Analysis: The Explorer by Gwendolyn Brooks and Fredrick Douglass by Robert Hayden

1045 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Major themes from the book the narratives of fredrick douglass

The world we live is in no ways perfect. Our world is littered with pride and greed. We want money and to advance in our life and in some ways we forget the people we walk over. It is about the money and it doesn’t matter who gets in our way. Most people also have a problem with admitting their mistakes. The United States of America was at one time a country that on the outside seemed to be perfect, but in truth it had dark secrets. It held slaves for hundreds of years and once they were emancipated the world turned to other means. Releasing the slaves gave the people freedom according to the Constitution, but they were never truly free. The people had fought all of their lives. Caucasian people still had this idea that they were better because of the color of their skin. Slavery was still a part of the world, but instead of being held in chains their individuality was taken away. They couldn’t be or do what they wanted because they were forced to live and do what and how the white people wanted. No matter how hard it got, they still had hope. They knew that their ancestors had succeeded and that if they continued to try they would succeed. In The Explorer by Gwendolyn Brooks and Fredrick Douglass by Robert Hayden show in three way hoe people were hurt, but also the wants of the people: freedom, hope and individuality.

Hayden described how freedom was one of the ways the people suffered and one of the major things that the human truly wanted. Freedom is given to us by the constitution, but it doesn’t always mean what is exactly said. They are free on paper, but there are people who are segregated and secluded. “Points to the contradictions inherent in our American notion, our American rhetoric , of freedom: which, while "be...

... middle of paper ...

...n make a difference in your life. Will you let others control your life or will you stand up from yourself?

Works Cited

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. CreateSpace. N.p.: n.p., 2013. Print. A discussion on how we have to be individual and be free and how at times when doing this we are at time misunderstood.

Gay, Ross. "Discussion on Fredrick Douglas." American Poetry Review (2009): 25. Print. The true meaning of freedom and we mix it up.

Sexton, Anne. The Complete Poems: Anne Sexton. N.p.: Houghton, 1999. Print. There are moments in our life when we need to have courage and hope.

Sinclair, Upton. Jungle. Standard ed. N.p.: Barns and Noble, 2005. Print. Talks about how people are forced into their situation by circumstances and can't control it.

Wright, Richard. Native Son. N.p.: Harper Collins, 1977. Print. How there are moments when we have to be individual.

Show More
Related

  • White Man's Burden Summary

    1766 Words  | 4 Pages

    Slavery is the idea and practice that one person is inferior to another. What made the institution of slavery in America significantly different from previous institutions was that “slavery developed as an institution based upon race.” Slavery based upon race is what made slavery an issue within the United States, in fact, it was a race issue. In addition, “to know whether certain men possessed natural rights one had only to inquire whether they were human beings.” Slaves were not even viewed as human beings; instead, they were dehumanized and were viewed as property or animals. During this era of slavery in the New World, many African slaves would prefer to die than live a life of forced servitude to the white man. Moreover, the problem of slavery was that an African born in the United States never knew what freedom was. According to Winthrop D. Jordan, “the concept of Negro slavery there was neither borrowed from foreigners, nor extracted from books, nor invented out of whole cloth, nor extrapolated from servitude, nor generated by English reaction to Negroes as such, nor necessitated by the exigencies of the New World. Not any one of these made the Negro a slave, but all.” American colonists fought a long and bloody war for independence that both white men and black men fought together, but it only seemed to serve the white man’s independence to continue their complete dominance over the African slave. The white man must carry a heavy

    Read More

  • Equality 7-2521 Quotes Analysis

    1050 Words  | 3 Pages

    “But what is freedom? Freedom from what? There is nothing to take a man's freedom away from him, save other men. To be free, a man must be free of his brothers. That is freedom. That and nothing else.”

    Read More

  • Native Son Rhetorical Analysis

    751 Words  | 2 Pages

    Intro: Summary, Thesis, Highlighting main points (Text to Text, Text to Self and Text to World) The tale of Native Son by Richard Wright follows the story of a young man by the name of Bigger Thomas who lives in the 1930’s. In the beginning of the story, we meet Bigger a young, angry frustrated black man who lives with his mother, brother and sister in a cramped apartment in New York. The story is narrated in a limited third-person voice that focuses on Bigger Thomas’s thoughts and feelings. The story is told almost exclusively from Bigger’s perspective. In recent years, the

    Read More

  • Rebellion Against Slavery in Fires of Jubilee by Stephen B. Oates

    1145 Words  | 3 Pages

    In conclusion, this book shows us that slavery is against mankind and all people are equal concerned of the race. Racism has become an wide-ranging in many of the countries mostly in northern Europe and Russia. Skin colour means nothing but just an identity. Many people use it to discriminate others whereas they got equal intelligence and sometimes the person being discriminated upon could be having sharper brains. This book also written for kids and immigrants to learned more about the past of where they lives. I recommend that every person should see the other as a partner but not as superior than the other and by that there will not be any discrimination in our society.

