How Did Maya Angelou Impact Society

When thinking of a historical figure, many imagine a president, king, or general that lead a country to greatness, but never realized some could be the ones who influence the minds of society. Although not thought of as anything, writers and poets hold the key to shaping the society’s mindset without even knowing it. Being a civil rights activist, social activist, and role model for women makes Maya Angelou a historical figure who has made a huge impact in American society and in American history. Born poor and black, she was a childhood victim of rape, shamed into silence. She was a young single mother who had to work at strip clubs for a living. Growing up in the 1930s as an African American was not a walk in the park. Angelou had to

Maya Angelou walked into a meeting of civil rights leaders talking about governmental policy regarding African Americans in society back in the 1990s, looked around, and put all of them in their spot with a simple, clever perception. “She came into the room,” recalled Al Sharpton, “and she said: ‘The first problem is you don’t have women in here of equal status. We need to correct you before you can correct the country”’("Maya Angelou’s Cultural Impact Not Forgotten"). Angelou had lived in Cairo and Ghana for a while working as a writer in each country before returning to the U.S. in 1970 and was appointed to the American Revolution Bicentennial Commission, which stressed the themes of renewal and rebirth based on a restoration of traditional values, giving a nostalgic and exclusive reading of the American past, by President Gerald R. Ford for all her accomplishments (“FG 75 (American Revolution Bicentennial Commission)”). She was later named to the Commission for International Woman of the Year, which had begun to address women's role in economic and social development, by President Jimmy Carter (“Commission on the Status of Women”). Never hesitant to speak her mind, Angelou passionately defended the rights of women, young people and the