ipl-logo

The Power Of Language In Malcolm X's Homemade Education

721 Words3 Pages

Have you ever wondered what language is or meant to you? Language can mean many things such as where it comes from if you speak more than one language or it can also mean a voice of power. In this essay I'm going to be talking about how this plays a big part in our day to day life. In the article “Homemade Education” excerpt from the Autobiography of Malcolm X talks about who he is and what language meant to him. Also another article is “Martin Luther King Jr. biography” gives his perspective on the power of language and how it helped him become who he was as a leader. “Language plays a big part in our life because it gives us a voice to stand up for what we want”. Without leaders before us such as Martin Luther King Jr or Malcolm X we would be here to this day without their power of language. Martin Luther King Jr was an American religious leader and a Civil-Rights activist. The power of his language played a big part in the civil-rights movement because his voice impacted a lot of African-American slaves to fight back against the white …show more content…

They had the same goal to help their people get a voice of their own to fight back. In Malcolm X article “Homemade Education” he speaks on his education and how going to jail and being attacked by police were experiences that changed him and mindset on who he is and how he wanted to have a language for other people that didn’t. That's what gave him the courage to fight back from his people and become their voice that they didn’t have for themselves.” My Homemade Education gave me, and with every additional book that I read, a little bit more sensitivity to the deafness, dumbness, and blindness that was affecting the black race in America.” When Malcolm X gave them their own language people started protesting this made other power speakers such as Barack Obama become power speak they got inspired from are leaders history

Show More
Related
494 Words | 2 Pages

In Frederick Douglas’ essay “Learning to Read,” and Malcolm X’s autobiography one of the most important similarities is that they both used their learning to read as an escape of the white man's persecution. Additionally, both lived in centuries of great oppression, gained their education while imprisoned or enslaved, and overcame the immense obstacle of being black in a white man's time. However, there are obvious differences between the two, such as Douglas simply wanted equality for himself, while Malcolm took his learnings and transformed them into a seething hate of the whites. Douglas was a very clever man who was peaceful and smart, whereas Malcolm had an aggressive mentality. Instead of despising the white race, as Malcolm along with

Read More
305 Words | 2 Pages

“Learning to Read”, by Malcolm X reveals that he had a reading and writing problem. Malcolm X wanted to get the attention of Elijah Muhammad, but did not have the skills to write to him through letter while he was in jail. Muhammad was a religious leader and all Malcolm X knew was his street slang. Malcolm X was frustrated that he cannot express his thoughts through letter, because he didn’t know how. He decided while he was in jail to learn how to write and read, by copying the dictionary.

Read More
282 Words | 2 Pages

Getting education isn’t only to impart knowledge, but strengthen motivation that propels learners to work on what they are willing to become. Malcolm X is an good example of a self-educated articulate and powerful black American leader who was vocal against racism and fought for the right of the black American. In the essay “Learning to Read”, Malcolm X identifies how motivated attitude can push someone to further academic career. He says, “let me tell us something: from then until I left that prison, in every free moment I had, if I was not reading in the library, I was reading on my bunk”(page 162). Malcolm recounts his experience on reading journey with motivation of self-education because he understand without the ability to read, a basic

Read More
544 Words | 3 Pages

Shivam Patel Professor Caitlyn Doherty English 1001 30 January 2023 Text in Action Proposal For the Text in Action paper, I plan on using Malcolm X’s Learning to Read. I chose this piece of text because of the impact Malcolm X had on the Civil Rights Movement. I believe that people like Malcolm, MLK, and Rosa Parks had a big part to do with the changes in culture and beliefs in America on African Americans. The moving essay "Learning to Read" by Malcolm X describes how, while imprisoned, he taught himself to read. He became a civil rights activist after reading about the terrible events in history and learning about them.

Read More
219 Words | 1 Pages

In A Homemade Education, written by Malcom X, he is determined to teach himself how to understand what a book is saying. After studying and copying down a dictionary, Malcom X states “I could for the first time pick up a book and read and now begin to understand what the book was saying” (279,280). Malcom X’s assertion that copying down and studying to become more articulate does not fit the facts with a wide range audience. While studying an entire dictionary can be very beneficial, it is an overwhelming amount that will exhaust the reader. Also supporting, there are other methods that would be more beneficial to help develop a person’s vocabulary.

Read More
446 Words | 2 Pages

In” Discovering the Power of Language”, a selection taken from The Autobiography of Malcom X, published in 1964, Malcolm X notes that the power of words is great. Malcolm X implies that the proper vocabulary helps to express emotions. Malcolm X develops his thesis by sharing with his readers his personal experience in prison, how he managed to self-educate himself by reading the dictionary and how he elevated himself from a common criminal to a civil rights activist. The author's purpose is to explain how important is your language in order to be heard. Finally, Malcolm X shares with his readers that being able to read a book and understand what the author is saying made him feel such a freedom that he never felt before.

