Black Like Me Analysis

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In the novel, Black Like Me, author and journalist John Howard Griffin, made a life altering decision. Griffin decided he wanted to experience what it was like to be a black in the Deep South. He wondered what adjustments a white would have to make, what experience did they have over discrimination based on their skin color (Griffin 1). Some claim the even though Griffin experienced racism firsthand, he could fully understand the black race because Griffin knew he would eventually change back to the white race. I disagree with this statement for many reasons. I believe Griffin fully experienced the life of the black and can understand the things blacks have to go through even if he is black for 6 weeks.

One of the main reasons as to why I believe Griffin’s experiment allowed him to fully empathize blacks and what they go through, are the many encounters that he and other African Americans faced. One example is the discrimination Griffin faced on the bus. During this incident, the bus driver wouldn’t allow Griffin off the bus at his stop, but, causing Griffin to walk 8 blocks from his original stop (Griffin 44). The driver allowed all the other whites off, but denied Griffin …show more content…

While Griffin reached New Orleans and was settling in, he decides to check in his traveler’s check. He must go from place to place all with rejections. He even encounters the “hate stare” from a woman, which is a hateful stare given to Negros by whites (Griffin 51). He ensures the readers that he would not have encountered these acts of hate if he were a white man and was also a taste of the beginning of his journey. Once again, this is something Griffin, and any other black in the South, has experienced. This is yet another example of why I believe Griffin has fully experienced what any black man in the South has and can fully understand and

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