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Champion Of The World By Maya Angelou Analysis Essay

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Once again, Maya Angelou manages to touch our hearts again with her poetic skills in Chapter 19 titled The Champion of the World in her autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. She recalls a time in her life where the African American community gathered at her grandmother's and uncle's store to hear a boxing match via radio. The boxing match was between the former champion Joe Louis and a white boxer. Maya Angelou takes the meaning of a simple boxing match into something more complex; she demonstrates the suffrage of her people fighting against oppression during that time period. She shows us that despite the injustices that may occur, there will always be victory for those who truly deserve it.

Maya Angelou's perspective as a young African American girl is described in Chapter 19 of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, titled Champion of the World. Her community is gathered to support Joe Louis, the former champion, in a boxing match that determines if he'll continue being champion or not. As the story progresses in her grandmother's and uncle’s store, the tone transforms from hopeful to defeated, to triumphant. For example, the following quote, “It was another lynching, yet another black man …show more content…

Louis, The Brown Bomber, is a significant character in this chapter that symbolizes the black community defeating unjust cruelty. As racism kept spreading during this era, the little confidence the people hearing the fight had vanished once they were aware that the Brown Bomber was being defeated. The only thing that the black community could see during those times was pure hatred from people, and even God, according to Maya Angelou. Even at a young age, the author was well aware of the unjust events occurring around her. That boxing match was a way to prove to the world that despite all of the harmful things done, a person can overcome those obstacles by fighting back, even when the situation seems

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“Champion of the World” In the excerpt, “Champion of the World,” Maya Angelou recalls of a specific time when growing up during the African American oppression. In paragraph one, Angelou uses the method of description in order to indicate that a crucial event is about to begin. She uses phrases from the passage such as, “The last inch of space was filled,” and “Uncle Willie had turned the radio up to its last notch so that youngsters on the porch wouldn’t miss a word,” so that the reader can visualize how closely packed the store was. African Americans from far away distances had even arrived in order to watch the fight (107). Their willingness to disregard personal space and distance shows the importance of the Brown Bomber’s fight to the

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Annotated Bibliography: Maya Angelou Angelou, Maya. I know why the caged bird sings. New York: random house, 1970. Print. Maya Angelou's book describes in great detail the events of her forming years and her emotions throughout.

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Rhetorical Analysis: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings In her memoir, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Maya Angelo commemorates and admires strong independent black women and strives to become a well-educated woman herself. Through the use of visual imagery, Angelou describes Mrs. Flowers as a refined black woman to convey to the audience a feeling of pride and recognition for all sophisticated black women and a sense of empathy for Maya. Maya compares Mrs. Flowers to the “women in English novels” who had the luxury to sit “in front of roaring fireplaces” and drink “tea incessantly from silver trays” (93). The visual description of the “fireplace” and “tea” demonstrates to the reader the value that white women have in this society.

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Maya Angelou published her novel I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings in the late 1960s to shed light on her personal experiences as a girl growing up in the segregated South. She writes unfiltered depictions of rape and sexual abuse, along with topics such as racism and teenage pregnancy. Her novel, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings became censored in America in 2002 due to these topics. Regardless of this novel being censored, it holds significant value in the lessons it teaches.

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Rhetorical analysis of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings “I was really white and because a cruel fairy stepmother, who was understandably jealous of my beauty, had turned me into a too-big Negro girl, with nappy black hair, broad feet and a space between her teeth that would hold a number-two pencil” (Angelou 19). Maya Angelou was only a little girl when she realized that she was different than all the other little girls; racism had already affected her life significantly. The times she grew up in and the way society changed around her were some of the reasons she wrote the book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. In this book, Angelou talks about how adventures, romance, and adversity changed her through the eyes of her young self.

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III. a. Maya Angelou was an avid writer, speaker, activist and teacher. As a result of the many hardships that she suffered while growing up as a poor black woman in the south she has used her own experiences as the subject matter of her written work. In doing this she effectively shows how she was able to overcome her personal obstacles. Her autobiography “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1970) tells the story of her life and how she overcame and moved forward triumphantly in spite of her circumstances.

