Title of Essay
“Strange Fruit,” written by Abel Meeropol, published in 1937. Meeropol went to Dewitt Clinton High School and graduated in 1921. He then began to teach there for seventeen years. In the late 1930’s, Pellison said, “Meeropol ‘was very disturbed at the continuation of racism in America, and seeing a photograph of a lynching sort of put him over the edge’ (NPR). This picture which had haunted him for days, was his inspiration. Its message brings readers to realize what the strange fruit symbolizes to and gives the reader a sensation of imagery. The imagery in Abel Meeropol’s poem, Strange Fruit, reveals the brutal reality of racism in America during the early to mid 1900’s.
Hughes says, “They hung my black young lover / To a cross roads tree.” (3-4). One can see that the narrator, this young girl has just loss her lover. Her lover got lynched and this causes our reader to have a broken heart. One can see that due to society and racism
To depict the unfair daily lives of African Americans, Martin Luther King begins with an allegory, a boy and a girl representing faultless African Americans in the nation. The readers are able to visualize and smell the vermin-infested apartment houses and the “stench” of garbage in a place where African American kids live. The stench and vermin infested houses metaphorically portray our nation being infested with social injustice. Even the roofs of the houses are “patched-up” of bandages that were placed repeatedly in order to cover a damage. However, these roofs are not fixed completely since America has been pushing racial equality aside as seen in the Plessy v. Ferguson court case in which it ruled that African Americans were “separate but equal”. Ever since the introduction of African Americans into the nation for slavery purposes, the society
In a country full of inequities and discrimination, numerous books were written to depict our unjust societies. One of the many books is an autobiography by Richard Wright. In Black Boy, Wright shares these many life-changing experiences he faced, which include the discovery of racism at a young age, the fights he put up against discrimination and hunger, and finally his decision to move Northward to a purported better society. Through these experiences, which eventually led him to success, Wright tells his readers the cause and effect of racism, and hunger. In a way, the novel The Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle illustrates similar experiences.
Through the use of color, symbolism and imagery you can see why Gary Soto really entitled the poem "Oranges," and why oranges play such an importa...
Racism in 1912 was a very big issue and still is in our society today. W.E.B DuBois’ essay “A Mild Suggestion” portrays the idea and reality of the social inequality that took place in 1912. DuBois uses satire to offer a solution to the apparent African-American problem in the United States. Dubois writes “the colored man says ‘the next morning there would be ten million funerals, and therefore no Negro problem”’ (DuBois 93) He then goes on to state that on a chosen night, the people implement a planned mass killing of all the African-American folk, therefore solving all of their problems. The essay is able to show how effective racist language and ideas can be, as well as providing a good example of a writing style that keeps the reader engaged throughout the piece.
“You may shoot me with your words, You may cut me with your eyes, You may kill me with your hatefulness, But still, like air, I’ll rise” ( Still I Rise, Line 21-24). This is saying you can try to hurt me and say or do hurtful things but I will be strong and rise above it. The novel we are reading is “The Secret Life of Bees” by Sue Monk Kidd. The author’s purpose of “The Secret Life of Bee’s” is social commentary of racism in the south and what it's like to grow up without a mother. The poem I chose to compare is to is “Still I Rise” by Maya Angelou. In the poem the author’s purpose is racism and sticking up to it. Both of pieces of literature “Still I Rise” and “The Secret of Bee’s” show the common theme of racism. The author’s present the themes both similarly and differently.
So goes the quote by William Shakespeare, and many people believe this is true. However, to many of African-American descent, both past and present, to be “called out of your name”, is one of the greatest insults imaginable. “Mary,” a chapter from volume one, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings,” of Dr. Maya Angelou’s five-volume autobiography, details the horror and rage she felt, and the retribution she administered, at such an act.The year was 1938, and Dr. Angelou, then going by her birth name, Marguerite Johnson, was 10 years old and working as a maid & cook’s helper for a white woman named Mrs. Viola Cullinan, the daughter of wealthy Virginian parents. According to Miss Glory, the cook whose family had been slaves for the Cullinan’s, she had married beneath her to a man whose money “didn’t ‘mount to much”. Marguerite pitied Mrs. Cullinan because she was old, fat, and ugly and couldn’t have children, though it was well known that her husband had two beautiful daughters by a colored lady. She tried to feel Mrs. Cullinan’s loneliness and pain, and tried very hard to make up for her barrenness by coming to work early and staying late.
