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Ellen L

Invisible Man and African American radicalism in World War II | African American Review... - 0 views

  • Invisible Man's continuing relation to the African American radicalism of its time helps explain the oft-noted ambivalence of its conclusion on such matters as artistic and political action and individual as opposed to group freedom.
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    This article talks about the Invisible Man in a more historic and political context, examining different political atmospheres in Harlem and the brotherhood.
Ellen L

U.S. Writers, Too, Drove Social Change - New York Times - 0 views

  • ''it is tyranny that has most often drawn writers into politics.''
  • tyranny indeed draws intellectuals into political conflict, so do economic, racial and social injustice.
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    Response to a Times article defending the changes brought upon by American writers. The original article stated "it is tyranny that has most often drawn writers into politics," this tyranny can be found in the Bosses from the Jungle, the plantation owners from GOW and the corporation owners in FFN.
Willie C

Family, Humanity, Polity: Theorizing the Basis and Boundaries of Political Community in... - 0 views

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    "Frankenstein is a novel that is deeply interested in a particular kind of social union, namely, the political community. Written in 1818 and in the moment between revolution and reform, Shelley's novel invokes contemporary discussions and theorizations of political community"
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    This source goes into the role the community plays in the novel. As the romantic value of human connection comes up, so does the community in a changing role. This is another one of Shelly's criticisms of her society.
Sarah Sch

Finance and Corruption in America - 2 views

  • The benefits big business receives for their donations to political parties are endless. Not only can a corporation get tax cuts, they can get negative tax rates. This means, not only do they pay zero dollars in taxes , but they also get additional profits at tax time. "Texaco, for example, received a tax rebate of $67.76 million, which meant that it paid taxes at a rate of negative 37.2 percent..." (Washington Post, October 20, 2000)
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    This article from corporate welfare discusses corruption in America and cites some incidents that demonstrate how money affects American politics. Some of the occurrences are typical of the corruption described in "Fast Food Nation", however there is also other stunning information. The excerpt above tells of how Texaco receives money from the government when it files taxes. Texaco receives money that is in the tens of millions of dollars while the lower class typically pays thousands of dollars in overall taxes per household. This article is helpful in an essay citing how big businesses benefit from corruption.
Ellen L

Barbara Ehrenreich on life on six bucks an hour | Books | The Observer - 0 views

  • 'That was the biggest - and nastiest - surprise,' she says. 'Discovering how big an atmosphere of suspicion there was, how much surveillance we were under. First, there were the drug and personality tests, then the endless rules. At Wal-Mart, we were not even allowed to say "damn".' She touches the discreet gold hoops in her ears. 'These would have been way too big for Wal-Mart. All that was a shock and it got to me
  • As she soon discovered, turnover in the low-wage world is so fast that companies simply use people up - literally working them until their backs give up the ghost or their knees buckle beneath them - and then spit them out. The poor are unlikely to have health insurance or pensions, so there is no prospect of retirement.
  • I thought he was going to say he was paying out so much in labour it was killing him. In fact, he admitted that everything I'd said was true. He was embarrassed and apologised. So I said: "Why don't you raise the wages?" But he shrugged that off.' Their lattes drunk, the only concession she won from him was that he would clean the employee rest room
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  • The poor don't vote, because they don't see the parties addressing issues that matter to them; and the politicians don't address those issues, because they don't think those people vote.'
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    The author was contacted by an old boss and able to make a concession or two for the employers, talks about the cycle of the poor not being politically represented, and other commentary by the author
Evan G

The Great Gatsby Setting - 0 views

  • Nobody’s concerned about politics or spiritual matters – but everybody cares about how they are perceived socially. The social climate demands respectability; it asks people to conform to certain standards
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    Talks about themes such as setting and appearance vs reality. Clearly, people aren't focused on internal qualities such as politics or religion; the rich care only about how they are perceived and how they appear. The need for social acceptance gives way to the appearance vs reality theme
Ellen L

