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Ways to reduce prejudice and discrimination
Ways to reduce prejudice and discrimination
Ways to stop prejudice
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In both “The Fourth of July” and “Black Men and Public Space” the narrators did one very important thing; they expressed how the encounter made the narrator feel. This is crucial because it almost allows the reader to share the feeling of helplessness that was felt. In “The Fourth of July”, Lorde explained how she truly did not understand why the family was treated differently. She tells of her parents’ fruitless effort to shield their children from the harsh realities of Jim Crow by planning out virtually the whole trip. The highlight of the story is when the narrator expresses both anger and confusion at the fact that her family was denied seated service at an ice cream parlor because they were black. The narrator of “Black Men and Public Space” takes a similar approach of exemplifying his helplessness. This narrator explained how he understood the stigma associated with his appearance and did his best to circumvent it, but unfortunately some situations rendered him helpless. In the opening paragraph, he describes a woman’s extremely cautious actions when she became aware of his presence one the dark and desolate street. He later explains how the encounter …show more content…
When Divakaruni moved to the United States, tried to abandon the smells of her childhood in favor of acculturation. She realized this is a mistake when she has a child of her own. She eventually comes to appreciate the smells’ abilities to comfort, give joy, and motivate. One smell in particular she told about is how the smell of iodine reminded her that “love sometimes hurts while it’s doing its job.” In rearing her own offspring, she intentionally tried to replicate the “smell technique” with her own twist in hopes that her children reap similar benefits. One example is how she filled the house with the aroma of spices and sang American and Indian tunes with her
A human being is a complicated entity of a contradictory nature, where creative and destructive, virtuous and vicious are interwoven. Each of us has gone through various kinds of struggle at least once in a lifetime, ranging from everyday discrepancies to worldwide catastrophes. There are always different causes and reasons that trigger these struggles, however, there is common ground for them as well: people are different, even though it is a truism no one seems to be able to realize this statement from beyond the bounds of one’s self and reach out to approach the Other. The concept of the Other is dominant in Frederick Douglass’s text “The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro”, for it determines the main conflict and illuminates the issue of intolerance and even blasphemy regarding the attitude of white Americans towards Negroes. The text was written as a speech to commemorate the signing of the Declaration of Independence and delivered at Rochester’s Corinthian Hall on July 5, 1852.
During his speech he was ignored and laughed at after working so hard and battling to be heard, but once he spoke of equality someone from the crowd became upset. “You sure that about ‘equality’ was a mistake?” (1220). Some are born with access and advantages, but some have to go through hurdles to get what they want. “I spoke automatically and with such fervor that did not realize that the men were still talking and laughing until my dry mouth, filling up with blood from the cut, almost strangled me.” (1219). This places a challenge on the white men in the area that an intelligent black boy who they thought nothing of yet still considered him voiceless and moronic. This chapter alone worked off of a single scene of how the narrator was indeed an invisible man in his youth, not knowing which way to turn, but remembering the words his grandfather said from his deathbed carrying on throughout his years. “Son, after I’m gone I want you to keep up the good fight. I never told you, but our life is a war and I have been a traitor all my born days…” (1211). Neither the culture nor the crowd wanted to accept what was given, doing anything to repress someone from attempting to reach a goal. It is a way to discourage one due to others feeling you aren’t good enough or have the will and drive. The theory applied may help readers see something that we would not see unless we
Let’s begin discussing this well written novel by Ralph Ellison in 1952 called “Invisible Man.” The narrator himself is "an invisible man” (3). “It is told in the first person and is divided into a series of major episodes, some lurid and erotic, some ironic and grotesque” (Books of the Times). This book describes the “racial divide and tells unparalleled truths about the nature of bigotry and its effects on the minds of both victims and perpetrators” (Cover). He describes his criticism and how he was viewed by others. “Paradoxically, is simultaneously too visible, by virtue of his skin color, and invisible, in that society does not recognize him as a person but only as an aggregation of stereotypes” (Strauss 1). He lived in New York City as an upstanding young black man. “Ellison 's use of invisibility as a metaphor extends beyond the issue of race” (Strauss 1). As Ellison describes, humanity of a black man is racially divided and not equal. He tells his story from the safety of an underground hole coming to the realization that the end is the beginning. Not everyone is seen as equal, not even today.
