More handpicked essays just for you.
The importance of education in the prison system
Malcolm X’s “A Homemade Education”
Importance of education in prison
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Prison Studies Considered
In "Prison Studies" Malcolm X briefly details how, during his incarceration, he embarked on a process of self-education that forever changed him and the course of his life. Malcolm writes of his determination to learn to read and write, born out of his envy and emulation of Bimbi, a fellow prisoner. His innate curiosity, sense of pride, and ambition to learn and be someone of substance motivated him to study relentlessly. As he learned more about the world he developed a great thirst for knowledge that left him with a lifelong desire that only his continued studies could satisfy. He believed that prison offered him the best possible situation in which to educate himself.
This idea of Malcolm's, that prison was the best situation in which to educate himself bears some examination. He dismisses the idea of going to college as being inferior to the education he received in prison. He speculates that college is perhaps filled with too many distractions (both ideas are found in the last paragraph of his essay, 19). While Malcolm states his argument in a way that is simple, direct and compelling, it is not an argument that is appropriate for every potential student. One would do well to consider Malcolm X's particular circumstances and his intended audience.
As far as his education in prison being superior to one he would receive in college, one should consider why he would think in this way. It is obvious that his education would have put him at about the junior high school level. For a man of his age and race and resources, at the time in which he lived, there were probably very few options available for remedial education. It is remarkable and admirable that Malcolm was invested with the intelligenc...
... middle of paper ...
... distractions. There are, however, a number of disadvantages to prison studies beside the obvious threats to life and limb.
The requirements of colleges are intended for a greater purpose than to extract the maximum amount of time and money from the hapless student. The requirements of higher education are intended to provide a wide-ranging and well-balanced view of the world and our place in it. A complete education is intended to provide us with the tools to understand and interpret what we study. A balanced education teaches us the hard-learned lessons of history, the logical methodology of mathematics and philosophy, the transcendent vision of the poet and the artists and the skeptical review of the scientist. While I have great respect, admiration and even affection for Malcolm X, I suspect that even this great man would have benefited from a formal education.
The reading on Malcolm X had lots of points that hit everyday society in America for African Americans. Malcolm X was like any other man hustling on the streets to get by, like a lot you see in today society with the drug dealers and such. Starting off Malcolm X was not an intelligent man; he didn’t know how to write without a little slang to his words, he didn’t know how to articulate what he wanted to be said. Malcolm X was convicted of robbery and was sent to Charleston Prison, but was later sent off to the Norfolk Prison Colony School, this is where he gave himself the educated needed to be a well productive citizen. Malcolm X stated, “I saw that the best thing I could do was get hold of a dictionary-to study, to learn some new words (p.211). “I spent two days just riffling uncertainly through the dictionary’s pages.” “Finally, just to start some kind of action, I began copying.” Here Malcolm X is seeing his time being served in prisons to not only be a lessoned learned but to learn something that he knew he would never learn...
His quest for an education had begun, but it would be a long one. He decries how it all really began while he was being held at the Charlestown Prison. Bimbi, a fellow prisoner, was very intelligent and Malcolm envied his gift. Bimbi encouraged him to read and Malcolm would try but would end up quitting because he would skip the words he didn't know and keep reading. The problem with this was that he could never fully understand what he was reading and would put the book down. So he decided that he needed to learn how to read and write properly.
Both of them were alienated. In "Paterson Public Library", "she was afraid of being beaten up by a black girl and the library became her sanctuary." (Cofer73). While in "Prison Studies" Malcolm X was incarcerated and alienated from society and the learning that went on within his mind became his freedom.
Macbeth rejects conformation to traditional gender roles in its portrayal of Lady Macbeth’s relationship with her husband, her morals and their effect on her actions, and her hunger for power. Her regard for Macbeth is one of low respect and beratement, an uncommon and most likely socially unacceptable attitude for a wife to have towards her spouse at the time. She often ignores morality and acts for the benefit of her husband, and subsequently herself. She is also very power-hungry and lets nothing stand in the way of her success. Lady Macbeth was a character which challenged expectations of women and feminism when it was written in the seventeenth century.
Simon Sinek, in the YouTube video “The Millennials in the Workplace Interview”, states that Millennials need to learn balance with their social media and physical life. According to Sinek, a millennial is a person born approximately between 1984-2000. Throughout the Interview, Simon is very zealous, empathetic, apologetic, and humorous. He uses metaphors, They Say I Say, diction, and parallel structure.
