Analysing Edgar Allan Poe's Short Stories The Black Cat and The Research Paper

Analysing Edgar Allan Poe's Short Stories The Black Cat and The Tell-Tale Heart - Research Paper Example African American girls and women also suffered or were exposed to various forms of racism, causing them to exhibit different reactions. This inferior image of African American women also got reflected in the fictional works as well. Most times authors in their fictional works will write what they have seen, heard, felt and lived. Those writers without fictionalizing will provide those aspects as a form of autobiography. American woman author Anne Moody wrote about the racism that happened in her life in the form of autobiography titled, Coming of age in Mississippi. So, this paper will discuss how Anne Moody in the book offers several moments and descriptions of how she learned about the meanings of race, and how she became aware of the racial differences that existed, and finally how she responded to those racial actions and differences. Anne Moody, although was born to parents who belonged to the same race, was exposed to racism because of the period and area, she lived in. Born in 1940 as Essie Mae, Moody (changed her name and) grew up in Wilkerson County, a rural county which was manifested with poverty and racism by the White population against the African Americans. Exposure to racism and different sides of racial relations from a young age itself made Moody aware of this issue, causing her to exhibit different emotions. ... Although, she was a small girl, she was intimidated and treated in a harsh manner in the household. This incident is her early exposure to racism and importantly made her award about the social hierarchy. With her biological father deserting, her step-father also proving out to be incompetent and also with her mother delivering babies quite often, Ann Moody had to take the responsibility of earning for the family. â€Å"Things seemed to get harder. Mama was always having another baby.† (). So, she worked at the White household in a suppressing environment for many hours in a day after her school timings and continuously during weekends. Along with her mother, who worked in various odd jobs offered by enterprises owned by the White population, Moody had to work in dominating White households. Doing such jobs based on race was quite demeaning and oppressing to the African population, and it was felt by Anne Moody as well. That is, as Moody worked in a suppressing white household , she understood the position of their population vis-a-vis the white population in the social hierarchy. â€Å"that not only were they better than me because they were white, but everything they owned and everything connected to them was better than hat was available to me.† (Moody 38). Anne started experiencing racism when she went to the high school, thereby experiencing different meanings of race and racial differences that existed. In the school, she became ‘racially aware’, as she was prejudiced by the White students. The one even, which disturbed her and made her understood the extreme side of racism is the murder of Emmett Till, a fourteen-year-old black boy. Hill was visiting Mississippi from Chicago, when he was lynched to