This essay will be addressing the book Invisible man written by Ralph Ellison. In Invisible Man the protagonist would describe how it is to feel invisible to the world just based on your skin color. This unnamed protagonist would describe his past on how once he was an excellent student to leaving in the basement of an apartment complex restricted to only whites. As the story progresses the protagonist explains many challenges he had to go through to end up living in a hole.
This novel is a record of a Negro's journey through contemporary America in search of success, companionship, but most importantly himself. This so called Invisible Man gives voice to the feelings of many black Americans that they were not "seen" by American society. Blacks were not integrated into the American mainstream and therefore not "seen." This, making the Invisibility of this man evident, particularly through his italicized wording, where he often questions who he is and his role in society.
Even so, his persona shines through with his point of view and recollection of past events of racial profiling he experienced. For example, he mentions that he was suffering from insomnia and, thus, would walk the streets at night, and when he faces the contempt of fellow pedestrians, he points out that he “was stalking sleep, not defenseless wayfarers” (Staples 542). With this in mind, it shows the reader that he is trying to defend himself against all the derision that society throws his way. Likewise, Staples’ persona can be seen as desperate, yet it can also be seen as angry and frustrated. As seen from his point of view, Staples indicates his helplessness and frustration in the way that he has no control over how the people of society view him; all he can do is try to act and coax people into believing he means no harm- the truth. Unfortunately, society still had a strong grip on stereotypes and judged and presumed the worst of him. In this case, by using his point of view, he gives the audience his insight of the cruel position he is in which gives him the credibility to show how racial profiling dominates in society against African Americans like himself. In the same fashion, Staples also uses anecdotes to show his difference between him and the stereotypical portrayal of an African American that society gives. One
People wondered how much of it was accurate to his life. Although no one except him knows whether he ever felt these things or not, it is evident that this novel was written to prove a point. The main character represents the feelings of the majority of blacks at the time. One can only imagine how blacks felt growing up in a world that constantly de-humanized them and treated them like garbage. The Jim Crow Laws created a sort of self-hatred for the blacks. They were treated as if they were a disease that the whites did not even want to be close to. Some African Americans lived their whole lives being treated this way and that had to do something to their self esteem. By the end of the novel the unnamed narrator finally declares himself a white man. He is the father of two and the widow of one. In the last words of the novel he states, “I no longer have the same fear for myself of my secret’s being found out, for since my wife's death I have gradually dropped out of social life; but there is nothing I would not suffer to keep the brand from being placed upon them [his children]” (Johnson 153). The character feels like a coward for not embracing and standing with his race, but for the sake of his children he is willing to live with that so that his children will not have to; so that they
In Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison, the unnamed narrator shows us, through the use motifs such as blindness and invisibility and symbols such as women, the sambo doll, and the paint plant, how racism and sexism negatively affect the social class and individual identity of the oppressed people. Throughout the novel, the African American narrator tells us the story of his journey to find success in life which is sabotaged by the white-dominated society in which he lives in. Along his journey, we are also shown how the patriarchy oppresses all of the women in the novel.
In this narrative essay, Brent Staples provides a personal account of his experiences as a black man in modern society. “Black Men and Public Space” acts as a journey for the readers to follow as Staples discovers the many societal biases against him, simply because of his skin color. The essay begins when Staples was twenty-two years old, walking the streets of Chicago late in the evening, and a woman responds to his presence with fear. Being a larger black man, he learned that he would be stereotyped by others around him as a “mugger, rapist, or worse” (135).