Read More
173 Words | 1 Pages

A Homemade Education by Malcolm X, is an informative essay about the author Malcolm X dedication to further his education by himself. In this essay the author talks about how he was envious, how he turned that into motivation, and how he didn't let the fact that being imprisoned would keep him from pursing his goals. The essay " A Homemade Education" was very meaningful. The most meaningful thing to me about this essay was the dedication behind the authors purpose to further his education.

Read More
1395 Words | 6 Pages

Language is used to convey a message as well as connect people to a particular culture or ethnicity he or she identifies with. People who share the same language share a bond and pass their history through language. In chapter one of The Skin That We Speak: Thoughts on Language and Culture in the Classroom Joanne Kilgour Dowdy speak about growing up in Trinidad and her mother insisting on her speaking in the colonizer's language rather than her native Trinidadian language. Joanne Kilgour Dowdy felt as if her identity was being pushed to the side when she was forced to speak “Colonized English” when she was at school or around the social elite of her community, and felt ridiculed from her peers for speaking proper as if she was white or of the elite social class. Dowdy major concern was how to have the freedom to go back and forth from home, language to the public language without feeling judged from both sides of her

Read More
219 Words | 1 Pages

In the story “Coming to Awareness of Language”, Malcolm X was in a situation where he wanted to learn more so he can understand books that 's when he started to read the dictionary to understand what the words meant later on he copied each word over and over so he could remember what it meant. In the story “Mother Tongue” it’s about about a girl that sees how her mothers’ problem of not knowing the language well affecting her mother and even herself when it comes to education. Then theres “Finding the Right Words to Express Me” the main idea of this story is that Henna had to balance out equally standard English and her natural language when it comes to different settings. These stories are related to each other by having different ways

Read More
116 Words | 1 Pages

In “Learning to Read”, Malcolm X uses rhetorical analysis to argue how African Americans continued to struggle in gaining education due to racism. He informs people that through our history books, there have been modifications that restrain the truth about the struggles black people faced. Malcolm X encouraged his audience to strive to get the rights that they deserved. He demonstrates that knowledge is very important because the truth empowers us. In his interview he persuades his audience with diction, tone, pathos, ethos, and appeal to emotion to make his point.

Read More
1635 Words | 7 Pages

Our identity is a place upon many attributes of a human being. Whether the person is someone who goes on promoting themselves to the world or not, and it shows how people communicate to others around them. Language is one of the main components that unveils the person’s identity in their everyday life, and they are many different ways to approach a person’s language. Relating to the article of Yiyun Li, “To Speak is to Blunder,” she knows two languages that has its positive and negative outcomes in her life. I to relate to her understanding of language, but a different view of what language means to me.

Read More
456 Words | 2 Pages

Malcolm X's "Literacy Behind Bars" is about the expansion of his world that provokes a burning passion within himself through the world of reading. While incarcerated, the author meets a man named Bimbi who leads the discussion with his stock of knowledge, prompting Malcolm X to further his skills in literacy. Taking small steps, he first broadens his vocabulary by reading alphabetically in the dictionary and copying pages. He reads aloud to himself until the words begin to stick with him. Not long after moves onto books, devouring them at a relentless pace, Malcolm X became so engrossed with reading that he begins breaking curfew rules just to continue reading by using the light outside of his cell.

Read More
877 Words | 4 Pages

Language drives the world around us. It is the premise of communication and lack thereof. Whether it be latin, french, spanish, music, literature, or art, language, in any of its various forms, gives one the freedom to communicate with and understand others. Those who can effectively exercise multiple languages are highly sought after and those who can not are often misunderstood. In many ways the manipulation of language can make those who hear, read, or see it think a specific way.

Read More
535 Words | 3 Pages

Summary of "Learning to Read" by Malcolm X In his essay "Learning to Read" from the chapter "Saved" in Malcolm's Autobiography published in New York (Grove Press, 1965). Malcolm was born in Omaha, Nebraska and his father was a political activist on behalf of Marcus Garvey. After he and his family moved to East Lansing, Michigan, where his father was killed and his mother placed in a mental institution. he became an orphan and ended up on the streets of Detroit where he was known as "Detroit Red".

Read More
411 Words | 2 Pages

Malcolm X's "Prison Studies" is a compelling literacy narrative that vividly recounts the transformative power of education. In this autobiographical essay, Malcolm X reflects on his experience of self-education while serving a ten-year prison sentence for burglary. Through his narrative, he demonstrates the transformative power of literacy and how it enabled him to break free from the constraints of his social and economic background, ultimately leading him toward a life of activism and advocacy. Throughout his essay, Malcolm X details his journey from a self-educated high school dropout to a highly literate and politically engaged individual. He explains that during his time in prison, he realized that his lack of education was a significant

Read More

More about The Power Of Language In Malcolm X's Homemade Education

Related Topics

Open Document