Gregory Howard Williams' Life on the Color Line Essay

It has been over one-hundred and fifty years since African-Americans have been liberated from the hardships of slavery. Even though the United States of America and its citizens have undergone many modern changes since slavery and its abolition, the effects of enslavement and oppression are still evident today. Many works such as Rituals of Blood: The Consequences of Slavery in Two American Cities, Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome, and Nothing But Freedom: Emancipation and Its Legacy all explain a common conclusion; the chattel enslavement of African-Americans left a profound effect on former slaves and their descenders. In 1903, W.E.B. DuBois wrote in The Souls of Black Folk, “the problem of the Twentieth century is the color line”. The problem

2011. “The New Jim Crow” Pp 217.-224 in Rethinking the Color Line, 5th Edition, edited by Charles Gallagher. New York, NY: McGraw Hill.

In his essay, “The Souls of the Black Folk” Du Bois (1903) states that “the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line,-the relation of the darker to lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea” (275). According to Appelrouth and Edles (2012: 269) “the color line is both a preexisting social and cultural structure and an internalized attitude”. In addition, they explain that the color line “addresses the historical and institutional (i.e., colonial) dimensions of race” (269).

Knowing where your ancestors come from can sometimes be a difficult thing to handle and understand. If you have a notion of yourself before you receive actual news as to where your bloodlines reside, It shatters your previous thoughts and causes you to feel like an outsider. You begin to question your cultured norms and habitual daily tasks. After reading the story “Color Lines” by author Ralph Eubanks, I was able to take away that in the 1950’s and 1960’s, “…The American South was a place where the idea of race and identity determined who you were and your place in the world – You were either black or white.” Ralph talks in his story about how dangerous it was to be related to white people: severe . Severe social consequences awaited any black

African Americans and Mexican Americans were being denied equal membership in U.S society. This race discrimination denied dignity to those who were minorities. For minorities there was everyday discrimination in restaurants, public services, housing and education (Alvarez, p. 18). Both

Life on the Color Line is a powerful tale of a young man's struggle to reach adulthood, written by Gregory Howard Williams – one that emphasizes, by daily grapples with personal turmoil, the absurdity of race as a social invention. Williams describes in heart wrenching detail the privations he and his brother endured when they were forced to remove themselves from a life of White privilege in Virginia to one where survival in Muncie, Indiana meant learning quickly the cold hard facts of being Black in skin that appeared to be White.

Crooks is a good example that discrimination shapes a person's life. Lennie had come into the barn and was in Crooks door way and crooks was uncomfortable due to Crooks being a negro and is used to people leaving him alone. “‘Come on in and set a while,’ Crooks aid ‘’long as you won't get out and leave

Discrimination can be defined from class as the differential treatment of groups without reference to an individual’s behavior. An instance of discrimination in chapter five comes from page 198 where she says that a black man is always thought of as a criminal or that blackness defines criminal. Both of these are also stereotypes that many people in society hold on too. Stereotypes are based on assumptions that all individuals who belong to a particular group can be categorized by that group. The problem is that the Drug War has caused many African Americans to go to jail and make mistakes so this leads most people to believe that all African Americans are criminals and that being black is one thing that is required to be a criminal. This belief is around because prisons are full of black men. This harmful oppression pointed at blacks by society can have very damaging effects. These effects can cause the minority group to internalize what they are being told and affect the way they see their fate and thoughts about how the outside world sees them. In many cases this cases them to end up in

Discrimination is the first subject that brings out people’s characteristics. John Lewis’s Uncle Otis took John on his first trip north. They were cautious on the road trip and packed their own food as they both knew black people weren’t allowed to be served too. John explains, “Stopping for gas and bathroom breaks took careful planning. Uncle Otis had made this trip before, and he

Racial differences in social and economic outcomes all play a major role in the discrimination that we witness in the book. Once the New York boys arrived in Georgia, they witnessed the southern racism for the first time. In Georgia, the New York boys were marginalized. They were degraded, due to Georgians classification of the New York boys as blacks. When Gus visited Warm Springs, he didn’t receive the same services as the whites, he was ignored. They were seen as disappointments.

Gannett states that though technically, the “average adult American... would have about seven parts white and one part negro blood,” “[i]t is a strange and a gratifying thing to witness… the complete dominance of the Anglo-Saxon strain” (Gannett 1). With that, Gannett turns his full attention to the average American in all his Anglo-Saxon glory, never to mention the “negro” part of him again. “The Average American” appeared in the year 1901, only two years before the publication of W.E.B. DuBois’ The Souls of Black Folk, a work which overflows with the pain, frustration, and injustices felt by those who had “negro blood” in their veins. If the average American has “one part negro blood,” then why are not the experiences of the African American as described by DuBois even slightly mentioned in Gannett’s assessment? The reason is simple. Though his purpose is not to discuss race, Gannett’s writing lionizes the Anglo-Saxon which naturally not only confirms the existence of the color line but justifies it as a necessary tool that separates the strong from the weak. Ironically, this direct fomentation of DuBois’ claim, in and of itself, is enough to prove to readers that the color line is indeed a problem, one that unjustly bars African Americans from “average American”

Discrimination is a prejudiced or prejudicial outlook, action, or treatment of a human being based on age, sex, or race. This is one of the main themes of the novel. Crooks is discriminated because he is of African American decent. Many of the men on the farm were racist which was common at this time. Because of Crooks's color, he was not allowed to eat, sleep, or even in the others' cabin. Therefore, Crook is angry at society for oppressing him so severely.

Discrimination is treating someone differently, often unfairly, because he/she is a part of a specific group, class or category of people. For instance, a girl named Wu Qing in China was discriminated against and could not find a job because how her body was a bit chubby and the scars in her face from an accident in her early childhood. Even though she was kind and used to be straight-A student, she had no friends. Now, she is looking for selling her kidney in order to pay the plastic surgery fee. Discrimination can change a person from innocent to evil is an important theme in the novel “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley. Even though

The Souls of Black Folk broadens the minds of the readers, and gives the reader a deeper understanding into the lives of people of African heritage. W.E.B. Du Bois articulates the true meaning of the problem of the color-line through his vast knowledge of American history and descriptive personal scenarios. Du Bois