Mrs. Kennedy's Period 1 Blog

Through out both the novel and the poem (I, Too) white and black racism is the only form discussed, but there are many other types as well. A common one in the united states is Asian stereo types and discrimination. Whether its that they all know knug-foo or that their all brilliant. People take white and black racism very seriously today but racism in general can sometimes still go un-handled, with Asian racism its things such as stereotypes and derogatory words as well as having an issue with the person due to a war like the Vietnam war.

It is important to take all forms of racism very seriously, racism is not just an issue of white and black but all peoples. And while many people go out to stop black racism more people need to focus on stopping all racism. In the poem “I, Too” Langston is referring to how black slaves/servants were made to eat in the kitchen and that one day he would not have to eat in the kitchen but out with the others, while this is great example of black racism and the “coming out of it” he is only showing one side of racism only the black and white part is alluded too, this is similar in most all of Langston’s poems in that only white and black racism is touched on. I believe that everyone needs to look at the bigger picture of racism, when I looked up “Asian racism poem” I got very few hits but when I looked up “black racism poem” I got plenty, in my mind this is wrong, more people need to look at and understand all forms of racism and not just one or two. I hope this blog made an impact on both your understanding and thoughts on racism and its many forms.

n my three mediums blacks and whites are portrayed very differently. In “To Kill a Mockingbird” black people are portrayed as lesser beings because they are being used as household servants. In Tom Robinson’s case all of the evidence points to him being innocent but the verdict is still guilty due to the racism at the time. in “Dinner Guest: Me”a poem by Langson Hues he admits to being black and admits to being the problem. He talks about how he is sitting at a table and is being waited on and being the center of attention even though he is the problem.

In my third medium, a Painting, blacks are portrated almost as equals with them playing sports going to church and even in congress. i believe this picture to be very powerful because it really captures the essence of blacks in america. but in another section of the painting there is a row of white people that seems to say white people are still dominant in congress. in another section a black man is shaking a white mans hand. overall in america this is what is going on with black    people.          

Racism has been among us for a very long time, but has improved. We see it throughout our world: in literature, lyrics to music, poetry, and on the television or internet. Below I chose to compare three pieces of work that portray racism in different ways.

In the book, To Kill a Mockingbird, black people and white people live completely separate lives. Atticus, a father and a lawyer, has been appointed to defend Tom Robison, a black man. Tom Robinson was guilty before proven because of his color. Atticus was treated poorly even for defending Tom Robison. This book shows how people were treated differently just because the color of their skin not for who they actually where as a person. Atticus does not have the prospective of most, he shares the same beliefs as Asher Roth and Langston Hughes that everyone should be treated fair and equally.

The poem, “I Dream a World”, by Langston Hughes describes a world of peace. The poem suggests that no matter what race you are everyone will be equal on earth. Asher Roth and Langston Hughes both talk about Peace, joy and freedom blessing us all. Asher Roth and Langston Hughes also talk about greed not existing.  Langston’s dream portrays what many people’s dreams are, no racism just love for one another.

Asher Roth wrote a song, G.R.I.N.D. (Get Ready It’s a New Day), that shows his feelings for a better world. He raps “Aint a man on the God green beneath any other”, which means that no one race or person is less equal or important than anyone else. To add on to that he raps “Together we’re strong, but divided never been so weak”.  He also says “I swear they turn a ear when we talk about peace and love”, Asher Roth is saying that people try to avoid fixing things in the world like peace or love. Asher Roth talks about greed like Langston Hughes when he raps “We only wanna buy new shoes” and he raps “Its not bout the fame and fortune”, He states it’s not about getting what you want all the time, it’s about loving what you have.

