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Double Consciousness And The Veil Analysis

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Born February 23rd 1868 DuBois spent his life caught between two extremely unsettling times in the history of African-American culture. Living in the time after slavery but before the boom of the civil rights movement in the 1960’s Debois situated himself in such way that he was able to bring awareness about the unique experience felt by many African Americans during this time period.As an African American writer Sociologist, Civil Right Activist and a Pan -Africanist Dubois communicates the reality of his and his people’s struggle in the his paper Double-Consciousness and the Veil. He argues that “ there is a sense of always looking at oneself through the eyes of others”(Dubois,1903,pp.164). Defining what he would essentially coin as the powerlessness felt by many African Americans when they must decide subjectively and objectively weather to be African or American in a given situation. He prefaces this by asking the question what does it mean to …show more content…

He Responds to the happening commenting that “I could beat my mates at examination time,beat them in a foot race or even beat their stringy heads...and all their dazzling opportunities were theirs not mine”(Dubois,1903,pp.164). Dubois is able to push himself to be stronger than his peersin all aspects including intelligence intellect and physical strength yet he must submit to his role in society until he can produce change. This begs the question what is the reason behind injustices like these. Is this a problem. Is his problem his own or is the problem with the society he lives in at the time. The Veil is the answer to this question, “I was different from the others or like mayhap in heart and life and longing but shut out from there world by a vast veil.(Dubois,1903,pp.164). In this time there was no need for pondering racial injustices for the whiteman because they saw the world of the blackman as conflicting and consequently separate

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