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deculturalization and the struggle for equalityessay
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African Americans- Throughout American and World history we can see that dozens of cultures and people have gone through the process of deculturalization. Deculturalization is defined as the stripping away of one’s culture. Culture is defined by a group of people from a particular area with alike social behaviors. The process of deculturalization is to make it where a person’s lifestyle doesn’t involve their culture, beliefs, values, and norms of their well-known society. Deculturalization removes one culture from a group of people and gives them another culture. African American history plays a huge role in history today. From decades of research we can see the process that this culture went through and how they were depressed and deculturalized. In school, we take the time to learn about African American History but, we fail to see the aspects that African Americans had to overcome to be where they are today. We also fail to view life in their shoes and fundamentally understand the hardships and processes that they went through. African Americans were treated so terribly and poor in the last century and, they still are today. As a subordinate race to the American White race, African Americans were not treated equal, fair, human, or right under any circumstances. Being in the subordinate position African Americans are controlled by the higher white group in everything that they do. Decades of research has shown us that African Americans have been depressed for hundreds of years. Although the Declaration of Independence states “All men are created equal,” that rule did not apply to African Americans. By the end of the Civil War more than 180,000 black soldiers were in the United States Military. After the Civil War, many Africa... ... middle of paper ... ...k74757&pageid=icb.page414105>. • Ladenburg, Thomas . "Chapter 6." Martin Luther King & Malcolm X on on Violence and integration. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Dec. 2013. . • "Slavery and Civil Rights." : Civil Rights. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Dec. 2013. • . • "Slavery in America." History.com. A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 12 Dec. 2013. • Smith, V. Chapman . "American Anti-Slavery and Civil Rights Timeline." American Anti-Slavery and Civil Rights Timeline. N.p., 4 July 1995. Web. 12 Dec. 2013. . • Spring, Joel H.. Deculturalization and the struggle for equality: a brief history of the education of dominated cultures in the United States. 3rd ed. Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2001. Print.
While the formal abolition of slavery, on the 6th of December 1865 freed black Americans from their slave labour, they were still unequal to and discriminated by white Americans for the next century. This ‘freedom’, meant that black Americans ‘felt like a bird out of a cage’ , but this freedom from slavery did not equate to their complete liberty, rather they were kept in destitute through their economic, social, and political state.
Deculturization and the Struggle for Equality made me think hard about America’s multicultural past, as well as how I will be able to prevent deculturization from happening in my own classroom.
History shows that slavery consisted of African Americans being treated inferior to whites. Slaves were mostly African Americans and even though today slavery is over people still look at blacks as less important than whites. Slavery has impacted our society today because people are still prejudice and discriminatory towards African Americans, they are still living in poverty and don’t have proper education and they don’t have an equal opportunity for jobs. Still today African Americans continue to lag behind whites.
Blacks in America today have overcome so much and had to prove themselves for many years. The progression of blacks through history has been slow and not always easy. As an African American I respect the struggles that blacks like Cecil Gaines had to overcome to get blacks where they are today. Even after slavery ended in 1865, when the Emancipation Proclamation was signed blacks still struggled for equal rights for many decades. It took a long time for African Americans to be looked at as equals and get equal benefits even after slavery ended.
When exploring African-American history, the most important things to focus on are that because of the times, black people were enslaved and treated poorly. They endured it all and worked hard to rise above the boundaries of slavery and prejudice. However, the most portentous aspect of African-American history is that it's heritage; it's history; and it's over.
For as long as I could remember, African Americans have succumbed to some of the cruelest treatment seen in America’s history. This mistreatment has taken on many forms particularly in respect to social and racial discrimination. Examples of prior struggles for equality of African Americans in America may include: the pursuit of their freedom and equal treatment that was attributed by slavery, attaining voting rights, and being able to secure a job that would not discriminate based solely on their skin color. A number of Key figures were instrumental in making American what it is today and here are just to name a few: Harriet Tubman, Martin Luther King Jr., and Thurgood Marshall.
