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Summary Of A Coming Of Age In Mississippi By Anne Modey

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In the Memoir book, A Coming Of Age In Mississippi by Anne Moodey, she writes about her life from her childhood all the way to her involvement in her civil rights movement. At an early age through her friendships and farm labors she learns about the societal treatment and poverty of black people. As she matures, she is further exposed to these problems and becomes more aggravated by these injustices. Likewise, Anne Moodey joins the Civil Rights movement to spark change and fight for equality, but is later compelled to leave due to death threats.Throughout her life she experienced many hardships of racism, prejudice, and oppression due to the color of her skin in that era. Perspectively it appears that Anne Moodey seemed to judge the success …show more content…

Based on the connotations and details within the book, it would seem as though Anne Moodey did not find the Civil Rights Movement to be too successful. In the beginning of her childhood Anne Moodey is unaware of racial the inequalities towards her people until she befriends her white neighbors the Johnsons. One day after meeting her friends at the movies Anne is separated from them and forced to sit on the balcony. Shortly after, her mother explains how things for her aren't the same as it is for the white kids, causing Anne reflects on this knowledge saying, “I now realized that not only were they better than me because they were white, but everything they owned and everything connected with them was better than what was available to me”(pg38). This first early reflection began to shape her understanding of racism and the problems it would later bring …show more content…

After hearing about Emmett Till’s death that she found a new fear of white people and for her life, feeling utterly distraught. Throughout her high school memories there appears to be a repetition of how African Americans are being utterly mistreated and beaten down. This is seen not only with Emmett till but also when the Taplin’s house being burnt down and with Jerry’s beating. All these horrible inhumane acts really gave Anne Moodey the truth on how things were for African Americans and truly opened her eyes on the subjects. Also in her high school age she saw the failures of people trying to stand up or try to start change in her area. Mrs. Rice was a woman who secretly informed Anne about further injustice and how it worked towards African Americans. However, she was seen to lose her job likely implied because of her views and willingness to inform students on the truth on the violence occurring. In addition, another example was with Samuel O’Quinn, a black activist and NAACP member, who knew all the facts of the tuplin burning and tried to gather everyone together secretly but failed. This failure stepped from Principle Willis who was an “Uncle Tom” which later lead to Samuel’s murder. In essences, Anne Moodey writes about all these tragic and unsuccessful events, which give off a strong mood of failure towards the idea equality between the two races. All these

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