Stories are often left untold or forgotten. The stories that are deemed profound or are remembered are of fact or evident to the masses. The stories that make up history, such as the African Americans’ fight for equality, are made up of concrete events that were witnessed. On the contrary, stories like the narrator’s in Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man are generally overlooked because they are focused on an individual’s experience. This is due to the theory that humanity is naturally self-involved, but also ashamed because the majority of our experiences consist of challenges. The narrator’s story was filled with past humiliations that were the major cornerstones to his identity. He illustrated the significance of embracing our humiliations, or
The narrator declares that he “did not become alive until [he] discovered [his] invisibility,” (Ellison, 7). The audience is taken back to a time when the narrator lived in ignorance, before he had accepted that invisibility was not an element of fantasy but a fact of his reality. In another moment of violence, the narrator is forced into darkness with a blindfold and the audience truly sees the hardships of exiting without awareness of the dual condition of African Americans. The narrator was invited to give a speech to the affluent white men of the town. But his speech was eclipsed by a battle royal, a violent event in which curses and slurs were hurled in his direction. Pain and suffering were forced upon him by the white patriarchs in the room and yet the boy was still concerned with the “dignity” of his speech and even after he was knocked unconscious the narrator wondered if he “would be allowed to speak,” (Ellison, 26). Even after being brutally beaten and slandered he still felt compelled to impress those who could not fully see him. He still felt as if his worth was determined by the white man’s praise. The reactions to his speech, which urges those who face oppression to “Cast down [their] buckets where [they] are, further signify the blindness of the observers. His speech is almost entirely compliant
n Frederick Douglass’ What to the Slave is the 4th of July, he presents a simple yet morally complex argument. In his letter, Douglass states that it is hypocritical for a country to celebrate its freedom and separation from another country, yet still have slavery alive and well in the United States. Morally, this issue is a pretty straightforward argument and the very definition of hypocritical. Douglass also touches upon his belief that all men and women are equal, as stated in the constitution, yet slaves are subhuman. Another topic touched on is the contributing factors that perpetuate the constant and unjust nature of how slaves are treated, such as religion, agricultural, and over all demeanor towards slaves.
The main character is completely alienated from the world around him. He is a black man living in a white world, a man who was born in the South but is now living in the North, and his only form of companionship is his dying wife, Laura, whom he is desperate to save. He is unable to work since he has no birth certificate—no official identity. Without a job he is unable to make his mark in the world, and if his wife dies, not only would he lose his lover but also any evidence that he ever existed. As the story progresses he loses his own awareness of his identity—“somehow he had forgotten his own name.” The author emphasizes the main character’s mistreatment in life by white society during a vivid recollection of an event in his childhood when he was chased by a train filled with “white people laughing as he ran screaming,” a hallucination which was triggered by his exploration of the “old scars” on his body. This connection between alienation and oppression highlight Ellison’s central idea.
In the essay “Shame”, by Dick Gregory, the author narrates how two painful experiences during his childhood reflected how difficult it was to grow up as a poor African American. Gregory was ashamed of being on welfare and of his poverty, so much so that he got of rid of the warm hooded mackaw he received because it was a reminder that he and his family were on relief. Gregory also expresses his embarrassment, shame, and desire to hold onto his dignity throughout it all. In the essay “I Became Her Target”, by Roger Wilkins, the author describes how it was difficult for him to break the ice with his classmates because he was a new student in school. In fact, Wilkins was the only black student in this new school which only worsened the situation. Moreover, he was the target of both
In Ralph Ellison’s novel The Invisible man, the unknown narrator states “All my life I had been looking for something and everywhere I turned someone tried to tell me what it was…I was looking for myself and asking everyone except myself the question which I, and only I, could answer…my expectations to achieve a realization everyone else appears to have been born with: That I am nobody but myself. But first I had to discover that I am an invisible man!” (13). throughout the novel, the search for identity becomes a major aspect for the narrator’s journey to identify who he is in this world. The speaker considers himself to be an “invisible man” but he defines his condition of being invisible due to his race (Kelly). Identity and race becomes an integral part of the novel. The obsession with identity links the narrator with the society he lives in, where race defines the characters in the novel. Society has distinguished the characters in Ellison’s novel between the African and Caucasian and the narrator journey forces him to abandon the identity in which he thought he had to be reborn to gain a new one. Ellison’s depiction of the power struggle between African and Caucasians reveals that identity is constructed to not only by the narrator himself but also the people that attempt to influence. The modernized idea of being “white washed” is evident in the narrator and therefore establishes that identity can be reaffirmed through rebirth, renaming, or changing one’s appearance to gain a new persona despite their race. The novel becomes a biological search for the self due through the American Negroes’ experience (Lillard 833). Through this experience the unknown narrator proves that identity is a necessary part of his life but race c...