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Essays on identity in literature
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In Claudia Rankine’s 2014 book, Citizen: An American Lyric, she promotes the idea of a “post-race” society, captivating the reader into a position of self-reflection. The lyricism of her prose explores the definition of the titular ‘citizen’, thereby encouraging and promoting change. Her incentive is not to change the minds of readers, only broaden scope of the world they already have, honing on the undeniable reality of the world. She invites her reader to emotions of grief and outrage, which leads the reader toward self-awareness. Citizen seeks to inspire her audience through the presentation of identity politics in the modern-day. It is a work premised on self-awareness to unconscious thoughts and actions. Her use of the second person, …show more content…
Ever since the abolition of slavery in the United States, America has been an ever-evolving nation, but it cannot permanently erase the imprint prejudice has left. The realities of a ‘post-race world’ include the acts of everyday racism – those off-handed remarks, glances, implied judgments –which flourish in a place where explicit acts of discrimination have been outlawed. It has become a wound that leaves a scar on every generation, where all have felt what Rankine had showcased the words in Ligon’s art, “I feel most colored when I am thrown against a sharp white background” (53). Furthermore, her book works in constant concert with itself as seen in the setting of the drugstore as a man cuts in front of the speaker saying, “Oh my god, I didn’t see you./ You must be in a hurry, you offer./ No, no, no, I really didn’t see you” (77). Particularly troublesome to the reader, as the man’s initial alarm, containing an assumed sense of fear, immediately changing tone to overtly insistent over what should be an accidental mistake. It is in these moments that meaning becomes complex and attention is heightened, illuminating everyday prejudice. Thus, her use of the second person instigates curiosity, ultimately reaching its motive of self-reflections, when juxtaposed with the other pieces in …show more content…
The juxtapositions of text and image, the places where text shifts from short prose passages to more traditional poetic line breaks, and the works of art draw readers to their own understanding of the unconscious prejudice in everyday life. Thus, Rankine has the capability to push her readers with the use of the second person, where the reader is really the speaker. This method helps establish a greater unity of people, where she chooses to showcase her work as a collective story for many. In this way, she guides the reader with the second person toward a deeper understanding of the reality of a ‘post-race world’, allowing the reader to experience the story as if it’s their own. The final section, focuses on the themes of race, the body, language and various incidents in the life of the narrator. In the end, Rankine admits that she, “…[doesn’t] know how to end what doesn 't have an ending” (159). It is what her audience chooses to do with the newfound self that they find, where their standing on the reality of differences
Christopher Paul Curtis wrote The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963 throughout the course of 1995. The novel follows the Watsons, a black family living in Flint, Michigan during the Civil Rights Era. In a historical context, 1963 and the early 1990s have far more in common than one would expect. The Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964 following the church bombing in Birmingham, and yet race-based discrimination remains a problem even in our modern society via passive racism. This paper will analyze the ways in which Curtis’ The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963 draws parallels between the time in which his is writing during and the time in which he is writing about. This analysis will also shed light on what can be called the “white standard,” wherein all things white are “good” or “better” and anything not-white is “bad.”
In the novel “Between the World and Me” by Ta-Nehisi Coates, the story is a direct letter to his son. This letter contains the tools and instructions that his son will need in order to be a successful “black body” in the modern society. Coates explains his life experiences and hardships he had to overcome because of the color of his skin. Coates pushes an urgent message to the world; discrimination is still prevalent and real in today 's society, and the world is still struggling to accept an equal life for blacks. Coates writings alter the minds of his readers and allow them to experience life through a black man 's eyes. Ta-Nehisi Coates does this by the use of rhetorical strategies like, repetition and tone, metaphors and similes, and
Rottenberg, Catherine. "Passing: Race, Identification, And Desire." Criticism 45.4 (2003): 435-452. Humanities International Complete. Web. 19 Dec. 2013.
