...Turning On the Light: The Role of Darkness in the Search for Enlightenment Your fingers scrabble blindly against the wall of the dark room, searching for the familiar shape of a light switch. The recognizable protrusion appears beneath your fingertips and with a crackle the fluorescent light of your dorm room flickers on. In that second of searching, all manner of monster and fiend flashed before your eyes, lurking in the shadows. In this sense, the looming darkness was both your barrier – sightlessly scrambling for the light switch – and your impetus – wanting to turn on the light to dispel the gloom. Expanding beyond the awkward, floundering quest for a missing light switch, the dark of life is often what both obstructs and drives the pursuit...
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...Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. James H. Cone, an advocate affectionately known for black liberation theology, a theology grounded in the experience of African Americans, and related to other Christian liberation theologies. James H. Cone approach provided a realistic snap shot of a new way to articulate the distinctiveness of theology in the Black Church. Frustrated and outraged at the White Church of playing a significant role in the oppression and racism of black people. Cone believed that the Black Church is a powerful force [in his life] and did not do enough in regard to racism among African Americans. Cone exploited scriptures, slave spirituals, blues, and other prominent African American thinkers such as David Walker, Henry McNeal Turner, and W.E.B. DuBois to help shape his theology. Malcolm X and the Black Power Movement and Dr. Martin Luther King also influenced his theology. Cone formulates a theology of liberation from within the context of the Black experience of oppression, interpreting the central kernel of the Gospels as Jesus' identification with the poor, oppressed, and the resurrection as the ultimate act of liberation. This theology cited as attempts to understand the meaning of faith, the meaning of God, in a world that is broken. Cone devoted his professional life to the study of religion from an African perspective. This groundbreaking influential work links the study of Jesus Christ life with the African American experience. Reverend Dr. Martin Luther...
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...threat and violence against people who sought to end it. In contrast, the leaders of the Civil Rights Movement chose the tactic of nonviolence as a tool to dismantle the institutionalized racial segregation, discrimination, and inequality in the south. The movement was guided based on Martin Luther King Jr.’s principles of nonviolence and passive resistance. The success of the American Civil Rights Movement and the fight for racial equality in the United States is a testament to the determination of millions of African Americans who fought against discrimination in the 1960s. Instead of using the alternative strategy of using an armed uprising such as one of Malcom X, Martin Luther King Jr. championed and thrived on the strategy of protesting for equal rights without using violence. King's non-violent approach was inspired and derived from the teachings of Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi, a Hindu religious leader, nationalist, and social reformer who revoked the British occupation of India through acts of civil disobedience and nonviolent protests. History is the best example on how acts of non-violence has brought social justice for millions across the globe. Prominent individuals such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Mahatma...
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...Ever since the Reconstruction era after the Civil War there has been the issue of race and equality and rights. A movement occurred and two men gained power and influence the African American community. Martin Luther King Jr., and Malcolm X two men having experienced different things in their lives held different beliefs and morals and influenced people based upon those things. Martin Luther King Jr., came from a Baptist home with a fairly easy childhood, he was educated when he was younger and attended Morehouse College, an all black college, where he had several role models that shaped his beliefs. Malcolm X, on the other hand, experienced a hard childhood and used drugs and committed other crimes in his early adult years. While in prison he found a father figure in Elijah Muhammad and joined the Nation of Islam. There are many differences between Martin Luther King Jr., and Malcolm X in the way they acted and influenced the African American community. This paper will look to describe their differing views and analyze their actions and their lives. In most cases a person’s childhood has a lasting affect on the rest of a person’s life. In comparing Martin Luther King Jr., and Malcolm X this seems to be the case. Martin Luther King Jr., was born January 19, 1929 and was raised by a strong supportive family. He had a somewhat privileged life and “never experienced the feeling of not having the basic necessities of life.”[1] His father “was a community leader in Atlanta...
