Why Is Maya Angelou Influential

Maya Angelou was a poet and a civil rights activist, born on April 4th 1928, in St. Louis, MO. Growing up she didn’t have the easiest childhood. Her parents split up when she was three and she was sent to live with her grandmother in Arkansas. She experienced traumatic events as a child. At the age of seven she was sexually assaulted by her mother’s boyfriend. Due to these transpiring events her uncle killed the boyfriend. After this occurred she stopped talking, she spent many years mute. (www.biography.com) During the second world war she moved to California, where she received a scholarship to a school for dancing and acting. Why is Maya Angelou influential? Maya Angelou did an enormous number of things throughout her life, she also influenced a lot of people. She

She was the first black female cable car conductor. After giving birth to her son she worked various jobs to support herself and her son. I personally chose Maya Angelou because to me she was a huge inspiration to a lot of people. She had all the qualities of a leader. During the Civil Rights Movement, she served on the Southern Christian Leadership Conference alongside Martin Luther King Jr. She was a part of allowing schools to be mixed racially, allowed different races to eat in the same restaurants, and even use the same restrooms. She did so much with her life, even with all the stuff that happened to her during her childhood. The qualities that I believe she had would lean towards bravery, humbleness, and she had great morals. Her grandmother taught her to see the best of things and she carried that a long way, even throughout her whole life. Without a doubt Maya Angelou was a female leader to me. She had contributed so much to her country and contributed more to the people. Life was rough on her, and never gave her any breaks, but she looked at the positives of