scholarly journals RACIAL DISCRIMINATION IN JAMAICA KINCAID’S THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MY MOTHER

Author(s):  
T. Deivasigamani

Jamaica Kincaid is an American novelist, short-story writer, gardener, essayist, and reviewer. She has become one of Caribbean’s major woman writers in recent decades. Kincaid’s writings comprise exile, search for identity, and alienation. Her production strikes the reader with a balanced mixture of anger and loss. Kincaid’s great variety of issues draws so many readers to her writings.  Kincaid’s novels reflect her desire to draw on the people, places, language, race, mother-daughter relationship, values, cultural traditions, and politics that have shaped her own life and that of African American people. In America, Racial discrimination is very common and hurts very much. During the slavery era, white people had black people as slaves in their own household. Black people have to satisfy their white masters. If the white people were not satisfied, they would try to hurt the black people. This paper “Racial Discrimination in Jamaica Kincaid’s The Autobiography of My Mother” focuses on how race plays a pivotal role in Africans literature and their day today life and how blacks suffered for their survival.  It also reveals how Kincaid’s The Autobiography of My Mother illuminates black American experiences in the contemporary American society from various perspectives. It also shows how black women have been exploited in a white dominated male chauvinistic society. In the face of enormous problems and frequent victimization, black women are shown imitating through their sense of community and social powers.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daisy Massey ◽  
Jeremy Faust ◽  
Karen Dorsey ◽  
Yuan Lu ◽  
Harlan Krumholz

Background: Excess death for Black people compared with White people is a measure of health equity. We sought to determine the excess deaths under the age of 65 (<65) for Black people in the United States (US) over the most recent 20-year period. We also compared the excess deaths for Black people with a cause of death that is traditionally reported. Methods: We used the Multiple Cause of Death 1999-2019 dataset from the Center of Disease Control (CDC) WONDER to report age-adjusted mortality rates among non-Hispanic Black (Black) and non-Hispanic White (White) people and to calculate annual age-adjusted <65 excess deaths for Black people from 1999-2019. We measured the difference in mortality rates between Black and White people and the 20-year and 5-year trends using linear regression. We compared age-adjusted <65 excess deaths for Black people to the primary causes of death among <65 Black people in the US. Results: From 1999 to 2019, the age-adjusted mortality rate for Black men was 1,186 per 100,000 and for White men was 921 per 100,000, for a difference of 265 per 100,000. The age-adjusted mortality rate for Black women was 802 per 100,000 and for White women was 664 per 100,000, for a difference of 138 per 100,000. While the gap for men and women is less than it was in 1999, it has been increasing among men since 2014. These differences have led to many Black people dying before age 65. In 1999, there were 22,945 age-adjusted excess deaths among Black women <65 and in 2019 there were 14,444, deaths that would not have occurred had their risks been the same as those of White women. Among Black men, 38,882 age-adjusted excess <65 deaths occurred in 1999 and 25,850 in 2019. When compared to the top 5 causes of deaths among <65 Black people, death related to disparities would be the highest mortality rate among both <65 Black men and women. Comment: In the US, over the recent 20-year period, disparities in mortality rates resulted in between 61,827 excess deaths in 1999 and 40,294 excess deaths in 2019 among <65 Black people. The race-based disparity in the US was the leading cause of death among <65 Black people. Societal commitment and investment in eliminating disparities should be on par with those focused on other leading causes of death such as heart disease and cancer.


2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 123-134
Author(s):  
Damay Rahmawati ◽  
Ramadhani Ardianto Karsa Sunaryono ◽  
Mira Utami

This study aims to see racism in the novel Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee as state of exception; a political philosophy of Agamben. Agamben's idea of ​​state of exception is used in this study as the theoretical framework. This research specifically reveals how racism becomes part of state of exception in American society around 1960s when the novel was written. The analysis focuses on issues of racism in American society as depicted in the novel. The issue of racism is taken with the aim of analyzing state of exception in USA, in dealing with racial discrimination. After analyzing the issues of racism and state of exception in the novel, this study reveals that racism in American society is politically structured. The finding of this study is the discrimination experienced by lower class citizens who are dominated by black people, as the impact of state of exception which affects their citizenship rights.


2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jehan Umar Rushadi

This research aims to answer how the issues of Black racial stereotype and race relationship are being used in the Chris Rock’s standup comedy entitled <em>Never Scared</em>. The issues of Black racial stereotype and race relationship are analyzed through the portrayal of living in US as Black people in the eyes of Chris Rock, an influential American Black comedian. This research is a descriptive qualitative research which uses Arthur Asa Berger’s techniques of comedy theory as an approach. As a result, this research finds that living in US as Black people is likely to be exposed by racial violence involving White people. The result also signifies how Black people are considered as inferior race in US society which then leads to the mentioning of racial discrimination towards Black people.


Author(s):  
Laura Fish

In A Room of One’s Own (1929) Virginia Woolf asserts: “Women have served all these centuries as looking-glasses possessing the magic and delicious power of reflecting the figure of man at twice its natural size”. (34) The use of the mirror is key to Woolf’s arguments about the position of women in general and in particular that of women writers. Complicating Woolf’s view less than a century later, I examine how black women function as looking-glasses in a dual way: as blacks, we shared the past (and now share the current) fate of black people reflecting the “darker” side of white people, as many whites projected onto blacks the unacknowledgeable traits of their own nature. The mirror is also key then to the way in which racial oppression has been analysed in literature. My paper offers an account, by way of selected examples from the history of our literature, of indicating how the mirror has been essential to how black British women are viewed and reflected back. I suggest that the misshapen image in the looking glass created by white people and also black men, allows them to see an inflated reflection of themselves, to assume false feelings of superiority, and to perpetuate oppression against us. I focus on Mary Prince, Mary Seacole, Una Marson, Joan Riley and Helen Oeyemi–authors whose work either anticipates or relates to Woolf’s notion of mirroring, by seeking ways to addressor overcome the situation in which we are placed. The texts explored not only trace the development of the tradition of our writing - the shift from being represented to representing ourselves– but also present a range of cultural and political views and identify three recurring themes: firstly, the denigration in our portrayal; secondly, the assumed superiority white people and black men adopt over us; and thirdly our resistance in remonstrating against such treatment and exposure.