There are close to 12 million Asian Americans living in the United States (U.S. Asian, 2000). Asian Americans are considered one of the fastest growing minorities (Pimentel, 2001). Between 1990 and 1999, the Asian population rose 43% (Census, 2000). However, Asian Americans are still portrayed in a simplistic manner by the American media, which in turn, promotes stereotyping. I have researched various types of mass media in the United States, such as: music, films, television and magazines. I will focus on several examples where Asian Americans are portrayed in a negative way. Furthermore, I will give examples of musicians, and independent films that prove Asian Americans have potential on what they can contribute to in the American media. Finally, I will recommend different ways to rid the stereotype put on Asian Americans by actions that can be taken, not only pertaining to Asians, but to other ethnicities that face stereotypes on their culture.
How his time spent in prison made him strive for more knowledge. Also, how he taught himself how to be more articulate. Malcolm X had an agenda of why he wanted to convey himself in more literary manner. Malcolm x talks about his use of language, he uses words
Malcolm X’s “Learning to Read,” is a powerful piece about his time in prison when he taught himself how to read. Through his reading, he discovered the awful things that happened in history and became a civil rights activist. Malcolm X changed his feeling and position throughout his piece, “Learning to Read.” His emotions are clear in his writing, but the change in his writing is clear to be caused by a change in his own thoughts because of the things he learned. The essay shows his lack of reading skills when he was young, but also how interested he became in it, and how much he uses it. He says that reading is important to readers' lives just as it was to his, helping one to form their own thoughts and views. Without the ability to read and understand the world, it becomes difficult to build your own ethical views.
He wanted to be able to properly write his thoughts and opinions out to be understood. He wanted to leave an impression on people to give them a thought of him exceeding his education far beyond the eighth grade. That impression was credited to his “prison studies” (Malcolm X 1). He had a voice that needed to be heard all over to bring a change to society. He self educated himself day and night with the dictionary, teachings ,and books. Malcolm X considered that “three or four hours of sleep a night” was enough (Malcolm X 3). Malcolm X became interested in the “glorious history of the black man” (Malcolm X 3). “Book after book” showed him the “white man had brought upon the world’s black, brown,red,and yellow peoples every variety of the suffering of exploitation” (Malcolm X 4). Like Douglass, Malcolm found the “Faustian machinations” of the “white man” against the “non-white victims” (Malcolm X). Douglass states, “I feared they might be treacherous.” Unlike Douglass being social and receiving help from others around , Malcolm was to himself and seeked information on his own through books. Malcolm X had more pride in his education and wasn 't afraid to share his knowledge, “Mr. Muhammed, to whom I was writing daily, had no idea of what a new world had opened up to me through my efforts to document his teachings in books” (Malcolm X 6). Malcolm X had some basic education knowledge
Millennials were born in 1980 to 2000 and the Gen X was born in 1960 to 1980. These two are very different to each, some would even say that the gen x are jealous of the millennials. According to Hess, millennials are more engaged unlike the gen x they’re defined as “slackers”. He also said that gen x are more likely to be cliquish and exclusive, they like to hang out in their own group and exclude others. On the other hand millennials are more diverse and inclusive, they include others and Hess also stated that “Millennials are actually giving wings to the American eagle, for everyone to hang out together”. The gen x are known for their motto as “Work hard, play hard”, as in order to have time to relax and have fun, they have to work hard before. But, the millennials are known for playing while working. Millennials found a way to play while working; like while typing an essay for school, we have another window open to watch Netflix with. I, as a millennial, grew up with technology. iPod, laptops, kindles, and etc. were already here to be use. If I need to write a research paper, I don’t need to go to the library and check out books on the topic like the gen x. I can just easily go online on my laptop or even my phone to get all the information I need. According to Hess, the gen x couldn’t connect with each other; if they wanted to hang out they wouldn’t be able to contact each other. But nowadays we have phones and iPod that allow us to go on social Medias, literally everybody know what everybody is doing. Even though that is a great thing for everybody to be able to connect with one another, we millennials tend to let social media 's take over their life. The millennials don’t live in the moment, they just go on their phone and worry about stuff that isn 't even their business, so the gen x have the upper hand on this
