Antjie Krog's Poem For All Voices, For All Victims Essay

He regarded this place as a “scab”. When I first read this part, I received nothing except puzzles even if I had understood the meaning of every word. A series of questions flashed in my mind. Why is the place “still a scab”? Did anything painful such as wars and slaughters happen in the place? Or did it reflected the problems between black people and white people? Did the situation in the place last for a long time? The scene is too far away from my life; I have never been to South Africa and I don't know any history or culture about it. So when I read this, I didn't have any special feeling. I cannot receive the information and hint the author wanted to express because of the lack of the knowledge. But if an encyclopedic professor read the same part of a fiction, maybe another book will be published as his/her

Allison Joseph and Sekou Sundiata are both great writers who engage the world by expressing their struggles through poetry. Both authors write about how people make assumptions because of what they hear and see around them. Their poems discuss the altercations and obstacles they have faced only because of the color of their skin. In the poem “On Being Told I Don’t Speak Like a Black Person,” Joseph incorporates a wide breath of experiences from her point of view. She expresses her strong emotion by using descriptive language which allows us to read with emotion. In “Blink your eyes,” Sundiata shows the intensity of his feelings by using the repetition of phrases and reinforcing the poems irony.

Martin Luther King Jr.’s Letter From Birmingham Jail and Rita Joe’s poem, I Lost My Talk share the controversial topic of racial injustice, recalling horrific events of the past all leading up to the sole purpose of asking for help. With both writers having personal experiences tied to these texts, we come face-to-face with the awful truths behind racial and cultural genocides and are left wondering whether or not the damage can be repaired.

In the events of Night and the Cambodian genocide, victims experienced the cruel separation from their families. On page 27 of Night, Wiesel recalls that the time he separated from his mother, was quick and simple. “Men to the left! Women to the right. Eight short, simple words spoken quietly, indifferently, without much emotion. Eight short, simple words. Yet that was the moment when I parted from my mother. I had not time to think, but already I felt the pressure of my father’s hand: we were alone” (Wiesel 27). Other than Wiesel, there must have been many other families who were torn apart during the Holocaust. In this extract, the German soldier directs the Jews to form two lines of men and women. It only took one statement for mothers for

Hello Yulissa, I actually remember watching the Brave New Voices poetry slams that my teacher made us watch when I was in high school and I always liked the strong messages they put in their poetry slam, especially “Somewhere in America”. I definitely agree that feminism follows Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs when it comes to physiological needs esteem, belonging, and love. I thought that your response was clear and very well written. I definitely agree with you that you need learn about the audience in order to catch their attention. Great

Stopforth and Kentridge both bring justice to those that have been unjustified through bringing them alive in their works (In Stopforth’s work it’s: Steven Biko, In Kentridge’s it’s: the people) (Wilson, 2001). They want to reconcile after years of oppression and death. Therefore it is present as a theme in both of their works. In Stopforth’s work it is the Interrogator’s faces that will forever remain the faces of the perpetrators during apartheid (Wilson, 2001). Death however is not shown as conspicuous as in Kentridge’s work where we are faced with it directly. In Stopforth’s work, it was not as direct. He was looking at torture, because it was present at the time when he made the work and on account of restriction of knowledge being shared to the public, certain truths were kept secret from society in the 60’s and the 80’s (Clarke, 2016). If you were a black activist, there would have been serious consequences, so by being white, it made it easier for the expression of the true nature of

Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric is a collection of poetry and criticism that challenges us as citizens to think about the fixity and ordinariness of racism as experienced by people of color who are often rendered as non-citizen subjects by society today. Many of the poems are structured around the daily forms of racism that many people of color experience. The poems remind us of the multiple ways black bodies have been and continue to be assaulted—even in ways that are not observed by the media. The irony of those who oppose the killing of people of color is that members of the same public perpetuate many of the racial motivated crimes themselves, and they are the ones that decry the most extreme form of racism, murder.

