Summary Of Champion Of The World By Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou’s Champion of the World excerpt is set in a racially controversial time in history. A time where blacks were still treated differently simply for the color of their skin, not to say that we are not even today. During this time, there was a constant battle in the daily lives of Americans of every color, race, and ethnicity to assert their dominance and declare their importance. This was especially true of the American Negro, the only race to ever be a slave on the nations soil, the only race to be denied access to every tool for advancement without ever being a serious contender. Tools as simple as equality and as easily attainable as land were declared to be too good for the Negro. Blacks began to fight for what they deserved. Soma battles made the simplest demands while others called for economic reform. There were athletes breaking into sports that were, prior to, all white.
They know that depending on who is on the receiving end, those hits are going total up to a decision. Someone has to win and someone has to swallow the bitter pill of defeat. No, actually it is much deeper than that. If blacks lost, it would have diminished the glimmer of possibility that they were equal to everyone else in the eyes of their oppressors. Likewise, if white won it would boost their collective ego so greatly that equality for the Negro would be an even more foreign concept out of reach to even be imagined. When Louis takes a punch, his supporters become tense and focus on the battle at hand. In this, they are much like the onlookers of every protest and legislative debacle. When things are not looking as promising, they hone in on the mission. They conjure up every remaining whim of motivation, determination, and strategy to do what is needed; much like Louis when he was the underdog in the fight. When times get tough, that’s when they pull out the finishing