importance to remember that those who do right according to Christian belief and are converted and saved like Wheatly will be rewarded in heaven regardless of their skin colour. Her subtle emphasis on religion becomes a gateway for her statement against racism that every other slave should be equal on earth as well. The diversity of tone as at first there is gratitude tuned with understanding, yet in the end authoritative diction and sound creates a more mild, soothing than aggressive tone and claim on racism. The Ballot or the Bullet" speech by Malcolm X concerns the crossroads, a descriptive determination, that Afro Americans have to encounter, choosing between trusting in American democracy and justice to eventually gain equality “the ballot” or taking matters into their own hands becoming much more militant “the bullet”. In fact Afro Americans either need to push harder for their rights to be acknowledged by society or there is a need of a physical fight against the system to overcome the “American nightmare”. With patience and faith, in 1964 Afro Americans still encountered segregation. Malcolm´s religious background, his aggressive negotiation, contrasting juxtaposition and provocation like “[...] if the white man does not want us to be anti-white, let him stop oppressing and exploiting and degrading us” or “our mothers and fathers invested sweat and blood” creates a too aggressive tone, militant and radical,. DuBois first chapter in “Souls of Black Folk”, brings awareness to the fact that there is a “problem of the twentieth century,