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From the beginning of I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, Maya Angelou continuously talks about her grandmother, Annie Henderson, as a woman she looks up to and would consider her main mother figure, which is why she calls her Momma. She is described as a hardworking and well viewed black woman in Stamps, for example Momma was addressed as Mrs., “The judge had really made a gaffe calling a Negro woman Mrs…” But this is not the only reason people look up to her; she is also the owner of a successful store, this is a big accomplishment being a black woman which proves to show her hardwork and dedication. Along with being successful in the business world she is also a very religious person with an unshakable faith. She raises Maya and Bailey to be

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Maya Angelou recalls the first seventeen years of her life, discussing her unsettling childhood in her autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Maya and Bailey were sent from California to the segregated South to live with their grandmother, Momma. At the age of eight, Maya went to stay with her mother in St. Louis, where she was sexually abused and raped by her mother’s boyfriend, Mr. Freeman. Maya confronts these traumatic events of her childhood and explores the evolution of her own strong identity. Her individual and cultural feelings of displacement, caused by these incidents of sexual abuse, are mediated through her love for literature.

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On page 119 in the memoir Why the Caged Bird Sings, written by the African-American author Maya Angelou in 1969, she describes how Marguerite decides to go against her boss, Mrs. Cullinan because she calls her Mary instead of her birth name. This leads her to protest by wrecking a China Vase which results in her having to leave her job. During this passage, the author shows how Marguerite feels oppressed by Mrs. Cullinan calling her Mary and how she ends up planning how she can escape her job. This can be seen through the use of language, context, and the surroundings. Through the use of language, the author is able to show how Marguerite feels the urge to resolve her uncomfortable situation while also showing how she feels relieved by her escape

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Family can be regarded as a strength or a weakness; it can build one up or tear one down. Marguerite Johnson faces a great deal of family related predicaments throughout the autobiographical narrative I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou. Specifically, her relationship and experiences with her grandmother, father, and mother play a large role in her personal development. Marguerite’s complicated family experiences cause short-term grief but ultimately strengthen her character. Momma is an influential character in Marguerite’s life.

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“I know why the caged bird beats its wings (8) Til its blood is red on the cruel bars (9)”, symbolize the protest that African Americans put forth to be treated equally. All over the world protest are being held and movements are being created all in hopes of their cries possibly fall on listening ears that understand. Al African Americans want is equality in a world where equality was never an option for brown

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Literature is never written – or read – for entertainment alone. There is always another purpose. Discuss in relation to two books Reading a book can be entertaining; that does not mean however, that the book is written for entertainment alone. At least one alternative purpose always exists.

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“Caged Bird” written by Maya Angelou in 1968 announces to the world her frustration of racial inequality and the longing for freedom. She seeks to create sentiment in the reader toward the caged bird plight, and draw compassion for the imprisoned creature. (Davis) Angelou was born as “Marguerite Annie Johnson on April 4, 1928 in St Louis, Missouri”. “Caged Bird” was first published in the collection Shaker, Why Don’t You Sing? 1983.

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In the poems “Sympathy” by Paul Laurence Dunbar and “Caged Bird” by Maya Angelou, both portray captive birds that sing. However in “Sympathy”, the bird pleads with god for freedom, whereas in “Caged Bird” the captive bird calls for help from a free bird. In “Sympathy” the bird knows what freedom feels like since there was a time where the bird was once free, but now is trapped. In the first stanza the use of imagery revealed how freedom felt before the bird was caged.

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The world is no stranger to oppression. Madness driven from an inferiority complex based on racial stigma. Prohibition of freedom being yet another way to inflate this expanding social divide between the oppressors and the oppressed, between white and black. Within the poem I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou, this concept of social division due to the desire of freedom and the desire to restrict the freedom of others is explored through the implementation of a variety of literary devices: symbolism, metaphors, sudden tone shifts, and a constant underlying allegory. Driven by her own experiences being raised during a time period where segregation and racism were acceptable behavior amongst the masses, Angelou illustrates this problematic normalization of discrimination through the juxtaposition of a free bird to a caged bird to convey the theme of oppression and the hope of freedom brought on by such.

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