Fighting for Freedom of Education and Human Rights in Plato’s The Allegory of the Cave and Malcolm X’s “Learning to Read” simil...

The similarities between the two stories speak of life's lessons and the sometimes-painful road we have to take in order to gain life

In both The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini and To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, literacy and education play a key role. The education of a man gives him power, and can determine his stature or influence in the community. Literacy gives a man an insight to knowledge that can be important. By developing characters with different levels of education, Khaled Hosseini and Harper Lee develop and strengthen the idea that literacy and education are dangerous tools, and can make the difference between life and death. Khaled Hosseini and Harper Lee depict literacy as both helpful and harmful. They also show how being uneducated leads to being taken advantage of. Using these ideas they strengthen the idea of educating and literacy being

On this basis, we have to be careful about the children’s education. Lots of students find literature boring and waste of time nowadays. So, we have to make them realize that literature does not only consist of stories written about imaginary people, but it represents ideas that are revolutionary and fascinating for their future life; however, that will not happen without taking responsibility. Therefore, parents and teachers have to undertake this task because that a generation takes the shape of the society it belongs. For instance, they will not feel strange if their parents do not discuss different ideas about a situation. That’s why; parents and teachers should keep children away from the idiot box, and should pay attention to their education. Not only from the perspective of literature but also relating what they learn from books with real life. Being aware of that technology is being used to establish conformity in society, that is, simply accepting the tenets of the majority, we have to try to change the rules of the

The short stories, “A Sunrise on the Veld” and “At the Pitt Rivers”, have nothing in common if you analyze them on a shallow literature level. “A Sunrise on the Veld” by Doris Lessing, highlights some of the reasons why life is so valuable. Lessing hints her readers that this short story is set somewhere in the desert by, “ … the flesh of his soles contracted on the chilled earth, and his legs began to ache with cold… He slung the shoes over his shoulder… they would be necessary when the ground became too hot to bear,” (Lessing, pg. 1212). Most deserts get heated by the sun by day, but loses the heat at night. The boy starts hunting, at first, but then is distracted by a wounded buck. Seeing this buck suffer, depicts him, especially sad. A boy is also the protagonist in “At the Pitt Rivers” by Penelope Lively. This boy spends his time in a museum, observing people and writing poems as the time passes. He keeps track of a couple he sees at the museum. The couple catches his attention because they are not his “ideal” of what a couple should look like. If a kindergartener reads these two short stories, he/she would find nothing in common with the stories. But, if the reader has the ability to analyze the text in more depth, he/she would find that they are more similar than the kindergartener would think.

In the Allegory of the Cave there are chained prisoners in cave who can only stare at the cave wall in front of them. At the back there is a long entrance with a staircase the width of the cave and a fire burning in the distance. They see only shadows projected in front of them from a raised platform and hear an echo that they attribute to what they observe. They talk about and name the shadows of objects they see before them. To them the truth are the shadows. Then one day one of the prisoners is released. He is told that what he saw before was an illusion. Once he is outside it takes a while for his eyes to adjust to the sun. First he observed the shadows of thing then their reflection and finally the actual object. Remembering his previous state he goes back to the cave and tries to explain that everything is an illusion but they laugh at him and think he’s crazy. They believe it best not to ascend and they choose to remain as they are. The cave represented opinion. The shadows that are cast on to the wall represented physical objects. The prisoners represented the common people (Welles).

Since the past, black people had been oppressed and excluded from a formal education, leading them to find ways to educate themselves. While they open their minds to new worlds and perspectives, they encounter themselves with a disastrous world that discriminates them and unjustly takes their rights away from them. In these essays, “Learning How to Read and Write” by Frederick Douglass and “Learning to Read” by Malcolm X, both authors tell their stories about how they found their way into the world of literacy even though they were banned to do it. Because they left ignorance back, they realize all the injustices that surround them. In my opinion, literacy is one of the most important tool humans possess to be aware of the issues of the world. Knowing about world problems makes people able to decide how to act towards situations and helps avoid being led by people that the only thing they want from others is power.

“The Lonely, Good Company of Books” by Richard Rodriguez, is an expressive narration about the importance of learning through reading. The essay is a narration of his life from his early school years to high school and how he struggled with the general belief that reading books are the main source of education. “Open the doors of your mind with books” (172) he quotes from a poster over his teacher’s desk. He learned early on that books were the key to academic success. Even though his bilingual parents never read for pleasure, they instilled in him the value of books. This idea was repeated by his teachers that reading was the main activity of learning.

