“Black people and Black women do not just endure, they triumph with a will of collective consciousness that Western experience cannot extinguish” (O’Neale, 28).
Maya Angelou was an American author, poet, and civil rights activist who is best known for her memoir, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. The autobiography tells the story of Angelou's childhood and adolescence, focusing on the events and experiences that shaped her into the person she became. This essay will outline the three most important incidents in the book that go toward making Maya Angelou the person she became.
Firstly, I will discuss how Angelou’s rape affected her by ushering an era of silence for the author. I will then discuss her teenage pregnancy and how this event
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Angelou was nothing but a child when the most traumatic event in her life occurred: she was only eight years old at the time. This incident had a profound impact on the little girl’s life and personality, causing her to become withdrawn and introverted. She becomes afraid to speak and struggles with a sense of shame and guilt, which is a recurring theme in the book. As she writes in the book, she blames herself for “allowing” herself to be violated. “What he did to me, and what I allowed, must have been very bad if already God let me hurt so much.” (Angelou, …show more content…
“Angelou creates this alternate identity that is rooted in literature to see herself as separate and unique from the racially biased society in which she lives. Angelou joins this isolated vision of self together with her identity that is linked to her ethnicity to form a complex vision of self that enables her to find a voice in a racially oppressive society. Once Angelou is able to view herself as an isolated individual, both removed from and connected to the collective identity of the black community, she is able to overcome the forces in her life that threaten to silence her.” (Giberson,