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Roll Of Thunder Hear My Cry

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Mildred Taylor’s Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry is a front-ranked bildungsroman novel. One of the most significant aspects of the story is its depiction of how the Logan children positively develop and grow up within a challenging and racist society. While education seems to be instrumental in their development, factors such as, the demystification of history, the unveiling of power structure, the racist society and the warm environment of home, all contribute to this process of growing up. Initially, in Roll of Thunder, education splits in two types, formal and informal. On one hand, formal education is the fabricated information the children are taught at school regarding their history and identity. However, it can be viewed as constructive …show more content…

Obviously, the mother is keen to make her aware of the vitality of cautiousness when dealing with Power Structure. An idea that she also emphasized earlier by visiting the Berrys. Although the children were shocked by the sight of Mr. Berry, this visit was intended to make them realize the size of their enemy and show them how to tune down their fear to cautiously resist racism. As McDowell (2009) points out, she wanted to show them those in power, what they are capable of and who the victims are. Indeed, they were living in a society where ‘those in power can vent their anger whenever they feel that the colored folks are forgetting their place’ (Bosimjian, 2009) and so they must learn to be cautious in resisting such mistreatments. Arguably, this racist environment is another major key in this process of growing …show more content…

Evidently, it seems to be nurturing their characters to gain empowerment. To demonstrate, in the bus episode, instead of desperately surrendering to such cruelty the children decide to plan for revenge. An act that was, as the child narrator observes, ‘well-maneuvered’ and cautiously calculated, and provided them with a momentary empowerment and endless giggles. The point here is that, this repeated daily mistreatment drove them to act independently instead of complaining about it to their elders. Furthermore, it is possible to argue that this act seemed to be a kind of wish-fulfilment for the adults, as both Mary Logan and Big ma agree that they are “glad that it happened” (Taylor, 2014). This indicates the children’s bravery and shows that such racist environment, as Jani Barker (2010) argues, arouses their characters. However, it is important to highlight the role of the Logan’s warm household in this

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