Racial discrimination has been an issue among different cultural groups, ethnic races and many religions. It is an issue that has stopped people from becoming well diversitized and embracing multiculturalism, especially during the olden days where slavery and wars were a huge part of the world. Racism has created a separation between people, causing many dilemmas’ to arise. This problem has been seen and touched upon throughout many works of literature and verbal presentations. A discourse on racial discrimination will be used to exemplify how individuals abuse their rights, categorize humans and ill treat others through an exploration of the texts in, Snow Falling On Cedars and The Book of Negroes. These novels have given an insight of the discrimination between different classes of people and the unfavorability of one’s kind.
Citizen is a biographical excerpt of events that occurred in Claudia Rankine’s life. Claudia, a woman of color living in America, endured racism of different magnitudes while trying to attain the American dream; a decent education, respectable career and an exceptional home. The compilation of her experiences illustrates how during encounters with friends, colleagues, strangers and members of her own family, race can take a center stage. During the course of the many encounters, Claudia does not defend herself. She coped with the situation the best she could at the time; by not saying anything at all. Towards the end however, she was able to gain her voice and cried out against the injustice of it all. In her writing, Claudia displayed how deep-rooted her pain was. Claudia uses metaphors to illustrate the affliction she endured and how baffled she felt at the apparent racism and the blatant disrespect for her humanity.
The chapters that are narrated by the omniscient narrator open with snippets of the primer that serve as an introduction to what the chapter will revolve around. The primer symbolises the white narrative; happy white people living happy lives, and is juxtaposed with the content of the chapters to emphasise the colourful diversity between the stereotypical life of white people, and the reality that black people have to endure. That ingenious structural technique evinces that Morrison’s target is language, particularly narrative, and how that can contribute to a distribution of pervasive ideas and utopias. Through these narratives, Morrison exhibits how language is a violent agency rife with pernicious
“My first victim was a woman-” (134) He immediately starts off describing his first encounter of racism when he moves to Chicago as a student. He encounters countless other examples of how he was discriminated just because of the color of his skin. “It was the echo of that terrified woman’s shoes that I first began to know the unwieldy inheritance I had come into.”(135) He described himself as the opposite of a criminal and was embarrassed because the people’s looks and reactions towards him almost made him feel guilty
Through her individual experiences, we learn much about the collective condition of people in that era of American history. While Wineburg (5) talked about “the tension that underlies each encounter with the past: The tension with the familiar and the strange, between feelings of proximity and feelings of distance in relation to the people we seek to understand,” this book explicitly contained a remarkable mix of those tensions. Race, violence, segregation, historically and culturally influenced ideations hang heavy and ever-present throughout the book and are juxtaposed with multiple familiar scenes and childhood feelings that students can more easily relate to. When presented with institutionalized racism, racist actions, and bigoted mindsets that strikingly conflict with our modern moral sense of equity and justice, we are compelled to engage in historical thinking and empathy in effort to contextualize each character’s rationales and make sense of an era remarkably different than our
This topic engages race theory and historical and sociological perspectives. The theme of race in Passing is important on a few levels. First, it’s a deeply personal story. As seen in George Hutchinson’s article, “Nella Larsen and the Veil of Race”, Passing mirrors many aspects of Larsen’s life and shows her specific experiences and confrontations with race. Hutchinson argues that the trauma of being rejected by her white family led Larsen to have a “critical perspective on American racial ideologies, both black and white” (Hutchinson). Secondly, the novel focuses specifically on black middle class culture in the 1920s. It was written by an “insider” of this marginalized group and it sheds light it. By writing about African Americans as part of the middle class, and not solely slaves or people living in poverty, Larsen shows the multifaceted reality of the “black experience.” Lastly, the questions about race brought up by the novel are relevant to broader societal issues. By comprehending how race is created and understood, the audience can begin to dismantle oppressive systems in their own
Her personal experiences demonstrate how whiteness is a source of fear in the imagination of black people because of the authority and power they have to control black people (hooks 339). She argues that white people need to reposition themselves – actively engage with other races – to understand their white privilege; this repositioning can deconstruct racialization and disassociate feelings of fear (of white people) in the mind’s of black people (hooks 346). Another concept hooks repeated was the concept of the “Other,” meaning any person who is not white; the “Other” are also people who are subject to more discrimination and hardship associated with their skin colour since they do not share the same skin tone as the power of authority. I argue that the “other” is more aware of white privilege since they have been affected by since they were born, whereas, unless a white people have been repositioned, they will not see this
In the novels Black No More and Passing addressed the issue of race identity and how race function in the normality of society. The novels depicted African-Americans finding stability during the time where white supremacy created social barriers. The narratives explored the authenticity of the disadvantages of a cultural norm that African-Americans encounter and why assimilation should be the standard or accepted. The texts inquiries on race and culture can be viewed in the context of perception, manipulation, and reality.
