Character Analysis Of Afrika Road

African Americans are fighting for their lives in a war that they do not even know exist. In Ralph Ellison’s short story, “Battle Royal,” this idea is made clear by the narrators struggle to be seen as an equal among the white men in the story. Ellison uses a white woman, a blindfold, and an electric rug as symbols to illustrate the struggles African Americans face.

The graphic history written by Getz and Clarke invites readers to discover the story of a young African woman named Abina and her trail against her slaver. Using a mixture of comic style illustrations, transcripts from the trial, a section on the historical context, and a reading guide, the reader is engaged in a multitude of ways to understand the story through multiple lenses. Tied together, all of these sections provide a thorough and exciting way for readers to stand in the shoes of a young woman while learning details about a world that once existed. By opening this novel, one can learn what this story entailed, how the trial process worked in Abina’s perspective, the different contexts of history and the book itself, and figure out their personal thought’s on others opinions of the story.

Charles Chesnutt was a well-known African American author who was known for his short stories that conveyed racist African American dialect and conveyed his wishes for equality and social and political change for African Americans. The purpose of this paper is to delve into Chesnutt’s short story “The Goophered Grapevine” to define the way Chesnutt manipulated his audience and worked towards white sympathy for the black community. Chesnutt knew that if he attempted his goal with his white audience’s knowledge, they would resist and he would therefore be unsuccessful. Therefore, Chesnutt needed to disguise the motive of the story so he could affect his audience without their knowledge of his manipulation. Chesnutt did so through the use of storytelling with three characters that served to show the three sides of the racial divide. Through the use of storytelling, Chesnutt used the three main characters in “The Goophered Grapevine as a whole to represent and show the different sides of the racial divide and manipulate his audience into sympathizing with the black society in order for social and political change; Uncle Julius functioned as the storyteller as well as the black society, John functioned as the white side of the community who resisted change, and Annie functioned as the side of the white community that sympathized with the black community and sought political and social change for the black community.

Racism is an issue that blacks face, and have faced throughout history directly and indirectly. Ralph Ellison has done a great job in demonstrating the effects of racism on individual identity through a black narrator. Throughout the story, Ellison provides several examples of what the narrator faced in trying to make his-self visible and acceptable in the white culture. Ellison engages the reader so deeply in the occurrences through the narrator’s agony, confusion, and ambiguity. In order to understand the narrators plight, and to see things through his eyes, it is important to understand that main characters of the story which contributes to his plight as well as the era in which the story takes place.

The Glory Field by Walter Dean Myers best conveys the character traits of courage, ambitiousness, and supporting family even when times appear to be distressful. This book takes you through African American history with the excitement and thrill of fiction. It allows you to witness the glory of African American evolution, from a period of slavery to modern day. The reader witnesses courage as African Americans try and fight for freedom and equality in an unforgiving society. African Americans try and defy the society’s perspective of them in an attempt to reach an optimal level of success. They work to divert from their typical expectations, and strive for success even when the possibilities are minimal. They strive to build a better living besides being maids and factory workers, and they attempt to remove every obstacle in their way of success. They desire to go above what is expected of them, so they can achieve at a prodigious level in a segregated society. Even as technology advances, the reader witnesses the character’s sense of community. They always believe that family is crucial to success even in times of distress. If they abandon their community, then they abandon the only people that support them. In this time period, their community was composed of the only people that cared about them. The African American society emulates these traits throughout this book, as the author inserts you into their fight for equity and freedom. The Glory Field takes

This novel actively demonstrates the choices we make in our everyday life, resulting in consequences that ultimately make or break our futures. The fates of two African American

The main theme of Battle Royal occurs again with the incident of the electrified rug. After the battle has ended, the boys are allowed to pick bills and coins off of a rug. As they try to take the money off the rug, they are jolted with electricity. Even though the pain factor involved in picking the cash off the rug is very high, the boys force themselves to carry on. This brilliantly captures the economic hardship faced by the black community and the negative effect of this hardship on social harmony. Once more, a theme of suppressed dignity emerges. It shows that even after their biggest fight for respect ended, African Americans were forced to endure racism and prejudice in other

