What Is The Moral Of The Color Of Water By James Mcbride

Does your past have a big influence to who you are and your children? Ruth McBride has been hiding her past from her children her whole life; her past shaped her and James’ life despite all the struggles he had with his identity. In The Color of Water by James McBride, his character is shaped by the influence that Ruth, his mother, gives by being secretive about her past. James struggles with his identity from when he was a child to an adult, which over time became a major issue he struggles to deal with. Ruth’s secrets about her past influence James’ confusion with himself and motivates him to find out who he is in order to gain closure with himself.

Black son, white mother. Living in Brooklyn, which is a predominantly black neighborhood, during the 1950’s. Just by analyzing the two main characters and the setting we can conclude that a recurring theme in James McBride’s The Color of Water is racial prejudice and injustice. Racial prejudice and injustice are still present in today’s society. All you have to do to see it is turn on the news.

     When her father passed away she had nobody to tell her what to do and how to act. This was very devastating and she had a hard time dealing with change. So much so that she wouldn't let the police take the body of her father out of the house for three days after his death. The only thing that was constant in her house was the slave

In life, relationships change based on what two people experience while living with one another. In The Color of Water by James McBride, one relationship that changes throughout the book is James’s relationship with his mother, Ruth. Although James states that he loved his mother, he was also embarrassed by her at a young age. Since James is black, he’s embarrassed by his mother's white skin, because her complexion showed her difference from his friends and their parents. James states that at the age of 10, he “had reached a point where I was ashamed of her and didn’t want the world to see my white mother.” (McBride, 100) In order to avoid being seen with his mother, James would avoid telling his mother where he and his friends would be playing so she wouldn’t look for him. At his young age, he would also refuse to walk with her to the grocery store, making it clear that “the intent was to hide my white mom and go it alone” (McBride, 101)

In her address, she used pathos to grab the attention of the audience, by talking about happiness being achieved only by doing things that benefited others and that enslaving another is no different from dehumanizing them. The structure of her address shows the passion she had for the freedom of her people as well as the urge to unite women to join her cause. In her essay, she wants to inspire women to connect their maternal instincts to the abolitionist movement and give sympathy to the slaves as if they were their own flesh and blood.

Racism had tainted her life from the very beginning. During her childhood she attended a one-room school for blacks only. She was only allowed to attend school for a short time due to the ailing health of

In James McBride’s “The Color of Water,” a young James shaped an imaginary world for himself where he believed his true self was the boy who lived in the mirror. He sought this young man in the mirror, as an outlet for his poignant aggravation and a flight from his agonizing veracity. Thus, James could take out all his fury and irritation into the boy in the mirror, who would pay attention to him without any awful judgments towards him. On the other hand, James needed the boy to be a precursor of what he could be or cover in other life—his imaginary world—. “To further escape from painful reality, I created an imaginary world for myself...” (McBride 90).

against lynching and created an impact on slaves. People who did not agree with her were

White women back then were raised by the “Cult of Domesticity”, but black women were taken away from their families to move into other plantations and were stripped away from their moral values which destroyed them. In (Doc 7), Harriet Jacobs, a former slave girl, was abused by her owners and was

work. She offered shelter and food to poor people, took in orphans, stood up for better child labor laws

Secondly, she found out many things. She even went undercover while walking the streets she turned herself into an older woman to spy and scout. She wanted freedom for all of her people, others joined as well. She snuck tons and tons of slaves to gain their freedom. But the thing is, if you get caught, you would be hanged. That did not scare them though, they rather die fighting for their freedom than just standing there and letting them push them around. She had been through slavery and didn’t want anyone else to go through it either.

In court, she was sentenced to thirty years in jail and was ordered to serve her indenture with George Washington himself. Even though this was really common in this time, it is still wrong and it was all because she was black. This shows that even back then, you didn 't have to have two black parents, if you were even partial you would be profiled and all of your rights would be gone. (The Roots of Racial Profiling).

she met president douglass and congerman, and her stories of slaery helped change view against slavery.it was a very hard moment to express how it was like to be torchred

designed to lead slaves out of slavery and into a new life. She had been fed up with the abuse and

She needed to survive and work in an environment that did not want her to succeed. She was not successful in her task at ending the civil wars that plagued her