    Read More

  • Defining Freedom in Eric Foner's The Story of American Freedom

    1177 Words  | 3 Pages

    In Eric Foner’s book, The Story of American Freedom, he writes a historical monograph about how liberty came to be. In the book, his argument does not focus on one fixed definition of freedom like others are tempted to do. Unlike others, Foner describes liberty as an ever changing entity; its definition is fluid and does not change in a linear progress. While others portray liberty as a pre-determined concept and gradually getting better, Foner argues the very history of liberty is constantly reshaping the definition of liberty, itself. Essentially, the multiple and conflicting views on liberty has always been a “terrain of conflict” and has changed in time (Foner xv).

    Read More

  • Native Son Hierarchies

    2066 Words  | 5 Pages

    Older and modern societies tend to have organized castes and hierarchies designed to encompass everyone in society. This is demonstrated in Richard Wright’s acclaimed novel, Native Son. The novel follows the life of a twenty year old African American man named Bigger Thomas, and his experiences living as a black man in 1930s Chicago, Illinois. Unfortunately, he commits two unlawful killings of women, mostly as a result of the pressure and paranoia that had been following him from a young age. He is tried and convicted of the deaths, and is sentenced to die as a result.

    Read More

  • Baldwin's Perspective in Notes of a Native Son

    1684 Words  | 4 Pages

    “Notes of a Native Son” is faceted with many ideas and arguments. The essay begins with Baldwin recounting July 29, 1943. The day his father died and his mother bore her last child (63). Baldwin shares his fathers’ past and of the hate and bitterness that filled him and how Baldwin realizes that it may soon fill him also. Baldwin spends the rest of the essay mostly analyzing his experiences and the behavior and mentality of his father, of whom he seemed to dislike. He comes to the conclusion that one must hold true two ideas: “. . . acceptance, totally without rancor, of life as it is and men as they are: in light of this idea... injustice is...

    Read More

  • Literary Analysis Of Frederick Douglass The Heroic Slave

    1273 Words  | 3 Pages

    Deviating from his typically autobiographical and abolitionist literatures, Frederick Douglass pens his first work of fiction, “The Heroic Slave,” the imagined backstory of famed ex-slave Madison Washington, best known for his leadership in a slave rebellion aboard about the slave ship Creole. An interesting plot and Douglass’ word choice provide a powerful portrait of slavery and the people affected by it.

    Read More

  • The Market Revolution On American Society

    885 Words  | 2 Pages

    Foner, Eric. "Chapter 9." Give Me Liberty!: An American History. Brief Third ed. Vol. One. New York: W.W. Norton, 2012. N. pag. Print.

    Read More

  • Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

    915 Words  | 2 Pages

    With the progression of time we find Frederick Douglas begin to shift the tone to a focus within himself. The story begins to c...

    Read More

  • Differences Between Transcendentalism And The Modern Era

    854 Words  | 2 Pages

    Emerson, Ralph Waldo. The American Scholar ; Self-reliance ; Compensation. N.p.: American Book, 1893. Print.

    Read More

  • Emerson and Thoreau

    780 Words  | 2 Pages

    Additionally, Emerson and Thoreau both warn the reader of the dangers when individuality is marginalized. Emerson views society as a “conspiracy against the manhood of every one of...

    Read More

  • Moral Inequality In To Kill A Mockingbird

    1456 Words  | 3 Pages

    Long ago, everyone lived in harmony. Then everything changed when people from Europe took slaves from Africa which ended up in America. Only Harry S Truman, angry from lynching events, could stop inequality in the 1930s. But when he was needed the most, his term hadn’t started yet. “I believe in brotherhood….of all men before the law….if any (one) class or race can be permanently set apart from, or pushed down below the rest in politics and civil rights, so may any other class or race……and we say farewell to the principles on which we count our safety…….The majority of our Negro people find but cold comfort in our shanties and tenements. Surely, as free men, they are entitled to something better than this” (Harry Truman and Civil Rights). To

    Read More

  • Anne Sexton: Cinderella

    1183 Words  | 3 Pages

    Kasdano, Michelle. "Poetry: The Legacy of Anne Sexton." Helium (2007). Web. 31 Aug 2011. .

    Read More

  • Racial violence

    1008 Words  | 3 Pages

    Today, the United States is considered to be one of the most diverse countries in the world with regards to its citizens being of a different race and ethnic background other than white, but sadly this was not always the case. During the post-emancipation era, also known as the period of “redemption” for southern whites, was a time of great racial violence and hate from most white individuals, typically farm and plantation owners, towards the newly freed slaves emancipated after the civil war, which of whom were predominantly black. Right before the civil war, society was separated into two racial hierarchies: white, and black. If an individual was of any color other than white they were labeled as a slave and considered someone’s, referring to white slave owners, property. After the civil war America’s social lifestyle and overall government changed dramatically due to the emancipation of slaves in the south. When African Americans were emancipated the idea and concept that was once accepted, any individual other than white is considered to be insubordinate and a slave, was now abolished and considered inhumane. This caused a major disruption within society because former slave owners lost huge amounts of manpower that use to work and generate profit by making enslaved individuals farm their land. As a result, once wealthy farmers and plantation owners became the poorest of poor with no one to work their fields and no money to even hire anyone because of post-war fees that needed to be paid. With that being said, African Americans are considered now to be citizens of the United States but sadly were not treated equally by their white peers till the Civil Rights Act (1964); and from the time of reconstruction through the period of...

    Read More

More about Analysis: The Explorer by Gwendolyn Brooks and Fredrick Douglass by Robert Hayden

Open Document