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In The Fire Next Time: Comparing Blackmon And Alexander

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Baldwin vs Blackmon and Alexander We all know people with a big heart, the people who forgive and forget and move on. These people are kind- hearted and don’t let the past harm their future. These outstanding characteristic all tie into one person, James Baldwin. James Baldwin wrote a short story called, In the Fire Next Time. This short story concludes the racial inequality in America and the issues in the next generation of black people. In this essay, I am going to compare James Baldwin's book to Blackmon and Alexander. A main theme I noticed when reading In the Fire Next Time is white people misunderstanding the reality of black people. This short story mainly talks about the myths and lies that white people are living in. Baldwin starts off with a letter to his nephew about the racial differences, and inequalities in the world. He relates to this feeling, and explains that white people will never understand the harsh realities of the world. White people were born into the world believing that it's a good place, and that life is fair. The sad truth is that they are wrong, …show more content…

Once the black people were freed, white people felt offended that they shared the same status as a black person, so they started to reconstruct amendments. Black people were socially and economically controlled. Businesses had cheaper labor, all blacks were put into mining, and convict leasing became a norm. In fact black people were being leased out as a way to pay their fines, which made it impossible for black people to have any economic status. This all relates to Baldwin because it's all about living in an unjust world. Baldwin stresses the idea that white people will always have a good life, and will never understand the pain black people go through. Black people have endured such pain, which explains why black people feel so little

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African Americans have lived in a world in which they are inferior to whites. The letter "My Dungeon Shook" written by James Baldwin and the memoir Warrior's Don't Cry, Both talk about how in this certain tin African Americans where judged not by their personality but by their skin color. Which they were treated not as people but as animals, who were inferior to them. Baldwin's purpose in writing "My Dungeon Shook" was to inform and to prepare his nephew on the reality that they live in. In the letter it states "You were born in a society which spelled out with brutal clarity, and in as many ways as possible that you were a worthless human being.

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James Baldwin uses personal experience in The Fire Next Time to support the thesis that African Americans in his generation were damaged physically and psychologically as victims of racism. The girls of Baldwin’s generation “[turned] into matrons before they had become women” (Baldwin 17). There are plenty of risk factors concerning the girls’ premature age while pregnant. The girls became destined to become like their mothers instead of pursuing the American Dream: to have freedom. A mother’s responsibilities are to care for the child and work in the household, stereotypically speaking.

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In The Fire Next Time, James Baldwin wants to find out if shaping or defending our identity is more real to us than achieving our humanity. He wants to know because all his life he has been troubled by religion and movements that made him question something. That something was, is it important to shape an identity and defend it or to achieve humanity? Baldwin went around about his life and each time he'd pick up a few things here and there that told him a little bit more. A little bit more for his question he's so wrapped up in whether he knew it or not.

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In the essay “Notes of a Native Son” by James Baldwin, he expresses feelings of hate and despair towards his father. His father died when James was 19 years old from tuberculosis; it just so happens that his funeral was on the day of the Harlem Riot of 1943. Baldwin explains that his father isn’t fond of white people due to the racist past. He recalls a time when a white teacher brought him to a theater and that caused nothing but upset with his father, even though it was a kind act. Many events happened to Baldwin as a result of segregation, including a time where a waitress refused to serve him due to his skin color and Baldwin threw a pitcher of water at her.

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Along with Baldwin’s opinions, he includes several historical facts that support his reasoning for being on the forefront of fighting for civil rights. The first situation he describes is when his friend Tony Maynard was falsely accused of a crime and put in jail. Lewis M. Steel, the man who tried Tony’s case wrote in an article that “Maynard had been wrongfully accused of a 1967 shotgun killing in Greenwich Village, convicted of manslaughter, and sentenced to ten to twenty years. Using a shotgun as the murder weapon was completely out of character for this stylish man with an artist’s sensibility” (Steel). When Baldwin heard about this, he became more angry with the Americans than before, increasing the oppression of the African-Americans.

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Baldwin’s solution for black people is for them to create their own identity and take a stab at achievement regardless of the social requirements or constraints set before them. For, “You can only be destroyed by believing that you really are what the white world calls a nigger". I was fascinated by the comparison of “Letter to My Son” by Ta-Nahisi Coates to that of Baldwin’s. Although they both bring forward the same topics and issues faced by the black community, however they both do not view the problem in the same way, as far as proposing a solution is concerned. For example, Baldwin proposed a solution in which he urges the black community through his nephew to recognize the shameful acts of injustice in America, and express acceptance with love towards the whites even though they may not do the same in

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In his own words, Baldwin states, "I had discovered the weight of white people in the world. I saw that this had been for my ancestors and now would be for me an awful thing to live with and that the bitterness which had helped to kill my father could also kill me." (Baldwin 4). This quote exemplifies how external factors, such as societal norms and geographic location, could change Baldwin's perception of his own race and the white race as

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In A Letter to My Nephew, James Baldwin, the now deceased critically acclaimed writer, pens a message to his nephew, also named James. This letter is meant to serve as a caution to him of the harsh realities of being black in the United States. With Baldwin 's rare usage of his nephew 's name in the writing, the letter does not only serve as a letter to his relative, but as a message to black youth that is still needed today. Baldwin wrote this letter at a time where his nephew was going through adolescence, a period where one leaves childhood and inches closer and closer to becoming an adult.

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