Racism is something that will stick your fingers just like honey: it will not go away completely, its hate will spread through the cracks of society. No matter how much tar and cement you stick there, the deaths, the beatings, the hate crimes will still come through.  They will stay. They stained the book of human life with blood.  Written in it too. It was and still a dark stain against life today. Life from the past cannot change.  But the people trying to change the hate to love are working toward the future.  With the pushing of white, yellow, and black people, life has almost come to an equal status.  Still hate lives on like the story of Pandora’s Box.  Right there, in that instant all the hate and evils of the world were released into what we have now. Inequality and hate.  But, with the help of people who care the box will reseal most of the world’s hate toward the colorless and the colorful.

In the story of “To Kill a Mockingbird” a little girl named Scout, she shares he story, but there an underlining story playing almost so sync you can’t tell it is there. On top you see a girl who experiences change: a change in her brother, in her town who she loves, and most of all, Mr. Boo Radley.  Then the underlining story is the one who sees the racism. Her father saw through the fog that was so thick in front of the eyes of people of the town.  Atticus, Scout’s father, has almost a clear path in comparison to Bob Ewell.  Bob is blind and thoughtless.  Within the story, Atticus did something that people thought was just unthought of to the people of Maycomb.  He was chosen to stand up for a black man, that wasn’t unthought of, but actually trying to win a case that was thought to be and instant lose to the black man.  Trying hard, looking for the loopholes in the loosely woven ties of Bob Ewell.  The case drove to a close.  The fog of racism was too thick for people and even if Bob was blatantly wrong, people couldn’t see it.  So in the story an innocent man was killed just because he was a different color.  A death, the worst you can do to a man, they pulled that card just because they could.  Just because you did not want to live in the same town as him. This is disgraceful.

Now to move to the view of a black man, Langston Hughes.  He is black himself, so this spins people into another view.  In his poem “ Mother to son” he repeats the line, “ Life ain’t no crystal stair”. He probably means that  life is like walking up stairs. But there is a catch.  That staircase isn’t polished, glossed over, or even completed  at times.  Then in the poem: “ Dinner Guest: Me”. The very first line it says “ I know I am the Negro problem.”  It  blatant said it.  The black man who live in the time of intense hate; even knows himself that the white population blames for living and even breathing.  Then “ I Dream a World”, we all dream a world but; you dreamed a world that scorn was not shown onto another man just because of the color of his skin.

Then the movie that I have recently saw was one that was set in the face of racism.  It is called “ The Help.”  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Help_(film).  The book was written first, but the movie follows very closely to the book.  In the film a black woman raises a white girl and is a maid in a white house. Then the white woman in charge was conviced by a close friend that black people carry different diseases.  Then, from being mistreated they are accused of stealing which is false at times.  Then they are told that they can not go further because they are black or because their family needs money.  But a white woman stands up for them by writing their voices onto paper.  Still white women depended for black woman to raise their children but also to bear their scorns.

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Democracy by Langston Hughes, and Changes by 2pac are all sources that deal a lot with racism. Even though they all deal with racism, this book, poem and song all have one thing that is emphasized most but deals with racism at the same time.
    To Kill a Mockingbird is a very eye-opening book that has more than half of the book dealing with racism. I think the thing that is most emphasized in the book though is the unfairness between the blacks and whites. Tom Robinson was discriminated during the trial just because he was a different color. That is very unfair. The trial was almost the whole book so the unfairness is the topic most emphasized during the book.

The poem “Democracy” by Langston Hughes mostly talks about how something needs to change between the blacks and whites because he can’t keep waiting each day hoping freedom will come. He says how he has just as much rights as another person but still needs the freedom. The thing most emphasized in the Langston Hughes poem “Democracy” is freedom for the black people.

    The last source i found was a song by 2pac. The song is called changes and he talks a lot about racism and freedom like the poem. The thing most emphasized though is how even though people talk about not being racist and how they try to be equal, 2pac sees no change. All he wants is peace and equality instead of poverty and war. It says in the song how the police seemed to be more harsh if you were black and how people cared more about the whites then blacks. Change is the most important thing, like the title says, and we need to act on our words not just say them. (http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=5517)
    These three sources have a lot to them but when you break it down and really think about it they still talk about racism, but there is one thing that is most emphasized.

