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Compare And Contrast Malcolm X And Douglass

1470 Words6 Pages

Adewunmi Adebanjo
Professor Hooley
English 1113-12345
27 August 2014 Societal Difference: How Individuals Provoke Societal Changes
Douglass Douglass and Malcolm X (also known as El-hajj Malik El-Shabazz) both achieved literacy through rare and unpredictable methods of learning. Douglass was a young man born into slavery in the 19thcentury, in years when the slave trade was legalized. Before he became enlightened, all he wanted to do was serve his master. One of the ways Douglass learned how to read was by making friends with children below his age so they could teach him secretly even though doing so was against the rules (Douglass 118-120); some of them were tricked into teaching him how to write. In contrast, Malcolm was born in the 20th century. He was imprisoned for burglary and learned how to perfectly read and write while serving his term. Malcolm already knew …show more content…

Learning how to read and write was not as prohibited as it was during the days of Douglass. However Malcolm also had to face some difficulties before he could read and write perfectly. He also had to break some rules in order to read. “Whenever I had progressed to really serious reading, every night at ten P.M. I would be outraged with the “lights out”…Fortunately, right outside my door was a corridor light that cast a glow into my room” (Malcolm X 276). He read with a glow of light and had to feign sleep whenever the night guards approached him. It is amazing how Douglass and Malcolm stuck their necks out just to read books in two different societies; one condemned education for people like Douglass, and the other did not see reading as a necessity. This is, however, the reverse in 21th century. Students drop out of school for reasons like: lack of effort and concentration, lack of determination, teenage pregnancies, and most importantly poor decision

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