ProQuest Staff. "Civil Rights Timeline." Leading Issues Timelines. 2014: n.p. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 22 Apr. 2014. .
Americans should realize the magnitude of slavery’s consequences on African Americans as a whole. Blacks were brainwashed and stripped of self-esteem and taught to be ashamed of dark color of their skin. Many African Americans have effortlessly tried to advocate “Black Pride”, trying to re-instill self-worth and being proud of our distinct facial and body features, and darker complexions. African Americans had zilch to begin with after the abolishment of slavery in 1865. Slaves were promised a “mule/ and 40 acres” and they didn’t live to receive it nor did generations to follow; because the American government has yet to live up to its word. The fruit of the slaves’ labor was stolen from the “land of the free”. The victims of the White people’s African slave trade never experienced such freedom. This race deserves compensation for the mistreatment
Marr, Carolyn J. “Assimilation through Education.” American Indians of the Pacific Northwest Collection. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Apr. 2014.
Since the beginning in the United States, African Americans have been seen as racially inferior and White Americans have been trying to keep them that way for many years, especially in the south. This can be seen when the south implemented the Jim Crow Laws in the 1930’s to the 1940’s. These laws were laws put into place in the south to refute African Americans 14th and 15th rights; to keep African Americans racially inferior. However these laws were fought very hard by African Americans even though they were being put down they still found a way to rise up and change America by fighting back for what they believed was right and not giving up. Many African Americans had their own thoughts on how to do this, such as Martin Luther King, Jr.,
After the Civil War ended in 1865, a big question was left: what does the future look like for freed slaves in America? For so long - 246 years, since the first African slave arrived in Virginia in 1619 - Southern African Americans were forced into slavery. However, in 1856, as a result of the Union’s win in the American Civil War and the determination of many, they were finally free - at least legally. The Civil War left a big dent on the South and tension was rising between whites and blacks. In the meantime, African Americans needed help, or else they would fall into the trenches of the American society once again. This was a time of crucial social change for Southern blacks, and the effects of Reconstruction on white and black race relations in America are still apparent and alive today.
To wrap it up, African Americans lived an unfair past in the south, such as Alabama, during the 1930s because of discrimination and the misleading thoughts towards them. The Ku Klux Klan, Jim Crow Laws and the way they were generally treated in southern states all exemplify this merciless time period of the behavior towards them. They were not given the same respect, impression, and prospect as the rest of the citizens of America, and instead they were tortured. Therefore, one group should be never singled out and should be given the same first intuition as the rest of the people, and should never be judged by color, but instead by character.
Throughout history, African Americans have encountered an overwhelming amount of obstacles for justice and equality. You can see instances of these obstacles especially during the 1800’s where there were various forms of segregation and racism such as the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan terrorism, Jim- Crow laws, voting restrictions. These negative forces asserted by societal racism were present both pre and post slavery. Although blacks were often seen as being a core foundation for the creation of society and what it is today, they never were given credit for their work although forced. This was due to the various laws and social morals that were sustained for over 100 years throughout the United States. However, what the world didn’t know was that African Americans were a strong ethnic group and these oppressions and suffrage enabled African Americans for greatness. It forced African Americans to constantly have to explore alternative routes of intellectuality, autonomy and other opportunities to achieve the “American Dream” especially after the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments were passed after the Civil War.
“The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.”~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
Generally speaking, their experiences and histories are definitely very different from White Americans whose families can be traced back generations to the first immigrants from Europe or maybe Founding Fathers of our country. Although everyone has pieces of their past they don’t like to think about, African Americans have certainly been placed under much oppression in America. As slaves they weren’t respected; when emancipated they weren’t seen as equals; and even today racism toward black people in America is unfortunately more present than we’d like to admit. Like Sethe, many people try to shut out their bad past experiences, but sometimes this method can only make the internal being more frustrated and depressed.