Racism today is expressed in many ways all over the media. Whether it’s in a harsh way or not people try to get their point across. Because of the many different opinions individuals may have, feelings expressed about racism may vary.

In the book To Kill a Mockingbird, Racism is expressed in many ways. As the novel is told from a child’s point of view, you’d see both sides of racism as a trial was taking place. Harper Lee choosing to have the book take place during a period of segregation also effected how racism was portrayed. Throughout the novel, racism was sought from the many points of views of individuals of different races. In the following quote Harper Lee expresses the power of language.”Scout, said Atticus,” nigger-lover is just one of those terms that don’t mean anything like snot-nose. It’s hard to explain- ignorant, trashy, people use it when they think somebody’s favoring negros over and above themselves. It’s slipped into usage with some people like ourselves when they was a common, ugly term to label somebody.” Scout responded, “You aren’t really a nigger-lover, then, are you?” Atticus replied, “ I certainly am. I do my best to love everybody… I’m hard put sometimes- baby, it’s never an insult to be called what somebody thinks is a bad name. It just shows you how poor that person is, it doesn’t hurt you.” (ch. 11 107-109) Racists using the term “nigger-lover,” shows us that some people who use the term debate on how others in-take the term.

In Langston Hughes’ poem I, too, He expresses the view of a black man who didn’t have the finest things in life. But even though his surroundings belittle him he tries to make the best out of him life. He states this by saying, “They send me to eat in the kitchen. When company comes, But i laugh. And eat well, And grow strong.” Just because he’s an african american  doesn’t mean he should be treated differently. At the very end of the poem it says, “Besides, They’ll see how beautiful I am. And be ashamed. I, too am America.” Langston Hughes writing this automatically tells you that he too is only human, and even though he is of a different race he should be as equal as everyone else.

In the art piece, it shows a chained slave painting their chains gold. Before the chains were painted gold, they were silver. This shows that with the very little this slave had, they tried to make the best of it. And this also shows that just because the chains look different, they’re automatically “better.”

With the three mediums I chose, racism played a big role. All entirely being about, or having dealt with an African American trying to have the best things in life. Each piece represents how race impacts us and the world around us everyday.

Racism is a very broad and well discussed topic, and many different pieces of literature and artwork deal with it. Although they all deal with racism, they all can emphasize different aspects of it. Three different mediums that I chose to analyze are To Kill a Mockingbird; “Democracy,” by Langston Hughes; and a piece of artwork, created by Octavio Roth. To evaluate the themes across these works I chose to see what is emphasized most in each work.

In this piece of artwork is Article 7 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. What is emphasized the most in this work is that no one should be discriminated against in a court of law, and that when a person goes before the law they are to be protected from any kind of discrimination. What I find interesting about this though is that Tom Robinson, when presented in front of the court, is not treated without discrimination; when he is presented before the law he is not protected from discrimination.

In To Kill a Mockingbird what is emphasized the most is that one person can make a difference when fighting racism, we can see this through Atticus. When he is defending Tom Robinson, although he did not win the case, he gets the people of the jury to think differently than what they had believed. Another thing that is emphasized is that innocence should not be crushed; Scout and Jem, being young children, are not blinded by racism while watching the trial. The innocence of childhood should not be forgotten so that there is less hate in the world.

In the poem “Democracy” by Langston Hughes it is emphasized that his race is not treated equal. Everyone tells him that tomorrow things will be alright, but that is not good enough because you cannot get by today hoping what tomorrow will bring.

These mediums all emphasize different things; To Kill a Mockingbird emphasizes that one person can make a difference, the artwork emphasizes that all people should be treated without discrimination in front of the law, and “Democracy” by Langston Hughes emphasizes that change cannot wait; but they all come together on the subject of racism. 

“To Kill a Mockingbird”, “Dinner Guest: Me”, and the song by the Black Eyed Peas “Where is the love?” all are similar because they all have problems to the solutions the writers of each are talking about. Each have to do with racism and ways to stop it.

