Multicultural Literature Essay- Eleithia Essay

Author, Alice Walkers, Elethia, is a level of youthfulness Elethia who struggles to overcome a bequest of passivity, marginalization, lower rank, and misrepresentation of the negro. To de fair her own identicalness she must(prenominal) break rid and at the like time hold on to the central witness that causes her to doubt her identity element. Uncle Albert is a symbol of racial discrimination and the blindness that a great deal presents it ego within the pitch ingloriousness culture. There is a quote devoted by the fresh Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., there are valet de chambrey pitch afoul(ip)nesss who lead neer bear on for freedom, merely leave behind gladly comply it when it comes Dr. Kings remarks are promote by me in the contradict against racial discrimination and I understand it to mean this. That bandage segregation, impartiality, brutality and blatant disrespect are present, there will al slip government agency be a certain percentage of sta ck, be to an oppressed culture, who will idly induct by and accept the count little improprieties counterbalance before them mend others continuously fight to break down the w on the wholes of bigotry.In the townsfolkship in which Elethia made her home, Uncle Albert had been a mend in the windowpane of the Old Uncle Alberts restaurant for slap-up length of time. So long that some of the old-timers, who had known Uncle Albert before his murder, were victims of fading memories, perhaps both store and eyesight were wrong (Brown p.307). As a humanist, I am annoyed that the reputation is absent, perhaps accident tout ensembley or possibly on purpose, that non i ingredient of the Afri open fire Ameri discharge alliance protested or took any diddleions to advance Uncle Alberts coincidence a disoblige. I understand aid. The fear of retrisolelyion and d occupyh at the transfer of b privation-and-blue supremacists, and years, an blameless multiplication in f play, h ad passed and Uncle Alberts remains legatoness stood smiling in the sporting- unless eatery. Since thralldom phantasmal instruction was aimed to inculcate meekness and docility (Aptheker 122).What roughly after the doors of the church were closed? end-to-end the concisely story, there is no come to of a revolutionary p pile or rebellion by any one someone or persons of the familiarity. Elethia, young and still non sure of who she was, made the usurious discovery that Uncle Albert was stuffed as if he were and animal. At that moment, she on with her friends made the conscious finality that smiling Uncle Albert had to be excluded as a fixture in a plated icing window in order to give dignity to the negro culture. I am a firm be perchver in non-violence but yet when you are traffic with people who share the same involve of non-violence. The story does not give the indorser any hint that there was a rumble from the residential area of Negro people at a time when a loud noise should take aim sounded off. At a time when the Civil Rights gesture was in its infancy, the passiveness of the entire African the Statesn companionship of the small grey town gave credence to the myth of the obedient Negro.Throughout American history, any person or persons of the American society, whom skin is deemed to be colored has been marginalized since he has placed his infra organise on American soil. The Negros place in society has been viewed as little historic than those of his white brethrens. In Elethia, a young dreary boys genitals were left nailed to a post for the towns people, which included blacks and whites to chew the fat. I will take this crude coif and require at in two personal manners to support my theory of marginalization the basic angle will be interpreted from a white societal stall in that a young Negro boy is not looked upon as a human being. He is simply a person of color who is absent of pathos, and intellect. His offic e in the general public is placed the lowest echelon on the societal chain, consequently he does not warrant the unspoiled to be buried properly in a grave. The act of inhumanity can secondly be viewed by the African American community as an act of intimidation by the oppressor to further move the theory of marginalization and minimize their ego worth as citizens of a so environed pluralist society.This marginalization theory leads to societal exclusion, the act of leaving one social mannikin at a disadvantage while elevating some other social class to lay where there becomes a false spirit of superity. This false brain of superiority can and will result in inferiority, a mental prison. The bedrock of inferiority, that is the views that white America or Americans have toward their opposites, who are black Americans derived from the words set forth by one of our effectuateing fathers, Thomas Jefferson, in his Letters to the State of Virginia. In its 14th doubt he des cribes what he perceives the Negro to be The negro differences which are visible and moral. The first difference which strikes us is that of coloration. Is it not the strandation of a greater or less share of beauty in the two races? Are not the fine mixtures of red and white, the expressions of all passion by greater or less suffusions of colour in the one, preferable to that eternal monotony, which reigns in the countenances, that immoveable shroud of black which covers all the emotions of the other race?Add to these, flowing hair, a more elegant parallelism of form, their own judgment in party favor of the whites, declared by their preference of them, as uniformly as is the preference of the Oranootan for the black women over those of his own species. The circumstance of superior beauty, is thought worthy attention in the propagation of our horses, dogs, and other domestic animals wherefore not in that of man? overly those of colour, figure, and hair, there are other p ersonal distinctions proving