Black Like Me Research Paper

John Howard Griffin: Black Like Me

Black Like Me, by John Howard Griffin, states the chilling truth of being a black man in the late 1950’s to the early 1960’s. John Howard Griffin is a white journalist who wants to know the real experience of being treated as a black person. Griffin transitions from a white man to a black man by darkening the pigment of his skin through medication. He walked, hitchhiked, and rode buses through Georgia, Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi. As Griffin makes his way through the South, he experiences things that no human ever should. First, I will explain that Griffin wants to bride the gap between the blacks and whites. In the beginning of the novel, Griffin states that he believes the only way to know the truth is to become a black man in the South. John Howard Griffin explains, “The only way I could see to bridge the gap between us was to become a Negro. I decided I would do this.”(Griffin 7) This quote explains that Griffin wants to bridge the gap between white and black. By writing this it shows how far Griffin will go to make

The main idea of Black Like Me is the evilness of racism. Griffin writes, “All the courtesies in the world do not cover up the one vital and massive discourtesy—that the Negro is treated not even as a second-class citizen, but as a tenth-class one. His day-to-day living is a reminder of his inferior status. He does not become calloused to these things—the polite rebuffs when he seeks better employment; hearing himself referred to as nigger, coon, jigaboo; having to bypass available rest-room facilities or eating facilities to find one specified for him. Each new reminder strikes at the raw spot, deepens the wound.”(Griffin 48) This quote ties into the main idea of the novel by describing how black men feel when they are discriminated against and treated unfairly. Griffin explains that they do feel hurt when they are called those terrible