The problem in “To Kill a Mockingbird” was racism but not only that, it was oblivious racism. The characters in the story were totally unaware of the things they were saying that were very wrong. The character who was well aware and tried to do something about it was Atticus. Throughout the story, he was trying to teach his children the right thing to do. Since the whole town was against Tom Robinson, Atticus was not and was offending him on trial. Scout, who was somewhat unaware of her actions during the story, was just throwing the N-word around like it was nothing; Like it didn’t effect anyone. She of course didn’t know the exact meaning, but the rest of the town did, and they still said it.

The problem in “Dinner Guest: Me” is of course racism and the poem is basically talking about the acknowledgment of the discrimination of blacks. I think the black person in this poem is at a restaurant with a white person and they are discussing the society and how wrong it is. The white person is asking him the usual questions that a black person would receive. Then the white person says he’s embarassed to be white because of how horrible black people get treated by them. The solution they came up with at the end of the poem is simply just to wait because realisticly, there isn’t anything else they can do.

The problem in the song “Where is the Love?” By the Black Eyed Peas is not only racism, but all the problems in USA that they are not doing anything about.  A good phrase from the song is “If you only have love for your own race, Then you only leave space to discriminate. And to discriminate only generates hate.” This is the main problem in the song. It’s saying that everybody only associates with their own race and if you do this, it’s basically discriminating, which leads to hate. The song has many solutions but mainly the big one is to just have love for each other.

When will this world come to a place where everyone is equal? When will these people that have been discriminated against realize their self worth? When will the harmony of the world come out and show it’s true colors instead of the ignorance of people against each other?

In the novel To Kill A Mockingbird there were many different that racism was represented and also many types of ways that harmony between everyone at the end was shown. When Tom Robinson went into court and was sentenced to death, everyone knew it was unfair no matter his skin color. Everyone knew Tom’s innocence, but because of the color of his skin, because of his origins and where he came from he was put to death. But Jem was able to get past the fact of the color of Tom’s skin. When Jem was able to realize that Tom was but a regular man like he himself would grow up to be he knew what was happening here was wrong. Jem knew that there should be no different in the color of his skin, he was a man like any of the other townsmen and he was innocent. The truth was that there was no justice being served. So why were the townspeople so ignorant to the fact that Tom did nothing? Why couldn’t these people see that they were putting a man to death for nothing? Most importantly, how could they not just look past his skin color and see a human being? Even though the others couldn’t see it, Jem did. Jem knew what the truth was, and it was that Tom and every other person in that court room was equal in the fact that they all came into this world the same way, and were all just human.

“Racism – A Game of Colour” by Amity Ray is a poem that could keep you thinking for the rest of your life about the world’s diversity and how it can be so beautiful but also how it could be so ugly. In this poem she explains all these different colors and how there are different shades and the fact that racism is the “trauma of complexion”.  She talks about how we think of other colors sometimes like “white is elementary and that black is voluntary” thinking one color is more needed than the other which leads to how it is for people also. Once someone starts to think that their race is needed more than any other and they start to have this kind of pejorative prejudice against everyone else who isn’t their race, that’s when it becomes racism. That’s when people forget about the ways that they are and just focus on the ways that they are different. In the second half of stanza 8, Amity Ray explains how we could all just become one picture. We could all be one simple picture of nature  and by coming together we could make it a beautiful picture. No matter what your color was you would belong somewhere and have harmony with every other. You just have to sit there and ask yourself, why is it that we don’t just work together? Why can’t it be easy enough to stop racism like it seems to be? To just work together and get rid of the bacchanal pride we all seem to have in this world instead of fixing these problems?

Harmony by Nevershoutnever, I suppose from the title of this song you can figure out where I’m going with this. This song has always been one of my favorites because the lyrics speak so truly to how we should all be living in this world. In the video it shows salt shakers and snails and how they have wars against each other. There’s judging, fighting, and pure hate. But there’s this one salt shaker who is in love with another snail, but just because of the fighting, just because of their difference they can’t really be together so the salt shaker has to send the snail his love. In the song it tells us how we’ve  come away from the fact that we are all equal and how if we just realized that fact itself, we could live in harmony.

