The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B Du Bois Throughout the past, African Americans have been faced and challenged with many difficulties. In the novel The Souls of Black Folk author W.E.B Du Bois, describes the issues that the African Americans face along with an outline of how the emancipation occurred. In 1863 the emancipation proclamation gave freedom to the slaves although they were not officially free for another 100 years. Du Bois examines the progress made behind the veil of race and all of the possibilities that the future holds for African American. To gain complete freedom the African Americans must follow a blueprint provided by Du Bois. The plan he had was to give Black Americans a good education, the right to vote, and to be just as equal as white people. Du Bois introduces the social condition of having double consciousness, which is the idea of feeling his or her own two-ness. “ It is a peculiar sensation, this double consciousness, this sense of always …show more content…
With this said, the term double consciousness means that a black American can have the sensation of two souls, two thoughts, two warring ideals all inside only one dark body. Along with this term another term is brought up in chapter one, this is the “veil”. The veil is a metaphor for the difference in views that between African Americans and white people; the veil is what the African Americans wear to show the different views that they have on the economic, political, and social opportunities. “Born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world,—a world which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see himself through the revelation of the other world” (2). This does not only explain the difference in views between African Americans and whites but also an allegory showing the invisibility that the blacks feel. These two terms go hand in hand when it comes to Du Bois’