Theme Of Racism In Notes Of A Native Son

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The year 2016 is the year that will bring the end to something that African Americans thought to be the impossible, the end of a 4 year term for the first African American president Barack Obama. African-Americans have gone through the pain and suffering of being sold and used like cattle, to the hardships of fighting for their rights and equality. Racism has been a serious issue regarding African-Americans for centuries, and despite having an African-American president America still has this existing issue in our country till this day. Due to the seemingly never-ending racial discrimination against blacks, many innocent lives have been taken. Popular slogans such as “Black lives matter” rid the streets as people riot and remind us of the prejudice …show more content…

These were all symbolic symptoms or effects of the racist poison people were feeding African Americans by segregating them from whites, and treating them with disrespect. Through Notes of a Native Son, James Baldwin tells the story of how his father died due to his racist country and their inability to take action against racism. Baldwin uses his father as a real life example to show how the evils of racism can affect an individual psychologically. Through a series of events and descriptions of his father’s different traits, Baldwin uses words such as fretful, and having a temper to express the effects that racism has had on his father. Baldwin he does not hesitate to start off his story by highlighting the some of his father’s positive traits showing the type of man Baldwin’s father truly was behind the bitter man that racism has caused him to become. Just like Baldwin’s father, African Americans struggle to be themselves because of racist stereotypes that cause them to become angry and violent. African American boys are unable to walk down the street at night in a black hoodie without being shot, or wear a hat or hood over their heads without being questioned. The fact that there is still racial discrimination against blacks till this day shows that Baldwin’s story is and will continue to be repeated due to the evils of

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