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Influence of protest
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What is Protest Literature
Protest literature conveys different definitions and meanings. According to Stauffer, "there is no common understanding of protest literature; the term has been used to mean almost all literature or no literature". Therefore, every genre can be described as "protest literature" because literature is a way and art of showing emotions, values and concerns. Because of the uncertainty of the definition, Stauffer provides a wide range of norms that can help classify the literature according to his views.
Stauffer enumerates a set of norms that helps classify by what he means by protest literature. Firstly, he defined protest literature as language that changes the society and self. In addition, Stauffer went deeper by describing the literature as a "catalyst or mirror of social change". Furthermore, some of the necessary requirements for protest literature stated by Stauffer are three in number. They are empathy and symbolic action, in which empathy promotes shock value, inspires emotions and desires, and symbolic action supports interpretation.
Even though almost all literature can be called protest literature in a sense that they all portray a point of theme or view, protest literature has to be specifically written for change. In other words, the writer needs to have specific goals for change in society or individuals from the very start. Therefore, the effects of protest literature cannot simply be spontaneous or by accident. Furthermore, protest literature cannot be judged by how effective it is. This shows that protest literature fails to persuade or "convert" even one individual, the literature is still consider a success because a point has been made which results in acknowledgement...
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... exactly they were or what direction to take.
Slowly he moves to and fro, to and fro, then faster and faster he swishes up and down.
His blue shirt billows in the breeze like a tattered kite.
The world whirls by: east becomes west, north turns to south; the four cardinal points meet in his head.
Mother!
Where did I come from?
When will I wear long trousers?
Why was my father jailed?
Works Cited
-Boy on a Swing by Oswald M. Mtshali
-Corruption:Lament by Sam Chrenyan
-Dance the Guns to Silence by 100 Poems for Ken Saro-Wiwa
-Fields of Gold- Children of Poverty by Jan Weeratunga
-Prophets Of Protest: Reconsidering The History Of American Abolitionism,Ed,Timothy Patrick McCarthy and John Stauffer,New York:The New Press,2006,pp 23-38
-Protest poetry:The voice of the conscience,Ananda P.Strestha,CNAS JOURNAL,VOL 27,No 2,(July 2000)
I began the research for this paper looking to write about Frederick Douglass’ drive to start his abolitionist paper The North Star. What I then found in my research was the writings of a man I had never before heard of, Martin R. Delaney. Delaney and Douglass were co-editors of the paper for its first four years, therefore partners in the abolitionist battle. Yet I found that despite this partnership these men actually held many differing opinions that ultimately drove them apart.
The scope of the investigation is limited to the Second Great Awakening and the American Abolitionist Movement from 1830-1839, with the exception of some foundational knowledge of the movement prior to 1830 to highlight the changes within the movement in the 1830s. The investigation included an exploration of various letters, lectures, and sermons by leading abolitionists from the time period and a variety of secondary sources analyzing the Second Great Awakening and the Abolitionist Movement from 1830-1839.
Martin Luther King and Henry David Thoreau each write exemplary persuasive essays that depict social injustice and discuss civil disobedience, which is the refusal to comply with the law in order to prove a point. In his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” King speaks to a specific audience: the African Americans, and discusses why he feels they should bring an end to segregation. Thoreau on the other hand, in “Civil Disobedience,” speaks to a broader, non-addressed audience as he largely expresses his feelings towards what he feels is an unjust government. Both essays however, focus on the mutual topics of morality and justice and use these topics to inform and motivate their audience to, at times, defy the government in order to establish the necessary justice.
Altman, Linda Jacobs. Slavery and Abolition in American History. Berkeley Heights, NJ: Enslow, 1999. Print.
Marable, Manning. Race, Reform, and Rebellion: The Second Reconstruction and Beyond in Black America, 1945-2006. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2007.
Marable, Manning. Race, reform, and rebellion: the second reconstruction and beyond in Black America, 1945-2006. 3rd ed. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2007. Print
Lawrence J. Friedman: Gregarious Saints: Self and Community in American Abolitionists, 1830-1870. Cambridge, Mass., 1982.
Douglass wrote three biographies about his life as a politician, slave, and abolitionist. However, the historical value of these works does not remain as important as the quality of the works themselves. Frederick Douglass’ writing deserves recognition in the canon of great American authors, because his work meets the chosen criteria for inclusion in a collection of important literature. Douglass influenced many famous abolitionists with his literary works, and this impact, coupled with his desire to write an expose about oppression in America, makes him a winning candidate. Although his published works, mostly autobiographies, received much acclaim from abolitionists, this paper explores the quality of Douglass’s work from a literary standpoint. This paper also details the events shaping Douglass’s impressive life and writing career. By examining the prestigious “life and times” of this black author, the reader will recognize the widespread influence of Douglass’s writing on other antislavery writers, politics, and hence, the public. In a look at his first and greatest work, Narrative of the Life, the following paper will demonstrate why Frederick Douglass deserves a place in the hall of great American writers. To fully appreciate the impact of Douglass’s autobiographies, we must examine violent period in which he lived. Douglass, born in 1818, grew up as a slave on Colonel Lloyd’s plantation in eastern Maryland. At the time, abolitionist movements started gaining speed as popular parties in the North. In the North, pro-slavery white mobs attacked black communities in retaliation for their efforts. By the time Douglass escaped from slavery, in 1838, tensions ran high among abolitionists and slaveowners. Slaves published accounts of their harrowing escapes, and their lives in slavery, mainly with the help of ghostwriters. Although abolitionists called for the total elimination of slavery in the South, racial segregation still occurred all over the United States. Blacks, freemen especially, found the task of finding a decent job overwhelming.
Egerton, Douglas R. Death or Liberty: African Americans and Revolutionary America. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.
Fromm, Erich. “Disobedience as a Psychological and Moral Problem” Writing and Reading for ACP Composition. Ed. Thomas E. Leahy and Christine R. Farris. New York, New York: Pearson, 2009. 258-263. Print.
Shaskolsky, Leon. “The Negro Protest Movement- Revolt or Reform?.” Phylon 29 (1963): 156-166. JSTOR. U of Illinois Lib., Urbana. 11 Apr. 2004 .
Literature has had a major impact on society, and, also our history. Literature has reformed and shaped civilizations, changed political systems, and has exposed injustices (3). Our literature has changed and developed as we have, keeping up with our society. “...literature is crucial for the advancement of society (3).” With literary works, we can convince others to view things a certain way, share our opinions, and more. Literature is greatly intertwined with our society and everyday lives, and they would not be the same without it. Literature plays an irreplaceable role in our
Paul Hawken, in the chapter “Blessed Unrest,” records the people of a new social movement, as well as their ideals, goals, and principles. He writes how they are connected, along with the diversity and differences they bring to make the social movement unique. Hawken communicates to the readers the various social, environmental, and political problems they will encounter in today’s world as well as similar problems of the past. Problems that these groups of organizations are planning to undertake with the perseverance of humanity.
Knowles, H. J. (2007). The Constitution and Slavery: A Special Relationship. Slavery & Abolition, 28(3), 309-328. doi:10.1080/01440390701685514
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.