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I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings Analysis

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How do Maya Angelou and Harper Lee express their views on racial inequality during the 1930’s through the novels ‘I know why the caged bird sings’ and ‘to kill a mocking bird’?
Maya Angelou, a well-known and loved Author wrote an autobiography of her life from when she was very young up to her death in 2014. The first book in the series of 7 is ‘I know why the caged bird sings’, it encompasses her growth and development as a child physically, mentally and emotionally, showing the journey and confusion that many young African-Americans go through as they grow up. Similar to ‘I know why the caged bird sings’, Harper Lee’s book ‘to kill a mocking bird’ is also based on growing up in Southern North America during the 1930’s. It’s a very well-known …show more content…

As Maya grows up she experiences many racial remarks and slowly develops an opinion on the segregation of her town. At first Maya thinks she isn’t good enough and that blonde hair white girls are beautiful and she isn’t “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”. As she grows up she experiences more racism and inequality. At Mayas 8th grade graduation she experiences her first white man speech, after Mr Donleavy, the local presidential candidate, had excessively praised and promoted the white child school he left leaving a sombre atmosphere in the once exciting graduation. Not helping Mayas self-opinion she now thinks that “it was awful to be Negro and have no control over [her] life”. Her next encounter with racial inequality was at the dentist. With a bad tooth ache that wasn’t going away, Mayas grandmother took her to the dentist. After declining politely to treat Maya as she was a coloured girl, Dr Lincoln states clearly that “my policy is that I would rather stick my hand in a dogs mouth than a

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Thinking back to when I read "To Kill a Mockingbird", I now recall striking comparisons between Maya Angelou 's autobiography and Harper Lee 's fictional novel. While reading "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", I drew more connections between the two very different books. Matthew has already pointed out the similar theme of racism, but I think there could be more similarities between the characters. Even though Maya Angelou and Jean "Scout" Finch were of different nationalities, both girls suffered due to their imaginative nature and physical appearances. Maya and Scout have compassionate older brothers (Bailey Johnson Jr. and Jeremy "Jem" Finch), a loving parent (Annie "Momma" Henderson and Atticus Finch), and the two girls live in a

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The 1960’s in the united states is one of the most difficult times the U.S has ever faced and is well portrayed in harper lee’s book “To kill a mocking bird”. She shows the main problems the us really faced. She shows how poorly African Americans were treated and the sexist stereotypes towards women and lastly she wrote about the economic crash. When harper lee shows the racist events, she does so very accurately. She slips in quotes in her writing that seem like they would go unnoticed but have a powerful impact in the book.

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It’s an awful feeling knowing that no matter how hard you work, you’ll never earn as much money as your white counterpart. Sadly, this has been the case for hundreds of years for African Americans living in the United States. To Kill a Mockingbird reveals the everyday struggles that African Americans endured during the 1930’s. Many of the events in the novel were based on the author, Harper Lee’s life. Just like Atticus, Lee’s father was also a lawyer.

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during this story it shows a young black lady that awaits with pride and anticipation her graduation day. once the day finally arrives, her dreams and expectations are shattered by the speech that Mr.Donleavy, a White, gave to the year of 1940. He was direct in causing the message of the graduate’s slim probabilities of getting a rigorous career that wasn't athletic . Maya Angelou declared that “It was brutal to be young and already trained to take a seat quietly and hear charges against my color with no likelihood of defense.” Donleavy gets the graduates to assume and have doubts.

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The novel To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, teaches about the prejudices people faced in the 1930s. Some of the different prejudices Harper Lee mentioned in the book were racism, sexism, and classism. The book teaches the reader about these topics through the different characters in the story. In To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee highlights the ways people were treated throughout the 1930s based on their race, gender, or social status. Racism is the main focus of To Kill A Mockingbird.

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Those decades shared a major subject, inequality. Harper Lee decided to acknowledge the inequality in her novel To Kill A Mockingbird. She wrote the story with setting in the 1930s but opinions from the 1960s. Raised in a town that held tight to their 1930s opinions during the 1960s, she decided to write what she knew. She showed the inequality in problems such as economy, race, and women.

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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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In 1960, a novel was released by the famous author Harper Lee, this book has then won the Pulitzer Prize, Bestseller and Brotherhood Awards, Library and Presidential Awards and the Academy Awards. The setting of the novel is placed in a small The title of this book is ‘To Kill A Mockingbird’ which represents Harper lee’s perspective in America 1930s after slavery was abolished, through the narration of the main character Scout. Harper Lee’s perspective of 1930’s America is efficiently portrayed through the development of coexistence of good and evil, through her manipulation of stylistic devices and aesthetic features. The main themes portrayed in this essay are, growing up and family, courage and fear and Prejudice and Racism.

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To Kill A Mockingbird, is a powerful, classic piece of literature which heavily influenced readers through its enduring concepts since its initial publication. Written in 1960’s by Harper Lee, the passage is set in 1930’s America in the southern state of Alabama. A prominent period of racial segregation, in which most experienced horrendous brutality, political exclusion, and legal segregation. Harper Lee endeavours the key concept of moral courage through the practice of common racial cultural assumptions, beliefs and values present in 1930s America. Lee employs stylistic devices and aesthetic features to provide an insight into the characters mind, and therefore, provide a marginalised perspective of the racial segregation of blacks during

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However, a racially cruel scene can be seen in the Stamps when Maya is raised to believe that white people are superior to blacks and it is best to not say anything to them for it will only cause harm. An example of this is when Grandma is front of her store and three white girls come strolling around calling Momma(grandmother) names such as Annie improperly by her

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Harper Lee's book "To Kill a Mockingbird" sheds light on racial injustice in the American South in the 1930s. The narrative is seen through the eyes of Scout Finch, a little child growing up in the Alabaman small town of Maycomb. The book examines a variety of topics, such as racism, prejudice, and having the guts to stand up for what is right. A classic work of literature, Harper Lee’s

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[Sofia’s child] like to work for me, be my maid?” (A. Walker, 85). Racial dominance enforces the concept that it would be an honor for black people to be a white lady’s servant. Instead of placing herself inferior position, Sofia stands her ground which leads her to a brutal

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To Kill a Mockingbird explores a number of contextual issues in Alabama during the 1930’s, Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird tells a tremendous story that touches on issues such as racism, injustice and gender bias in Alabama during the 1930s. She shines a light on the racist themes to show how people of that time spoke and behaved. She also uses language considered offensive to help illustrate the episodes of alabama's past. The prevalent themes during the 1930’s create the content of the novel and how it has caused controversy over time.

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People throughout their lives are constantly discovering who they are and who they want to grow into. The same statement accurately describes Maya Johnson, a strong woman who wrote about her life in her autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. As a little girl, her mother’s ex-boyfriend raped and she had to rediscover herself whilst navigating through the grim veil of trauma - a process that burdened her for many years. Throughout her life, she encountered many different people, some good, others bad, but they each helped her eventually discover her identity. ‘Identity’ is how people define themselves as a human being, and, therefore, nobody else can dictate it.

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