Dick Gregory, And Brent Staples: Literary Analysis
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Individuals construct their own identities through interactions with people in general society. Society itself impacts every identity through stereotypes, and in this case, those of the authors who are minorities. Social conditions which authors Amy Tan, Dick Gregory, and Brent Staples faced in their narratives constructed each from limitations from to the nature of discrimination by stereotypes. These conditions differ by experience, Gregory and Staples both endured inequality from the color of their skin, Tan addresses the lack of acknowledgment due to language her mother encountered in everyday life.
Gregory reveals a subtle understanding of segregation from the point of view of a seven year old, “If I knew my place and didn’t come to close…” (pg164) This awareness draws a line, that as a child, he understood that there are…show more content… She discriminated her mother by her accent, she confesses to being ashamed of her English, she believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say. (pg480) Tan’s decision to emphasize her mother’s challenges in everyday life due to discrimination, “… the fact that people in department stores, at banks, and at restaurants did not take her seriously, did not give her good service, pretended not to understand her or even acted as if they did not hear her.” (pg480) In this quote the way that people in general society associates her mother is that since she cannot speak proper English, she must be uneducated, thus assumed to be less important compared those who can. Tan connects this with her identity of being a writer because as a child she was encourage to purse math and science. English was a harder subject to grasp by her because a person’s developing language skills are influenced most peers, however, in the writing it’s her mother.