The purpose of this essay is to highlight the issues that Dana, a young African-American writer, witness as an observer through time. As a time traveler, she witnesses slavery and gender violation during 19th and 20th centuries and examines these problems in terms of how white supremacy disrupts black familial bonds. While approaching Octavia Butler’s novel Kindred, this essay analyses how gender and racial violation relates to familial bonds through Dana 's experience in Tom Weylin 's plantation. It is argued that Butler uses pathos, ethos, and in rare cases logos, to effectively convey her ideas of unfairness during the American slavery, such as examining the roots of Weylin’s cruel attitude towards black people, growing conflicts between
Located as a privileged subject relative to race and gender; I am at a transitional place regarding power relations. My upbringing as a white male of a middle class family in a line of Scottish farmers immigrating to the rural Midwestern US roots me in the blood-soaked soil of the Klu Klux Klan. I was born and raised 20 years after and 30 miles from Marion, Indiana, site of countless barbaric lynchings of African Americans. My sympathies betrayed the hegemonic classifications of my own body and color of flesh. I lined up with the victims, not with my kin. My desire to be done with the coding of the politics of identity in my flesh increased my sense of disembodiment. My own betrayal of skin and kin accompanied by the undeniable privilege afforded me by the embodied coding of race has created a ...
Application of the hypodescent rule, while not yet written into law, had been a tradition in American racial categorization since the start of slavery. In her short story, “Désirée’s Baby,” Kate Chopin addresses the practice as it was applied in the “one-drop rule,” the notion that an individual with white complexion may be deemed black by society given the presence of any African ancestry. Chopin eloquently places Désirée, the story’s protagonist, at the intersection of the two races, highlighting the flaws and inadequacies of the one-drop rule. The plots progression, culminating in Désirée’s removal from white society and possible death, may indicate a text working to criticize racial prejudice; however, such interpretations become increasingly difficult to maintain in light of Chopin’s heavily racist undertones. Placing the dominant theory of racial assignment under a microscope, “Désirée’s Baby” works toward the conclusion that the one-drop rule is not only flawed by the unfortunate repercussions the method leads to, but essentially doomed by the absurdity of the concepts it stands upon. While it may seem contradictory, Chopin’s conclusion is strengthened by the use of an implicitly prejudiced text, a tactic allowing for the further scrutiny of social mores within a system they were designed to uphold.
Claudia Rankine’s book Citizen: An American Lyric provides racially charged commentary on the internal and external conflicts of black experiences in America. She uses various formats - poetry, short essays, and artwork- to articulate her ideas and nuance the various themes over which this conversation takes place. By addressing Rankine’s discussion on Serena Williams, the themes of racialization and colonialism interact with one another to produce a discourse on black womanhood in environments that prioritize whiteness. This discussion includes dialogue on the presence of black women’s bodies in spaces that are constructed as white, and on the trope of the “angry black woman” and how they intersect to subjugate Williams. Rankine explores the themes of racialization and colonialism as mutually constructed and dissects how they operate blatantly and covertly by looking at Serena’s experiences in the setting of tennis.