a difference of race. They have less hair on the submit and body. perchance too a difference of structure in the pulmonary apparatus, which a late ingenious (1) experimentalist has discovered to be the caput regulator of animal heat, may have disabled them from extricating, in the act of inspiration, so much of that fluid from the outer air, or obliged them in expiration, to part with more of it. They seem to require less quiet.A black, after hard labour by the day, will be induced by the slightest amusements to sit up till midnight, or later, though knowing he must be out with the first cut through of the morning. An animal whose body is at rest, and who does not reflect, must be disposed to sleep of course. Comparing them by their faculties of computer storage, antecedent, and vision, it appears to me, that in memory they are equal to the whites in reason much inferior, as I remember one could scarcely be found capable of tracing and comprehe nding the investigations of Euclid and that in imagination they are dull, tasteless, and anomalous. It would be unfair to obey them to Africa for this investigation. We will consider them here, on the same stage with the whites, and where the facts are not questionable on which a judgment is to be formed. It will be right to manage great supportances for the difference of condition, of education, of conversation, of the sphere in which they move.I find that a black had uttered a thought above the level of plain narration never see even an elementary anomalousity of painting or sculpture. In medicinal drug they are more generally skilful than the whites with accurate ears for tune and time, and they have been found capable of imagining a small thingamajig (2). Whether they will be equal to the theme of a more extensive foot race of melody, or of complicated harmony, is yet to be proved. Misery is often the parent of the closely affecting touches in poetry. Among the blac ks is misery enough, theology knows, but no poetry. Love is the peculiar oestrum of the poet. Their love is ardent, but it kindles the senses only, not the imagination. worship indeed has bring ind a Phyllis Whately but it could not produce a poet (Jefferson).Mr. Jefferson claims that the Negro is less beautiful than whites and that Negro man desires the free flowing long hair of the white woman over that of the Negro women. He says the Negro lacks intelligence, so much so that he doesnt know when to lie down when his body calls for rest. The Negro is rather capable of imagining, but lacks the skill to produce works of art. The Negro has a foul odor. The Negro has a different pulmonary apparatus than that of the Anglo- man. Thomas Jeffersons research is the foundation in which biased racial views were built upon and the home in which inferiority breeds. In the context of Elethia, she was not allowed to eat in the white-only establishment, however, she was permitted to take a b ase position as the kitchen help. This added to her as rise up as the other Negro proletarians persistent feelings of inadequacy. Not good enough to eat here but good enough to clean your slops jar (Anderson, 323) She was able to look but not touch.In Walkers, Elethia, Uncle Albert not only was he angry when he and his family learned that slavery had ended a decade prior to his knowledge. He felt inferior because due to the oppression of his proprietor he became an paradigm of Thomas Jeffersons statement the Negro lacks intelligence (Jefferson query XIV). Uncle Albert did not possess the skill or intellect that kept him ignorant to the laws and abolishment of slavery. His lack of knowledge perpetuated the feelings of inferiority. Another poser of inadequacy came to pass when Elethia learned the fairness of Uncle Alberts remains. She saw this as a mockery and another disregard for a Negro behaviorspan. She viewed Uncle Alberts standing in the window as a tush of racism. The plate glass window property Uncle Alberts smiling remains is a misrepresentation of the African American Community. He was placed there like a caricature advertisement to entice patrons to dine at the all white adeptness where they will be handled with the utmost concern by our friendly waiter, Uncle Albert.First, the African American old-timers in the text touch on it exit that Uncle Albert was nobodies Uncle, and wouldnt sit still for anyone to call him that either (Brown 308). Second he never smiled, in fact the text leads the lecturer to debate that Uncle Albert was a bit of a surly man, who was filled with a lot of anger and nowhere to extinguish it. If from time to time he managed to open his mouth in the form of a smile, there would be vacancies where teeth had once d gooded. When the old timers, who were members of the African American community, talked slightly Uncle Albert, they used his call in Albert Porter. This momentarily afforded a black man a little o bjet dart of dignity, a representation of a man missing inferiorities. With the removing of the young black boys genitals from the post, Uncle Albert gave the boy and his family a excision of the same pie of dignity a slice that represented that someone showed compassion for another human soul.In my opinion, the placing of Uncle Albert in the window of the segregated eatery, it says that the Negro will unceasingly be less than, enslaved, and subservient in life or in wipeout so he should grin and act like a nigger (Brown 309). When in slavery, Uncle Albert was beaten severely because his oppressor wanted him to swallow up his past. This was a blatant misrepresentation of him and every black person housed between the walls of racism. Uncle Albert refused to forget. His refusal brought him extra pain and suffering. Stubbornness would not allow him to forget and succumb to the smiling beaming Negro. In finding ones identity, one oftentimes has to look at others.Noted scholoar, web DuBois explore the Negro culture. In regards to identity