Black Community/Black America - 0 views

  • It is not easy for the Black America to empower itself when all the odds appear to be against the community. Many members of Black America find themselves being afraid to participate openly in the political and economic processes that might empower the Black Community. This fear has led many in Black America to believe that they must exhibit a racelessness persona in order to achieve vertical mobility in America.
  • Education is a tool that Black America must use for social change, to educate its youths, and to correct the mis-education of and about the Black Community.
  • lack educators and writers must commit themselves to helping Black America define itself. The capacity to untangle the complex racial, social and cultural human experiences in the United States of America, that helped to define Black Americans, seems to elude the Black Community. Educators are needed to help untangle the meaning of racial stratification and its impact on the Black identity (politically, socially, culturally, and economically). Thus the identity of the Black Community suffers.
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    This article discusses the course of action the author believes will most successfully mobilize the black community further.  Henry discusses the importance of education and identity in achieving social mobility.
Emily S

Racism in American Politics - 0 views

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    Although Americans jump to think of the USA as a free country where people are generally accepting, racism has had an outcome on politics in last 10 years. Immigration policies like those at the Arizone border showcase that racism is still present, even if not against African Americans
Sarah Sch

Ellison, Ralph 1914-1994 - 0 views

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    "Ellison's evolving political views had a deep impact on his continual re-envisioning of that novel's structure and content."
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    This article is a biography on Ralph Ellison which explains the time from his birth to his death. The article provides additional insight into Ellison's life and his early life ambitions. This article expresses how the events of Ellison's life and political views provide insight to the authorial purpose of the novel which is to bring the reader to the realization of their own oppressive behavior and hopefully change.
Ellen L

The Oppression of Black People, The Crimes of This System and the Revolution We Need - 1 views

  • Conventional wisdom says that while some disparities remain, things have generally advanced for Black people in America and today they are advancing still. People like Obama and Oprah are held up as proof of this.
  • Take employment: Black people remain crowded into the lowest rungs of the ladder...that is, if they can find work at all. While many of the basic industries that once employed Black people have closed down, study after study shows employers to be more likely to hire a white person with a criminal record than a Black person without one, and 50% more likely to follow up on a resume with a “white-sounding” name than an identical resume with a “Black-sounding”2 name. In New York City, the rate of unemployment for Black men is fully 48%
  • Black infants face mortality rates comparable to those in the Third World country of Malaysia, and African-Americans generally are infected by HIV at rates that rival those in sub-Saharan Africa. Overall the disparities in healthcare are so great that one former U.S. Surgeon General recently wrote, “If we had eliminated disparities in health in the last century, there would have been 85,000 fewer black deaths overall in 2000.”5
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  • Or education: Today the schools are more segregated than they have been since the 1960s6 with urban, predominantly Black and Latino schools receiving fewer resources and set up to fail. These schools more and more resemble prisons with metal detectors and kids getting stopped and frisked on their way to class by uniformed police who patrol their halls. Often these schools spend around half as much per pupil as those in the well-to-do suburbs
  • People rebelled in hundreds of American cities,25 and the revolutionary stance of leaders like Malcolm X and forces like the Black Panther Party resonated with millions in the streets and campuses of the U.S. Many things fed into this—including, again, the international situation which, as pointed out earlier, was marked by a great upsurge in national liberation struggles and the influence of a socialist China under the leadership of Mao.
  • ome African-Americans were given opportunities to enter college and professional careers, and social programs like welfare, community clinics, and early education programs were expanded. Government spending for training and jobs that would employ Black people increased. Some discrimination was lifted in credit for housing and small businesses. Most of this was in the form of small concessions—not only did this not begin to touch the real scars of hundreds of years of terrible oppression, but discrimination continued in all of these arenas. Nonetheless, these advances were hardly insignificant.
  • To put it another way, the ’60s showed that when masses rose up in rebellion against the powers-that-be, and when that was coupled with a political stance that called out the system as the problem, and when a growing section of that movement linked itself to and learned from the revolutionary movement worldwide…well, when all that happened, you could radically change the political polarization in society
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    The most relevant parts of this article are the introduction and the 60's section. These discuss the struggle of the black population and the impact of leaders like Malcolm X on society. 
David D