...Walt Whitman’s Alabama birds, Harper Lee’s Alabama presents a bleak picture of a narrow world torn by hatred , injustice, violence and cruelty, and we lament to see ‘what man has made of man’. It brings out forcefully the condition of Negro subculture in the white world where a Negro, as dark as a mockingbird, is accepted largely as a servant or at best as an entertainer (Dave 245).
In “Queens, 1963”, the speaker narrates to her audience her observations that she has collected from living in her neighborhood located in Queens, New York in the midst of the Civil Rights Movement. The narrator is a thirteen-year-old female immigrant who moved from the Dominican Republic to America with her family. As she reflects on her past year of living in America, she reveals a superb understanding of the reasons why the people in her neighborhood act the way they do towards other neighbors. In “Queens, 1963” by Julia Alvarez, the poet utilizes diction, figurative language, and irony to effectively display to the readers that segregation is a strong part of the American melting pot.
“Fruits and Words” by Aimee Bender a short story that is full of symbolism and metaphors. The protagonist struggles with her relationship with steve, and on the road she discovers a strong craving for a mango. The mangos and the words symbolize the protagonist's lost hope and dying relationship.
Overall, this poem is used to compare an African American to a cypress tree in a positive manner, which is evergreen and always pointing upwards. The time frame in which Angelina Weld Grimke wrote this in was a difficult time to live in. Only recently had African Americans received their rights, and even then, other races, more prominently, caucasians were hateful towards them. Although not lengthy, this poem manages to successfully capture the enduring strength that African Americans held during this difficult time period by simply comparing them to a strong cypress
In conclusion, Wilson’s “The Piano Lesson” portrays racist stereotypes through symbols, such as the piano, watermelons and supernatural powers, characters like Breniece, Boy Willie, and Avery and also through conflicts within oneself, with another character and also supernatural power. Racism was prominent throughout the play but these are the symbols, characters, and conflicts that were very significant. Wilson’s “The piano lesson” did indeed teach about the happiness of white men in the misery of black men, as once said by Fredric Douglas, “The white man's happiness cannot be purchased by the black man's misery.”
Strange Fruit is a poem on the lynching in southern American at the time. The poet was Apel Meeropol, who was a middle age white, male from New York City. He was an English teacher who had a strong passion for poem and social activist. As a social activist he was very disturbed at the continuation of racism of America at the time and seeing a photograph of lynching put him over the edge
Over the course of the century chronicling the helm of slavery, the emancipation, and the push for civil, equal, and human rights, black literary scholars have pressed to have their voice heard in the midst a country that would dare classify a black as a second class citizen. Often, literary modes of communication were employed to accomplish just that. Black scholars used the often little education they received to produce a body of works that would seek to beckon the cause of freedom and help blacks tarry through the cruelties, inadequacies, and inconveniences of their oppressed condition. To capture the black experience in America was one of the sole aims of black literature. However, we as scholars of these bodies of works today are often unsure as to whether or not we can indeed coin the phrase “Black Literature” or, in this case, “Black poetry”. Is there such a thing? If so, how do we define the term, and what body of writing can we use to determine the validity of the definition. Such is the aim of this essay because we can indeed call a poem “Black”. We can define “Black poetry” as a body of writing written by an African-American in the United States that formulates a concentrated imaginative awareness of an experience or set of experiences inextricably linked to black people, characterizes a furious call or pursuit of freedom, and attempts to capture the black condition in a language chosen and arranged to create a specific emotional response through meaning, sound, and rhythm. An examination of several works of poetry by various Black scholars should suffice to prove that the definition does hold and that “Black Poetry” is a term that we can use.
...ites a short 33-line poem that simply shows the barriers between races in the time period when racism was still openly practiced through segregation and discrimination. The poem captures the African American tenant’s frustrations towards the landlord as well as the racism shown by the landlord. The poem is a great illustration of the time period, and it shows how relevant discrimination was in everyday life in the nineteen-forties. It is important for the author to use the selected literary devices to help better illustrate his point. Each literary device in the poem helps exemplify the author’s intent: to increase awareness of the racism in the society in the time period.