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Martin Luther King speech about racism
Martin Luther King's perspective on racial discrimination
Martin Luther King speech about racism
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George Yancy, in his piece Dear White People, tries to get white people to recognize their racism just like he recognizes his apparent sexism. This is a bold move by Dr. Yancy, who is a professor at Georgia State University. The quote above, is a simple statement of his goal for his New York Times article from December 24th, 2015. My reaction to this quote and the entire article is; why I am being blamed, as an individual, for black suppression and my overall happiness in the system? Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. taught us to not judge by one’s color of their skin, but by the content of my character. Yancy goes against these teachings, as he uses group politics to race bait white people into a certain reaction that he will use to prove his point.
One of the most influential and enlightening scholars in contemporary academics who focuses primarily on African-American issues, both from the past and the present, is undoubtedly Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Born in 1950 and raised in the small, middle-class, 'colored' community of Piedmont, West Virginia, Gates's acclaimed 1995 autobiography, Colored People, brings readers to a place and time in America when both the racial boundaries and the definition of progress were changing weekly. Colored People, however, is not about race specifically. Rather, it is a story which chronicles how his family existed during a unique time in American history -- a time when attempts at desegregation were just beginning. Starting with a preface that takes the form of a letter written to his daughters, Maggie and Liza, and continuing on throughout the rest of the book, Gates -- in spite of the fact that he graduated summa cum laude from Yale and received a Ph.D. from Cambridge University -- writes his autobiography in a conversational tone that is so accessible that it comes off as though he is telling his story to the reader in person and for the first time, thus making us both understand and empathize with it more. Through his story, he provides details about all the characters that influenced his life -- from Uncle Earke the Turkey, who loved to rant about the female sex, to his grandmother Big Mom, who founded the local Episcopal church, onto to his first true love, the little bookworm Linda, and finally Reverend Monroe, who inspired all who came into contact with him -- but he pays special attention to describing his mother. Based off the writing in Colored People, Gates's mother was one of the bravest, accomplished, and most determined ...
This week I read the short article on Alan Locke’s, “Enter the New Negro”. This article is discussing the Negro problem in depth. “By shedding the chrysalis of the Negro problem, we are achieving something like spiritual emancipation”. Locke believes that if we get rid of whatever is holding us back we would gain something renewing and beautiful.
Lynching of black men was common place in the south as Billie Holiday sang her song “Strange Fruit” and the eyes of justice looked the other way. On the other side of the coin, justice was brought swiftly to those blacks who stepped out of line and brought harm to the white race. Take for instance Nate Turner, the slave who led a rebellion against whites. Even the Teel’s brought their own form of justice to Henry Marrow because he “said something” to one of their white wives (1). Flashing forward a few years later past the days of Jim Crow and the fight for civil rights, several, but not all in the younger generation see the members of the black and white race as equal and find it hard to fathom that only a few years ago the atmosphere surrounding racial relations was anything but pleasant.
The poem, “My Great-Grandfather’s Slaves” by Wendell Berry, illustrates the guilt felt for the sins of a man’s ancestors. The poem details the horror for the speaker’s ancestors involvement in slavery and transitions from sympathy for the slaves to feeling enslaved by his guilt. Berry uses anaphora, motif, and irony, to express the speaker’s guilt and provide a powerful atmosphere to the poem.
“I repeatedly forgot each of the realizations on this list until I wrote it down. For me, white privilege has turned out to be an elusive and fugitive subject. The pressure to avoid it is great, for in facing it I must give up the myth of meritocracy. If these things are true, this is not such a free country; one’s life is not what one makes it; many doors open for certain people through no virtues of their own.”
Conflicted Often, people go through changes in their lives based on experiences. Former KKK member, Claiborne Ellis would be one of those people whose experiences changed his mentality. Certainly, having conflicted ideas about other races, is a challenge in itself. So, after reading Why I quit the Klan, I could not imagine a racist honestly changing his view on his personal feelings on other races.