Working-Class Hero - 0 views

  • The real secret to Ehrenreich's book, though, is yuppie voyeurism. Nickel and Dimed is an interesting read. It approaches the working poor like a separate species -- and for most of Ehrenreich's readers, they are.
  • Ehrenreich's book does have historical precedent, but it's not Orwell. It's the illustrated guides to the London underworld so popular with the Victorians. Ehrenreich's official conclusion: It's difficult, if not impossible, to keep afloat on $7 an hour. Her implicit conclusion: The poor are different from you and me. They look different. They eat different foods. They live in places middle-class people rarely go. They smoke. They even think differently from the way we do. They distrust collective endeavors. They're not stupid, but they're not interested in politics or other abstractions. Above all, they instinctively dislike change, even when change might improve their lives.
  • And sooner or later, she will be invited to testify before Congress, probably about the effects of welfare reform and the subsequent growth of the service economy.
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  • The problem with Ehrenreich's book is that while it identifies a real problem (hardworking people trapped in poverty), and it feeds an increasingly common anxiety (with the economy softening, could this happen to me?), it offers no realistic solutions. Ehrenreich's prescription seems to be this: Increase union membership and force employers to pay their workers more, perhaps by doubling the minimum wage.
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    This compares Ehrenreich's book to Orwell's (who did a similar thing but took it more seriously) and speculates on possible consequences of the novel, pointing out a lack of a plausible solution.
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    "Why is an author who slams the "corporate overclass" suddenly so popular with the corporate overclass? The usual masochism of the affluent accounts for some of it. The rich like to be told they're wicked, both because it confirms that they're powerful and because it makes them feel slightly less guilty." This article explains why Nickel and Dimed has popularity, even with the upper class. The rich, while they still may be wicked in some regards, have come to accept this fact rather then shy away from it. By knowing and accepting that they are the fittest in Darwin's "Survival of the Fittest" theory, which has carried over to American Capitalism, they feel "that they're powerful". The article shows interesting perspectives on which types of person read the novel and for what reasons.
Zach Ramsfelder

Harlem Renaissance: Politics, Poetics, and Praxis in the African and African American C... - 0 views

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    This graduate school thesis illustrates the racial tensions present in the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 1930s. The NAACP was just rising to prominence, and many white people considered the black people in Harlem to be "uppity" and presumptuous because the whites considered the blacks to be unable to produce anything of value to society, yet the Harlem Renaissance produced music, literature, and other works of art in spite of such preconceived notions.
Connor P

Gale Power Search - Document - 1 views

  • The narrator eventually takes a job with the Brotherhood, a political organization that supposedly helps the socially oppressed. To take the job, he is forced to change his name, leave Mary, and make a complete break from his past. He complies.
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    This quote has to due with the Invisible Man's attempt to break away from his past. This shows his progression as he knows that it is only holding him back. He needs to thirve in the new north with a new life
Evan G

Horrific life experiences helped shape Malcolm X | Share News - Local Canadian, Caribbe... - 0 views

  • Recognizing that the name he was given at birth was forced on his ancestors by the White people who at some point had owned his ancestors
  • Louise Little, traumatized by the horrific murder of her husband, cheated of the insurance money she should have received at his death and unable to find work to support her children was further victimized when the government imprisoned her in a mental institution, seized and scattered her children into various foster homes.
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    Source discusses the name trouble: the blacks are given names by their white slaveholders. Links to IM---blacks cannot find their own identity if they are being named and depersonified by the whites! Also discusses Malcolm's mom, who suffers, like IM, to the point of losing her mind and sanity, all at the hands of the white oppressors. 
Sarah Sch