Life for Millennials is not as easy as it has been said to be. According to Taylor Tepper, an editor of Money Magazine, when the Great Recession peaked in 2010, the large mass of Millennials graduating college were more vulnerable being that the unemployment rate among young adults peaked at 14% (Tepper). A Pew Research Center survey came to the conclusion that “Millennials are the first in the modern era to have higher levels of debt, poverty and unemployment, and lower levels of wealth and personal income than their two immediate predecessor generations had at the same time” (Tepper). In addition, David Bass, a Millennial himself and author of “The Millennial Generation Lacks a Strong Work Ethic,” states that the current employment rate for young adults is 55.3%, “the lowest rate since the end of World War Two” (Bass). These numbers do not tell it all, rather “a generation’s greatness is not determined by data; it’s determined by how they react to the challenges that befall them,” challenges that this generation does not fall short of
Malcolm X while in prison completed his first transformation. Like many great figures and history makers had a low point in is life. At this time Malcolm was into drugs, hustling, women and money. He became so dependant on making a lot of money he and some of his friends decided to rob the house of an old white man. They were caught for this crime and were not only charged with this crime but were also charged with having sex with white women. Malcolm and his friend "Shorty" were sentenced to six years in prison. The two white women that were Malcolm and Shorty’s accomplices were sentenced to a year in jail. During the first couple days of prison Malcolm was coming off a drug high and was having withdrawals. These withdrawals led Malcolm into solitary confinement for two months. When he was let out of his chamber he met the man that would later be responsible for Malcolm’s transformation. This man was a follower of the nation of Islam and the great Alijah Muhammad. Malcolm learned a great deal form him. This shows us that even in the worst of circumstances we can learn and become better. This transformation was a great test for Malcolm and starts to let us see what a great influence he would end up being in the lives of many Americans.
In the tale of Malcolm X it states, “It really began back in the Charlestown Prison, when Bimbi first made me feel envy of his stock of knowledge.” While he was in prison he began to realize that as his friend Bimbi began to talk he and take control of conversations that he wasn’t as educated as he believed himself to be. Also he’d begun to realize that being dumb and uneducated isn’t as cool as it seems when you begin to have a conversations with those who’re more educated than you are. In his tory he also states, “...nearly all of the words that might as well have been in Chinese...I saw that the best thing I could do was get hold of s dictionary-to study, to learn some words.” He felt the need to acquire the knowledge due to the fact that he wanted to understand his friend and have the knowledge to hold a conversation with Bimbi. Malcolm X wanted to expand his knowledge and his vocabulary.“Under Bembry's influence, Little developed a voracious appetite for reading.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_X) His original goal for obtaining education as for the purpose of understanding hi friend Bimbi and due to that need to acquire more knowledge it lead to him discovering more about the complexities and ‘greyness’ along with the deafness and blindness that was affecting the people of America more specifically the black community in
In Learning to Read, by Malcolm X, he talks about his studies while in prison. Having only up to an eighth grade education, Malcolm X struggles with reading and writing. The main reason he decided to learn how to read was because of the letters he received while in prison, primarily from Elijah Muhammad. (X 354). He wasn’t able to write responses to them like he wanted to without using slang. Along with not being able to write letters, Malcolm X couldn’t read books without skipping over most of the words, thus motivating him to study an entire dictionary. With the use of said dictionary, he also improved his penmanship by writing down every word, definition, and punctuation he saw. (X 355). Once he memorized the whole dictionary, he was then able to read books. There wasn’t a moment where Malcolm wasn’t reading even at night when the lights were out, he still managed to use the little bit of light shining into his cell to read.
The researchers also considered Hans Toch’s use of the scientist-practitioner and his influence on its popularity. They also considered Tom Tyler’s work on people’s views and obedience to authorities when they are viewed as legitimate. His work showed that people are more willing to follow authority and the law when they are perceived as just and individuals are given a voice. The last additional source the researchers considered was the RNR model by Don Andrews and Jim Bonta in their work The Psychology of Criminal Conduct. Their work created a strategy that used empiricism to find the most important risk factors for offending and evidence based principles to alter the risk factors that could be changed. The researchers concluded that because of the influence of psychology in prisons has brought many benefits such as a lower suicide rates, mortality rates, and homicides. The researchers also concluded that it is necessary to engage prison staff at different levels of leadership. They found that it was important to share scientific knowledge with prison guards and workers, and explain why that knowledge was needed so that the benefits of prison psychology can permeate all of the prison system. The researchers predicted that prison conditions will continue to improve and prevent suicide, disorder, and recidivism and improve safety. The researchers hoped that their conclusions would lead to an increased investment by the members of the APA into prison research, and a greater implementation of psychology throughout the prison