The time of the 1940’s in South Africa was defined by racial oppression of the native inhabitants of the country by the Dutch Boers, also known as the Afrikaners. These people were the demographic minority yet also the political majority. They executed almost complete control over the lives of the natives through asinine rules and harsh punishments. The highly esteemed novel Cry, the Beloved Country tells a story of Stephen Kumalo, a black priest dealing with the struggles of living in the South Africa during this time. His son killed a white man and on the day his son is to be hanged for this crime, Kumalo climbs a mountain in order to reflect on the current situation both in his family and in his country. In chapter 36 of Cry, the

The Adapa Poem begins with the introduction of Adapa as the son of the god Ea, protector of mankind, and provider for the sacred city Eridu. Adapa sets out on a boat for the holy day of the city and believes the winds are working against him, making his boat drift and the waters unstable. In response, Adapa threatens the winds and breaks the South Winds’ wing stopping the wind from blowing towards the land for seven days. This angers Anu, the Mesopotamian god of the upper sky, because of Anu’s affinity for the winds (noted in Enuma Elish when he gifts the winds to Marduk). Following Adapa’s actions, Anu calls for Adapa to come before him.

"There was a war against coloured people, I had to become a soldier." - Mildred Maud Jordan, as quoted by June Millicent Jordan June Jordan's "Poem about my rights" is not only a powerful piece of literature, but also a striking piece in its oral form. Written as a personal journey through the hardships of an African-American in a conformed society, she is faced with rejection, isolation, fear and unlawful treatment due to her being "the wrong people, the wrong skin on the wrong continent." In this essay I will take into account the theoretical understandings of oral performance in poetry, as well as its contrasting dynamics between spoken and written word. June Millicent Jordan (9 July 1936 - 14 June 2002) was a Caribbean-American poet and activist.

Cry, the Beloved Country, by Alan Paton, is the timeless novel about South Africa in the 1940’s. As powerful white men use the land for their own benefit, the tribal system of the African natives is broken down and replaced by poverty, homelessness, fear, and violence. A black priest, Stephen Kumalo, ventures to the great city of Johannesburg in search of his lost sister and son. His journey demonstrates the unhealthy lifestyle and mutinous atmosphere of the black people; yet he is the beholder of forgiveness, love, hope, and the restoration of a country overwhelmed with problems.

Next, I’d like to discuss the ways in which the conditions of “Living, Loving, and Lying Awake at Night,” and the roles that were plagued amongst the women in South Africa and how forced migrations affected their situations. Due to the Apartheid era, and men's non existence in their families life because of forced migration, women began to feel as though they could only do for themselves causing for their acceptance without man's presence. In an early reference to the chapter, leaving, the author shows the ways that apartheid affected the women. For instance, “As year went from the woman had come to

June Jordan said that poetry is a medium for telling the truth. Resistance poetry serves as a medium for oppressed people to raise awareness about a social, political, economic, or racial issue without being evident about the themes of their poetry. This means that the poets can defend themselves by saying that the resistance poetry was misinterpreted. There are multiple similarities and differences between the Apartheid of South Africa and Israel, and related themes/events are interpreted

To begin, jazz’s unique extemporizing aspects incites Amiri Baraka to proclaim his conviction on the worldly problems that we face in his eminent poem, Afrikan Revolution. Presented on February 4, 1973 after Amilear Cabral’s funeral, Amiri Baraka expresses his concerns on the differences among the people in society, specifically, people of African descent and anyone who is suffering from oppression. At the start of the poem, Amiri Baraka strikes his audience with examples of

The poem “Africa” was written by Maya Angelou, a very famous African American poet. WWII had just ended, and the Europeans colonized Africa. The continent was split into many countries, each controlled by separate European nations. These nations were in control of Africa’s resources. Throughout this poem, Angelou uses several techniques such as extended metaphor, repetition and imagery to thoroughly explain what is was like to live in Africa during the pre-colonization, colonization, and post-colonization eras. With these techniques, Angelou provides the readers with a clear image of what it was like to live in Africa.