Jimmie Blacksmith Analysis

Rankine presents the ideas of Blacks maneuvering through the system by explaining situations which Black people have been affected by systematic racism. For instance, she provides scenarios that show the relationship between Black people and microaggressions. Two scenarios in particular are unique to this concept. The first scenario is Rankine discusses is a Black person’s work being copied at school and they are compared to a White person:

In the United States, there has been many cases of Racial injustice. From the beginning of the start of the United States of America it was the injustice to the Native Americans being captured and used for slave labor while their bison be slaughtered for sportsmanship. But this paper is on the specific race of the African Americans. There are many races that have been racially profiled and ostracized by the English people. But the treatment that African Americans have endured even till this day is disheartening. African Americans have gone through enslavement during the early 1600’s to the mid 1800’s. Then the African Americans were obstructed by the Jim Crow laws creating the ‘Separate but Equal” propaganda during the late 1800’s into the 1960’s. After the abolishment of the Jim Crow Laws, people were considered equal until the recent actions of many police officers using deadly force on African American youths in the early 2000’s.

The historical fiction novel ‘the longest memory’ set in the 18th century depicts a character ‘Whitechapel’, an elderly slave working at a plantation, in Virginia. Whitechapel, unlike other slaves is treated with more respect from the ‘white’ individuals in the novel and accepts the treatment inflicted on him by the white men, stating that if he acts with respect then receive good treatment. However, towards the ending of the novel it is prevalent that he desires for things to change following the death of his beloved son ‘Chapel’. The black diggers in the play ‘black diggers’ set in 1914 Australia, are similarly treated in an inhumane manner by white men. The black diggers desire for change in this area and therefore enlist to fight for Australian in the first world war. They long that when they will return, the inhumane treatment they received will no longer be, however, they faced further scrutiny by the white Australian society upon their return.

In Fredrick Douglas’s essay on the convict lease system, he purposely does not use words like “racism,” nor does he outright blame the whites for the situation. Instead, he uses gentle language to state the injustices done, allowing the reader to guilt himself. He says that white people have “done little to prevent the Negro becoming a criminal” (Douglas 1), condemning their inaction, rather than their actions. Douglas talks about injustices such as exclusion from churches and schools, as well as unfair trials, but does not talk about the convict lease system’s “legal” slavery because he wants the reader to come to the realization of his guilt on his own. He avoids talking about unwarranted lynchings and unfair incarceration in order to draw attention to the metaphorical “elephant in the room”. The more he avoids talking about it, the more the reader thinks about its blatant absence and about their actions, subtly making the reader feel guilty for actions done in the past.

The life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination… the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself in exile in his own land (qtd. in W.T.L. 235).

The discriminating social stratification in 1950’s developed a set of servile behavior on the blacks. They were thought to be inferior to whites, and were treated accordingly. Moreover, different parts of the country had various ranges of sensitivities while dealing with the blacks. For example, in Mississippi things were particularly tense after the Parker lynch case. No black man would dare look into any white man’s eyes in fear of the repercussions. On the bus, a man warned Griffin to watch himself closely until he caught onto Mississippi’s ways. In an extreme case like this, it was vital to learn about their roles and behave accordingly.

Expectations were met with severe disappointment for most blacks in America following the Civil War. Rather than gifting African-Americans with the freedom they dreamt about and fought hard for, the Emancipation led to an achievement of an ambiguous status in society, which created a larger problem of race that W.E.B Du Bois discusses in The Souls of Black Folk. In order to introduce this problem, Du Bois employs the use of a metaphor that compares the post-war life of Blacks in America to being stuck within a Veil as most held distorted images of self and self-worth. His use of the Veil metaphor emphasizes the severity of the “Negro Problem” in an attempt to convince white Americans that, in order for real progress of American industry and culture to take place, the problem must be solved.

In the middle of her struggle, Moody offers insights and correctives to some common interpretations of down south black involvement. They believed that since the black churches were focal points of the community’s beliefs and social groups that they were also in the front position during the first occurrence of racial discrimination. Although, for Moody’s experience, this was not true, well at least in Centreville and the rest of Wilkinson

The Strange Career of Jim Crow is a book that opens reader’s eyes to obstacles that black people faced during this period of time. Van Woodward does an excellent job in this book illustrating history. He provides factual and vivid examples of the racism that blacks faced in their fight for equality. It is obvious that this is a well written book in that it is still being published

It is astonishing to witness the extent people will go an act out against instead of compromise to achieve their desired outcome. Following the court case in Harper Lee’s To KIll a Mockingbird, there is evidence that suggests the jury was uncertain of a verdict- although in the end they were willing to come to the conclusion that a black man’s life isn’t as important as accepting the true reality. The jury and it’s verdict reveal and support the uncanny truth that in 1930’s Alabama, black and white’s were not viewed as equals among any terms. In James Kinneys The Cold Within, each of the men exhibit different demeanors, yet in fact, each of them expose a human flaw found in society.

Both parents preached to their children about the importance of self-reliance, pride, and self-respect, values directly contradicting the “customary” values that African Americans were expected to assume (Evers-Williams, Marable, 30). As a Child Medgar was told how, his great-grandfather had killed two white men in a dispute an had managed to avoid white retaliation by escaping from town (Evers-Williams, Marable, 30) Myrlie Evers-Williams now relates James Evers would constantly preach to his children: “My family will be able to walk on the sidewalk. Whites will treat them with dignity. They will be able to register to vote.”

Gaines does an exquisite job of describing thoroughly the pain of enduring those issues. The relationship between social structure and race is one that numerous individuals can't see or are apparently unaware of, on the grounds that it is not evident to us, particularly those of the white race. It is intriguing to consider the points of interest that corresponds with being of the white race and the impacts it has on social structure, and on others races, predominately ethnic

Jim, a black runaway slave, is obviously treated unfairly, being a black man in a white-man run world. Although, some of these actions towards him are not just racial and social-standing driven. The

One of the first people that is affected by the racial discrimination of the time is Jim who, for a time, would constantly go out searching for a job to only be denied by a white employer each time, until finally he gives up. Everyday he goes out to interview for a job , but then he comes home saying that if he “knew how [to] change the color of [his] skin” he would (30). Every time he is rejected, Jim goes “ to pieces because there [isn't] any work for him”(168), and he remains jobless until he carries “on with another woman” (52) as a way to regain his pride from being denied constantly rather than continue trying. On the other hand, there is Boots Smith, another character that succumbs to the constant racism in order to avoid a deeper surrender to hunger and poverty. As a porter on a pullman train, Boots is called “nameless” by the passengers he attends to (264), and he listens to the most racist comments such as “[blacks] steal…[blacks] lie…[and blacks] rape”(264-265), yet he doesn’t do anything about it because he doesn't want to go back to the life of having a ¨hunger hole in his stomach¨ (265). Next, there is Lutie Johnson, a character that is absolutely depressed by the racist cycle that plagues her and every other African American’s life. Near the end of the novel, she comes to believe in a constant cycle in which black “women work because for years now the white folks

Prejudice is a cancer that spreads hate among its perpetrators and victims alike. In 1930 Langston Hughes penned the novel, Not Without Laughter. This powerful story, written from the perspective of an African-American boy named James “Sandy” Rodgers, begins in the early 1900’s in the small town of Stanton, Kansas. Through the eyes of young Sandy, we see the devastating impact of racism on his family and those they are close to. We also see how the generations of abuse by whites caused a divide within the black community. Among, and even within, black families there were several social classes that seemed to hinge on seeking equality through gaining the approval of whites. The class someone belonged to was determined by the color