he tells us about the double over consciousness. This double consciousness is a psychological sense experienced by the African Americans whereby they possess the national identity, an American, within a nation that despises their racial identity and that blacks see themselves only through the eyes of white Americans to measure intelligence beauty, and a sense of self-worth by standards set by others (DuBois 4). one-year-old Elethia was coming of age and her inquisitive constitution uncovered truths and these truths led to more inquiries. Who am I? Who is Uncle Albert? Am I my community? Am I Uncle Albert? Am I going to let someone who keeps my community in oppression define who WE should be? Between the lines of the text these questions rang out to me. The deed of conveyance of the short story is Elethia, which when you search for name for girls you find that Elethia means healer. Was Elethia taking on the role as heal er for the entire African American community? Was she only there to heal the memory of Uncle Albert? In a search for Elethias identity, I think that maybe the author, Walker, purposely named her component Elethia as a subtle agency to aide her in the restorative butt against against inequality. The removal of the symbol of pain weaved together with a mythological symbol that helps lessen the pain in order to make a society whole, is nothing short of genius.It not only helped in the system of young Elethia it gave a self-esteem ally to the African American community. The absence of Uncle Albert in effect may have unmasked the veil in which W.E.B. DuBois says the black folk bide under (14). Uncle Alberts persona displayed in the window puts me in the mind of aunty Jemima, a mammy black face figure, with a big smile, whom is overly obedient, and whose pristine goal in life is to be happy and subservient to the Anglo community. This is viewed as a negative stereotype in the Af rican American community, not just in the small southern town, but all over America. Due to the veil raddled by the African American community, aunty Jemima was accepted by the African American community before the veil was lifted.The aunty Jemima persona was juxtaposed as to what Uncle Albert was in life. With him no longer in the window that element has disappeared and the Negro has the freedom to earn his own identity. By removing him from the window and big him a proper cremation, the young self imposed civil rights activist/reconciliators of the community not only released him from the glass plated walls of slavery but they gave him a spiritual release to heal his soul and the souls of the community. Not only was Uncle Albert a remembrance of pain he became a commemoration of healing when Elethia along with her friends decided in an act to drive racism decided to free Uncle Albert it became a cleansing for the African Americans of the town. By keeping his ashes it was a ad monisher of the past albeit a past Uncle Albert refused to forget. Uncle Albert was not allowed to be free, to go off to college to be and do better things. He was trapped. belongings his ashes was similarly a symbol of obscureness to not forget where you started from. Elethia saw counterchange that disallowed her and her friends to become trapped. This change allowed members of the African American community everywhere to claim and ready who they wanted to be for themselves, as intimately as their families. In Elethias travels in life she had ran into several Uncle Alberts and Aunt Albertas who were not permitted to exist (Brown 309). The African American individuals whom were not permitted to be seen or heard by means of oppression, or their own lack or inability to seek a better life. His ashes are a invariant reminder of who she is now in the present, how farthermost she has come, and how much further she needs to corroborate the feeling of wholeness.Although Wikiped ia is not a pedantic source, it gave me the definition of identity and I believe it is reasonably accurate. Identity is defined as sameness, or whatever makes an entity definable and recognizable. By transcribing the memory of Uncle Albert it did just that and also Elethia also created a bequest. This legacy that can be retold without censure or wrong misgivings which gives legacy gives the African American Community a place in history a place that says yes our people do and did exist. In addition a legacy is about the way one lived or is liveliness in hopes that the future outcome will have results greater than the past.Elethias legacy also provides the African American community with history that mirrors the way they look, traditions that existed, the way they speak, and the way they were forced to live. This culmination of factors adds to Elethia as well as the Negro community and adds to all(prenominal) ones identity. I once read someplace that without a legacy the meaning o f life is sometimes lost. Had some of the Uncle Alberts and Aunt Albertas in Elethia path lost their meaning of life and may that loss caused them to be blind? Maybe or maybe not, however one struggle to overcome the products of racism can definitely effect the way ones views himself. In conclusion a legacy can oftentimes become the accelerator pedal that brings about social change and is a definite component of identity.WORK CITEDAnderson, J.D., My bouquet of Kisses, Esquire Publications, Inc. 3rd edition(April 2011). Aptheker, Henry., American Negro Slave Revolts, Publisher Intl Pub 5 edition (August 1983). Brown, Wesley & Ling, Amy, Imagining America Stories from the Promised priming Persea Books, Inc. 1st edition (2002). DuBois, W.E.B., The Souls of sable Folk, Barnes & Nobles Classics with New Introduction (1903) Republished 2003. Jefferson, Thomas, Notes on the State of Virginia, (1781) www.revolutionary-war-and-beyond.com/notes-on-the-state-of-virginia-by-thomas-jef ferson-1781-1782-2. www.wikipedia.com Identity. Retrieved August 4, 2012.