2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 68
Author(s):  
Nestiani Hutami

Discussing about gambling practiced in western culture has always been a controversial phenomenon for there are abundant of both positive and negative effects. This phenomenon is portrayed in one of Shirley Jackson’s works which is interesting to notice that she who is known for her mysticism in most of her works put lottery gambling tradition into her iconic short story entitled “The Lottery”. However, although Jackson’s idea about performing lottery is quite different from American society in general, she tries to depict the value of lottery itself as one of the preserved traditions in the United States. The great development of lottery gambling in America assuredly contributes to the growth of this gambling around the world. It does not only give impacts on the life of American people, but also on the life of people of other countries, especially Indonesia.Keywords: lottery, tradition, controversy, value, development, impact.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (5) ◽  
pp. 51
Author(s):  
K. Srividya Lakshmi

Alice Walker is a Black American novelist, essayist, short story writer, poetic, critic, biographer, editor and Pulitzer Prize laureate. Alice Walker captures the experience of Black women in her works as a series of movements from women who are victimized by the society to women who have taken control of their lives consciously. She has explored the lives of Black women in depth even questions their fate. She has courage to see through the seeds of time and declares that in future black women would no longer live in suspension. “The Third Life of Grange Copeland” (1970) was the first novel of Alice Walker. The focus is on Black women characters in The Third Life who empower themselves through education and economic independence. This novel introduces the domination of powerless women by equally powerless men. The novel challenges African Americans to take a scrutinizing look at them. Mary Margaret Richards observes that “The Oldest generation represented by Grange finds itself trapped in a share cropper system… a form of slavery (African –American Writers, p.744). The novel introduces many of her prevalent themes, particularly the domination of powerless women by equally powerless men.


Author(s):  
Novia Sekar Ayuningtyas ◽  
Mohamad Ikhwan Rosyidi

Slavery was a central institution in American society and was accepted as normal and applauded as a positive thing by many white Americans. America was full of Negro slaves when there were many injustice actions done by white people to black people. Beloved is a novel written by Toni Morrison in 1987, explores the hardships endured by a former slave woman and her family during the slavery and the Reconstructions eras. This study aims to explain the dilemma experienced by the main character of being American and its correlation between the main character’s dilemma and ethnic segregation by the White Americans against the Afro-Americans as portrayed in Beloved novel. The method used in this study is a qualitative study analyzed by deconstruction theory of Paul de Man. Meanwhile, the method of data analysis is based on the dilemma experienced by African-American people in the novel and its correlation between the dilemma and ethnic segregation. Morrison’s novel shows that the dilemma experienced by the main character in the novel is divided into the episodes of control, gender role, and humanity service. The correlation between the dilemma and ethnic segregation is portrayed through the struggle of Afro-American people fight against the domination of White Americans. In conclusion, ethnic segregation in America creates dilemma for Afro-American or black people and it should be removed to vanish any differentiation and live in harmony.


2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 18-35
Author(s):  
Beugre Zouankouan Stéphane

This study analyses three essential motifs which are perception, visibility and invisibility and how their relationships determine and legislate the interracial relationships between whites and blacks in Ralph Ellison’s novel, INVISIBLE MAN. Through insightful analysis, this paper aims to show how from a visible status in existence, the perception that white people have about black people transforms this visibility into an invisible status both in human existence and society and namely in the white American society. And also it aims to clear out how this metamorphosis of black people from visibility to invisibility at first based on white people's perception, is principally based and due to their color of skin, and to another “Blackness” of Black people or African-Americans color of skin. Creating a real problem of existence and identity for black people through the question: “do I exist?”, the refusal of such perception and invisibility constructed by racism, stereotypes, prejudices and the concept of white people superiority will oblige black people to struggle for their visibility, their true existence, their identity and recognition by white people as an equal human being.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 143-157
Author(s):  
Olivia Nanlohy ◽  
Olga Rorintulus ◽  
Sarah Kamagi

This Study aims to determine the Actions of Racial Discrimination committed by White People against Black people in The Help. This research used qualitative method, in terms of using words or text. In conducting this research, the data are collected from primary and secondary sources. The primary source or the main source is the novel entitled The Help, written by Kathryn Stockett. The second sources are some related books and articles from the internet, that are supporting this research. In analyzing the data, the researcher used Mimetic Approach by Abrams. The result of this study is presented descriptively. As the results of this research, the researcher found that there are many actions of Racial Discrimination reflected in The Help. It can be seen in some several sections. First, there is a Discriminatory Law namely Jim Crow Law of the Southern United State. Second, the Discriminatory Stereotypes that the White People created about the Black People such as, Blacks are dirty, Black People are thieves, Black People as diseases, and Black People are dumb. And the last is the Discrimination in Public Services, that can be found in residential area, library, education, health service, voting, and public transportation.


1976 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 26-47
Author(s):  
Donald D. Stone
Keyword(s):  

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