Once Martin Luther King Jr. the American Minister announced, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” What Martin Luther King Jr. is saying here is that injustice can spread out everywhere unnoticeably quick and it can shape everyone’s identity. Just a bit of injustice can modify a person from their thinking to their physical forms. To go through injustice is a big deal, and to act on it is rare. In Arnold Junior’s diary, A Diary Of Part-Time Indian, By Sherman Alexie, Junior is faced with multiple injustices, and to act on them, he leaves the reservation and goes to a “White people only” school, Reardan. The ones that he left behind have a much hatred on Junior, but he knows better than that. He can’t look back. The only choice left for him is to keep going forward. Similarly,in the book A Long Way Gone, by Ishmael finds himself at a loss because he had lost all his family and lots of his friends during the civil war in Sierra Leone, and he doesn’t know where they are or if they are alive or dead,he is suddenly joined the government and is known as the boy soldier. He is hurt everywhere. He doesn’t know anything at all, but he has to keep going. Many individuals like Junior and Ishmael faced with injustice suffer great loss, but in order to prevent more loss from happening, they have to take big risks. This might lead to much hatred from those left behind. However, when they draw on an inner resilience they are able to succeed in their quest for justice.

The story by Abani is set in an African background. It may be unfair to render the people as backward automatically, but their decision to act arbitrarily and against the wishes of the elders speaks of weakness regarding civility. Like the villagers in Jackson’s story, the bloodthirsty mob carries out an illogical and crude act with no regard for the life of the man they perceive to be a thief in the hope that the children will learn a valuable lesson.

Affirmation- “… genuine friendships developed between the French and black American soldiers, and the level of cooperation between the two forces seemed nothing short of miraculous in light of recent experiences in the U.S. Army. Here both sides needed each other.” This part of the chapter resonated with me. Despite of the racism towards the African American, it was surprising to see that a “genuine relationship” developed between the French and black American soldiers. This occurrence shows that good things happen in a bad situation.

In this journey our main character also see’s the many faces of the black man, and how all of these faces where created in response to the actions of the white man never in response to one’s own actions. Towards the end of the novel the main character finds himself in a difficult predicament as he is being hounded by men who want him dead. Despite this, he manages to find a pair of glasses and a huge hat which he believes would disguise him just enough so that he can escape his potential murderers. As he walks around Harlem in his new guise, many begin to confuse him for someone called Rinehart who seems to be bookie, a pimp, and a preacher all at once. The ability to be so many things is at first attractive to the main character as he slowly begins to sink into the role of Rinehart, however he soon realizes that Rinehart’s multiple identities are merely a reflection of his inauthenthicity. Rinehart has no true self-consciousness and has allowed for others to create his image for him; Rinehart is only identified in the novel by others, never by himself. Rinehart’s character is representative of the notion of Double Consciousness as it shows the black men without the ability or better yet the privilege of self identity.

The story, for the most part, centers upon an African-American family, their dreams for the future and an insurance check coming in for death of the eldest man. Stirring into the mix later is the hugely oppressive,

In the Novel “Cry the Beloved Country” by Alan Paton, two fathers are trying to put the pieces of there families back together while also keeping themselves together. They each go through a variety of struggles, with one learning his sister is a prostitute and his son is a murder while the other deals with his sons death and tries to move passed it. Throughout the novel, racial tension is a theme frequently seen from the beginning of the book til the very end. Paton uses the setting of South Africa to underscore racial tension associated with the apartheid movement to illustrate these themes. The concept of racism is prevalent during the story as it is used by the government to caused both blacks and whites to fear each other which eventually tears apart Kumalo’s family.

This section demonstrates how the fear manifested itself among the whites. The Afrikaners’ power is not in numbers, as “they were few” but instead in political authority. They exploit this and impose harsh laws on the black to try to control and restrict them. However, they have bound themselves in their fear of the natives, a force that is perhaps more confining than their rules. Instead of trying to understand their fear and show their compassion towards these other human beings, they instead choose to hide it so that they will not appear weak. Additionally, the solution of love that Paton suggests presents a conundrum. In order end the fear, they must love, but to love they must stop being afraid. This demonstrates the almost impossible nature of true equality occurring between the natives and the Afrikaners.

Ever since the beginning of time, fear has been haunting the lives of human beings. The passage “Once upon a time”, by Nadine Gordimer, the characters within this text shows how fear is seen and what actions are done to stop “threats”. In this text, there was a family in a quartered area , mom, dad, and a little boy. only trusted maids and etc. were allowed into the area. In front of the family house is a warning sign that says one could be an invader even though the homeowners are covered by security systems. Towards the end of the passage the homeowners house was broken into. In “once upon a time” Gordimer uses imagery and symbolism to justify that apartheid was a fearful time to live in.