(3) Civil Rights Movement - 0 views

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    "However, the migrants were no longer obsequiously dependent on agriculture or domestic service for livelihood, nor were their lives and limbs endangered because of political agitation. They were free to support racial uplift organizations and programs."
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    " Blacks were becoming less rural and more urban and aggressive. The social energies that fueled postwar activism had been built virtually out of sight of mainstream America."
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    This article provides historical background for the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950's and 1960's. The article explains the influence of the postwar era and other factors that engender and affected the movement. The article provides additional insight into the society dictated position of blacks in American culture and racism throughout the society. This article puts the autobiography, Malcolm X, into greater historical context. The article would be beneficial for an essay discussing oppression and the black's fight to attain equality.
Sarah Sch

(5) Islam - 0 views

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    "All human beings are under the same obligation to obey the divine law ("Noblest among you is the most righteous" Qurʾan 49:13), and this equality is further expressed in the universality of the messages that God sends to His creatures throughout time and place, starting with Adam and concluding with Muhammad"
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    " Muslims and followers of other traditions are exhorted to cooperate in establishing a moral society and prohibiting evil and mischief."
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    "The Qurʾan exhibits a firmly actionalist system of ethics based on individual responsibility in the realization of the optimal social, economic, and political structure of the umma, the universal community of believers."
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    This article provides information on the Islamic religion. In Malcolm X, the Islamic religion is vital to Malcolm X's journey and ultimate realization. After Malcolm X participates in his pilgrimage, he realizes that he demonizes the white people throughout his life, although there are decent white people among the demons just like any group of individuals. This realizes causes Malcolm X to change his approach to the whole racial problem in America and open him to working with the whites. This article is beneficial to an essay discussing Malcolm X's journey.
David D

BBC NEWS | Americas | Misunderstanding Malcolm X - 1 views

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    On 21 February 1965, Malcolm X was gunned down in broad daylight at a political rally at the Audobon Ballroom in Harlem, New York. The very embodiment of black power, Malcolm X gave his life for his cause. A freedom fighter, he was determined to achieve his aims - "by any means necessary," as he put it.
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    Malcolm X truly was misunderstood. The influences in his life shaped who he was at certain moments in time, and I don't think the world really got to see the true Malcolm until after her returned from Mecca with a different mindset about whites.
David D

The Ballot or the Bullet by Malcolm X - 0 views

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    This is the complete text of Malcolm X's The Ballot or the Bullet speech. The speech sums up Macolm's view of white America. He attacks the political system, the draft, and the fact that blacks are not truly American while newly naturalized immigrants are Americans. He further uses the description of the blue eyed European to convey his image of the devil.
Willie C

The Autobiography of Malcolm X - 0 views

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    "Distraught when a personal rift between him and Elijah Muhammad-over Muhammad's alleged extramarital affairs, as well as their growing political differences-led to his ouster and silencing"
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    This provides a detailed overview of the novel, focusing in this section on his falling out with Elijah Muhammad. Malcolm is devastated by this new knowledge and it shows an accurate depiction of how he changed his life when he traveled to Mecca.
Evan G

It's Alive: Frankenstein's Monster and Modern Science - 0 views

  • The theme of civic responsibility in Frankenstein begins with the book’s subtitle, "the Modern Prometheus."
  • Victor Frankenstein may also be in search of God-like secrets and claim only the best intentions, but his actions are corrupt and he dies without acknowledging his role in the destruction that has occurred.
  • A central concern of Frankenstein is the scientist’s shirking of responsibility for the creature he has created.
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    Mary Shelley used science as a metaphor for any kind of irresponsible action and what she really was concerned with was the politics of the era and the way the monarchy was operating in the interest of relatively few people.
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    This source relates Frankenstein to contemporary times, discussing the theme of social responsibility that scientists have, both to their experiments as well as to humanity. It discusses the manner in which Victor overstepped his boundaries, and resultingly was punished and suffered for it.
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