Why is education important to society? Would one be able to read without a successful teacher teaching one how to read? Education is a key that holds the ability to open many doors - doors which open into vast rooms of knowledge, love, experience, discovery, and dreams. Education is an essential to human living and a fulfilling life, but what happens when the path one takes is not the choice that one personally wants? In “University”, written by Leona Gom, and “Warren Pryor”, written by Alden Nowlan, the poems present both negative and positive effects of education on society.

Richard Rodriguez, the author of The Achievement of Desire, and Malcolm X, the author of Learning to Read, describe the ways their lives were profoundly impacted, as well as altered, because of their quest for an education. Rodriguez writes about his academic successes, while Malcolm X describes his education as self-taught. Achieving an education changed both men and both men pursued an education for different reasons.

Education is a life-altering event that involves becoming more open- minded. When one’s horizons are expanded they begin to understand and view more. The process of becoming knowledgeable through education can differ from the individual or situation. The overall experience as well can change the perception. Two passages, “Learning to Read” by Malcom X and “The Allegory of the Cave” by Plato both contain an individual who goes through the path of gaining wisdom. Although both passages contain similarities involving one going through an experience resulting in the enlightenment of education, there are several differences in how the acknowledgement is approached and the type of predicament the individual is in.

Patrick Awuah, the founder of Ashesi University, explains that the purpose of a liberal arts college is to educate free men and woman to become leaders. Ashei was the first non-profit liberal arts college in West Africa. Patrick saw the need for a liberal arts education because he felt that the current leaders of Africa did not have the creative thinking skills necessary to fix the problems threatening Africa. He believed that a liberal arts education teaches students how to confront complex problems and create new and important ideas. The key trait of a liberal arts education is that it teaches students how to think creatively and allows them space to develop their own thinking skills, it creates a good balance between societal and scientific knowledge. -new sentence/rephrase

Literacy is the Denomenator of a balanced education. This is because by being able to read, one is able to learn a world of information and ideas that otherwise could only have been taught vocally. Literacy can put a person directly into the heads of the greatest philosophers, scientists and activists. Frederick Douglass knew that education was his best opportunity to advance himself from his situation. One thing that he did not realize when beginning his education is that by educating himself, he will inevitably realize the injustice that surrounds him and his people. Although literacy can make one aware of injustice, and possibly less blissfully naïve about their existence, ultimately it is the most important tool to one’s success.

Learning how to read is one of the most common processes in the world. For me, learning how to read is the most useful ability that I have learned throughout my entire life. For others, most people learn how to read though different languages in different ways. For Malcolm X, he found reading to be appealing and devoted so much time to it. Malcolm X recounts his personal history of learning to read and how he finds reading to be the most important skill and influence everything in his life. He retells his history of reading several books and dictionaries and how th process slowly affected his life. He elaborates how reading increases a performance and efficiency to heighten their potential. In “Learning to Read, “ by Malcolm X, he

Humanity often takes for granted the education we receive and don’t realize its effects on us. We fail to see that proper education reduces one’s gullibility, as those who receive training in critical thinking are less easily manipulated. In the novella Animal Farm by George Orwell, fascist rulers take advantage of the illiterate animals on the Manor Farm because they were oblivious to what was happening to them. Meanwhile, in the novel Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, citizens of a dystopian society have their access to education withheld from them, leaving them unable to think for themselves or properly assess their lives. In both works of literature, the author sees the importance of education being that illiteracy will leave one vulnerable to being manipulated due to their inability to thoroughly interpret and analyze situations with proper insight. In other words, being apathetic towards one’s education will only set them up for doom.

The educational system’s purpose is to teach. People are expected to learn as much as they can and encouraged to be well versed in these subjects in order to succeed in life. However, schools limit sources of knowledge to individuals that may allow this depth of understand. Books are banned from the library for containing curses, nudity or any other facet of the real world deemed ‘inappropriate’. Teachers cannot utter any extensive sentence about creation or evolution, neither can any school text, in fear that a person might become offended in defense of their beliefs. Rather than what you are allowed to learn in school, it is the knowledge gained through an individuals own endeavors that empowers and liberates them from societal