Similarities Between Maya Angelou And John Gast

Midterm Essay

Maya Angelou and John Gast cast nice imagery across their works when describing their understanding of American culture. John Gast describes the idea of Americans expanding westward with the advancement of technology, railroads, and telephone wires in his painting. Maya Angelou portrays the Difficult life of an African American shoe shiner in Times Square in her poem. She showcases the idea that you can be successful regardless of the color of your skin. Both works describe details that contribute tribute to the understanding of American culture at the time they were released.

John Gast brings to light the idea of America expanding to the west in his painting. Some folks were unsure at the time, but John Gast believed it

We can see this in the first thematic detail where the woman pictured as the main focal point is wearing a gold star on her forehead. This woman is meant to be a symbol of progress, and the gold star on her forehead means the star of empire. John Gast used the women and the star to symbolize the idea of the American empire progressing to the west. This relates to America’s culture at the time by expanding the idea that America wants to be the best empire and have the most territory. The second thematic detail provided in this painting shows the same woman holding a telephone wire in her hand as she floats in the sky feeding the wire on top of the poles. This is just one of the many examples in the painting that symbolizes America’s expansion westward. This thematic detail reflects its cultural context by symbolizing the many things America needs to do when advancing technology across the land. This detail also helps contribute to our understanding of America's culture at the time it was made by showing the

We can see her portraying this in the first thematic detail when she writes, “I’m the best that ever done it, that's my title and I won it.” This line from the poem shows that the worker is the best shoe shiner in Times Square regardless that they are African American. This detail reflects the social context of the poem because it refers to the idea that you can be successful in what you do, no matter what your skin color is. The next thematic detail that the poem provides is when Angelou wrote, “I clean ‘em till they squeak, In the middle of next week.” This line in the poem represents how hard the worker is working to make sure the white man’s shoes are spotless. This reflects the social context of the poem by showing how much harder African Americans had to work just to make a quarter and a dime. They had to do hard labor to be able to make a living. The third thematic detail provided in the poem is the line that reads, “Say I’m like a greedy bigot, I’m a cap’talist, can you dig it?” In the detail, it symbolizes the idea that the white men don’t want to pay the African American workers the full amount of pay they deserve after they worked for it. They call the worker a bbigot when in reality they just