"My Children are black. They don't look like your children. They know that they are black, and we want it recognized. It's a positive difference, an interesting difference, and a comfortable natural difference. At least it could be so, if you teachers learned to value difference more. What you value, you talk about.'" p.12
In relation to the “Implicit association test, which measures unconscious bias,” Myers acknowledges that “Seventy percent of white people taking that test prefer white.” Not only do white people prefer someone of their race, but “Fifty percent of black people taking that test prefer white” as well. Informing us of the results from the IAT (Implicit Association Test) helps showcase that there is a clear bias among us that “we’ve been schooled in.” Myers provides this data in order to further justify that we all play a role in the “prejudices that fuel those kinds of tragic incidents” that happened to the black men mentioned in the previous paragraph. Conversely with a grandiose tone, the diversity advocate explains that the problem isn’t so much that “we see color” its “what we do when we see the color.” Verna Myers bringing this issue to light is effective in the sense that it makes her audience re-evaluate their standpoint within these specific instances. Are their prejudices a part of the problem?” Yes. Verna Myers is well aware that “we are not shooting people down in the street” nonetheless, we still contribute to the issue until we are willing to “look within and being to change
Because Blacks are stereotyped to be "uncivilized", whites have the "private fears to be projected onto the Negro." (96) Fear only promotes further racism, and the labyrinth of attitudes. He states that the problem with racial oppression will never be resolved unless the white man gives up his power.
People get their identities from the people who they surround themselves with and from the society in which they live. Identity as far a race was created by this hierarchy where those who were white deemed themselves more powerful and superior. Honneth would say to Coates, identity is relational and because of this we cannot be indifferent to instances of disrespect from those who surround us in this country. We are all in some way vulnerable to instances of disrespect, but it is the way in which we respond to these instances of disrespect that matter. Not only is this true for those who are experiencing this disrespect but for those showing this disrespect as well. Honneth would say that once we gain awareness of these vulnerabilities of disrespect we can then provide ourselves with the motivation to change certain socially unjust situations. Coates discusses multiple times that by his son becoming “politically conscious” that he can recognize why blacks are experiencing these instances of disrespect and what he can do to deal with
... 11-13, 1997), white-studies guru Noel Ignatiev remarked: "Now that White Studies has become an academic industry, with its own dissertation mill, conference, publications, and no doubt soon its junior faculty, it is time for the abolitionists to declare where they stand in relation to it. Abolitionism is first of all a political project: the abolitionists study whiteness in order to abolish it....Whiteness is not merely oppressive and false, it is nothing but oppressive and false. As James Baldwin said, 'So long as you think you are white, there is no hope for you.'"
His essay reminded me of a personal experience, the first racial experience of mine, and dealing with a person who knew no better. I experienced this while living in the South. It was a early morning in sunny Florida, I was on my way to school and my friends and I were riding the school bus. When a Caucasian girl got on the bus and saw that there was only one seat available and it just so happened to be a seat next to a black girl. So she decides that she rather...
As I read Black Boy, Griffin provided me with a small insight on the way whites and blacks were differently treated. Black Like Me was based on a white man who wanted to get a better understanding of the life of negroes and how it feels to be treated unequally. He wanted to know what stood between the white man and black man, why they could not communicate. Griffin writes in his book that, “the only way I could see to bridge the gap between us was to become a Negro” (Griffin 1). His journey then began and he lived the life of a black man. It is with such bravery that he went and risked becoming a Negro. He knew that adverse consequences would occur once people knew the truth. He did not care; I was fascinated with his desire to see what...
Zora Neale Hurston’s writing embodies the modernism themes of alienation and the reaffirmation of racial and social identity. She has a subjective style of writing in which comes from the inside of the character’s mind and heart, rather than from an external point of view. Hurston addresses the themes of race relations, discrimination, and racial and social identity. At a time when it is not considered beneficial to be “colored,” Hurston steps out of the norm and embraces her racial identity.
Before taking this class, I never really delved into the idea of whiteness. I knew it was a thing, but no one ever talked about. However, after going to the passionate difficult dialogue on whiteness, I saw its impact on many of my peers. Also, I have seen how it has perpetuated a lot of hurt in society and a feeling of non-inclusion. Whiteness is the idea of the white race or culture having privileges or advantages in the United States through the government , media , corporations , schools and much more. This process of whiteness perpetuates racism in America. You don’t have to be white to employ whiteness. Whiteness is always present even when white people aren’t there. There are many situation sin the book in which whiteness was revealed. Irvin bribes the police officer to let Ma Rainey off the hook. Irvin proclaims “ (Slides a bill from his pocket)Look, Officer. I’m Madame Rainey manger…as soon as we’re finished with the recording session, I’ll personally stop by the precinct house and straightening up this misunderstanding .”(Wilson ,pg. 52). Another scene the displays whiteness in society is when Cutler has to ask Irvin for a specific form of payment. He has to ask fro this specific form because Cutler is unable to cash his check anywhere. As Hampton said in “The People Have to Have the Power” , the people have the power, it belongs to the people. The by product of capitalism is racism and one