“I am I, you are you, we are we

We could live in such harmony

Can’t you see apathy lies between?

We could live in such harmony”

Apathy-  Noun:Lack of interest, enthusiasm, or concern. Synonyms: indifference – unconcern.

Apathy is an important word to the issue of racism. To not be concerned about these problems, to have lack of interest in others making them have a belittling affect; however “we could live in such harmony” if we could just open our eyes to this issue and realize what we are doing is wrong.  So why is it that we can’t love each other and instead fight each other because of difference in complexion of skin? Why can’t we just hold on to the words of this song and live in the harmony that we are all supposed to experience, the harmony that is supposed to make this world go round rather than this hate that makes society screwed up and fall apart so effortlessly?

All these questions, if all just answered with harmony could be so easy and not be so confusing. Because some think it’s time to take a stand and love everyone equally no matter their culture or color. “Love makes the world go round.”

Harmony, even if they look like a shinigami. Don't discriminate against them their just as beautiful <3

My first medium is the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee. My second medium is the poem “I Dream a World” by Langston Hughes, and my third is the song “Changes” by 2pac. They are all the same because they are all about racism. Though they all focus mainly on white / black racism, they all convey the same idea.

The novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” shows examples of racism and discusses it in various ways. For example, when it was clear that Tom Robinson was innocent, they still said he was guilty. This was most likely for the soul purpose that he was black. Then, when he tried to run for freedom they killed him. This was because he was trying to escape, but racism could have played a part there. Nearly all the people in Maycomb County were racist. Only a handful of people were not racist. This “handful” included the Finch’s. Atticus defended Tom as best he could in the trial, whereas usually a white lawyer would hardly try to win that particular case. Atticus agreeing to defend Tom, and actually putting all the power he could into winning that case and proving Tom’s innocence, could be used as an example of black’s and whites coming together. So I feel as if the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” sends the idea that peace between races is possible and that there should be peace between races and people shouldn’t “hate” each other because they have different colored skin, and everyone should be treated equal.

The poem “I Dream a World” talks mostly about how he (Langston Hughes) dreams of a world where there is no hate, no fighting, and no racism, and how he dreams of a world where whites and blacks can come together. It also says “A world I dream where black or white, whatever race you be will share the bounties of the earth and every man is free”. By that I think it’s saying that he dreams of a world, or the world should be at a place where everyone can live here without racism being a problem; at the same time, it’s saying every man is equal and should be treated as such. That’s how the poem relates to the novel, races being peaceful with each other. They both focus on the same idea, racism is not a good thing, and people should not fight with each other because their skin color is different.

The song “Changes” is similar to the novel because on the song it says, “Cops give a damn about a negro, Pull the trigger, kill a ni**a, he’s a hero” which shows how lawmen are/were racist against people who weren’t white. It also says “We gotta’ start makin’ changes”. Here, he is saying we have to start changing the way we think about people who are different from us. Which in the novel there were characters that made changes as to how they acted towards people who were different. Then in the song it says “I see no changes. All I see is racist faces.” which is saying racism is still a problem even though it shouldn’t be. Then, it says, “It takes skill to be real, time to heal each other”. This is saying that blacks, whites, etc, just need to forget the fact that their skin is different colors and come together and be peaceful instead of hurting, killing, and fighting with each other because they’re different colors. That’s how the song relates to both the novel and the poem.

I chose these three because they are very similar and focus on the same topic(s): people should treat each other equally, live together peacefully and not hurt/kill each other because they are different colors, or different races, or just different all together. They all also give examples of racism, like how and in what ways people are racist towards each other or things people would do to people they were racist towards; they all talk about how racism is/was a problem and what should – and/or could – be done to completely end racism.

TKAM                          Langston Hughes                Tupac Shukur (2pac)