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...“I have a dream” spoken by Martin Luther King Jr. was verbalized in 1963 on August 28. It was a national turning point for America. In his speech, he uses many literary expressions to portray his beliefs such as Metaphors and Allusions. These are heavily used to depict his ideas about the injustices of African American people and where these injustices thrive. Martin Luther King was an activist for civil rights. He, along with many, wanted to bring to light the terrible injustices that belong to an African American. He uses many metaphors to paint a vivid picture of the world as he saw it. In his speech he declared, “This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality.” He uses this metaphor to compare the time a segregation to a excruciating summer. He expresses that people will not rest until they are all considered equal. This time would be joyous just like the autumn, out of the heat and suffering. Later in the speech, Dr. King also states,”The...
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...The Drum Major Instinct. Martin Luther King, Jr. remains arguably the most recognizable African American figure in world history. First thrust into the international spotlight courtesy of his leadership of a boycott of the public bus system in Montgomery, Alabama, where he was pastor of a local church, King became the lightning rod for the civil rights movement that emerged in the wake of the successful boycott. During the 1960s he gave innumerable speeches characterized by oratorical genius, led a succession of mass marches in the heart of segregated America and helped to reconstruct American race relations before his assassination in 1968. Ever since Montgomery he has attracted the attention of biographers and historians keen to understand what made him such a magnetic and inspirational leader and what made the story of the civil rights movement so compelling. Martin Luther King is most remembered for a speech given during one of the finest hours of the civil rights movement -- a sermon that set the moral tone for the movement. But while the Aug. 28, 1963, sermon "I Have A Dream," delivered during the March on Washington, framed much of Martin Luther King Jr’s notions of a free America, it was not the speech that defined his legacy. One of the world's best known advocates of non-violent social change strategies, Martin Luther King Jr., synthesized ideals drawn from many different cultural traditions. Recent studies of him emphasize the extent to which his ideals were rooted...
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...themselves as equals to those in England and did not believe that their rights should be neglected. Similar to the British-Americans during the Revolutionary War, the pioneers of the Civil Rights Movement sought equal rights and freedom. Prominent civil rights leaders brought new ideas to the world, dreaming up ways to eliminate an archaic mentality. Ultimately, without the reinforcement of...
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...Americans united to challenge the system of segregation. Many whites sympathized and joined their campaign. The Montgomery bus boycott was the first of the large-scale protests. The Montgomery bus boycott helped African Americans to protest peacefully and bring attention to their struggle; it paved the way for Martin Luther King Jr to speak for other African Americans; and a year later, it led to the Supreme Court’s ruling that it was illegal for public transportation to be segregated....
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...Martin Luther King I have a Dream On August 28, 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his "I Have a Dream" Speech at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. Martin Luther King was one of the leading roles in the Civil Rights Movement. He was working on getting the black people the same rights as the white people; he wanted them to be equal, but ad that time there were still laws against the black people. That made it possible for white people to treat them the way they wanted to without it being “wrong”. Laws were separating them ad restaurants, hotels and schools. 1. Find some of the most powerful examples of Martin Luther King's use of imagery. The King uses imagery in his speech to make people understand and relate to his ideas. He especially uses time and landscape as imagery’s. By using images and symbols in the speech, he connects to more people then he would have with big rhetoric woods. He wants the African American people to face and push for more freedom: “Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood” (page 12, line 12-14). A valley symbolizes a low point there is difficult to escape from. The sun symbolizes a brighter future were all people are equal and the quicksand symbolizes a trap there is difficult to get out of. When he says “solid rock of brotherhood” it symbolizes a stable people there...
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...Famous Thinkers All famous thinkers have a few things in common that make them achieve the level of greatness they acquire through life. Creative ideas are the foundation of the creative process (Goodman and Fritchie, 2011). Many of these ideas revolve around finding a solution to a problem, or changing the way people think about approaching issues. The two famous thinkers this paper will examine—Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), and Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968) each used the creative process to change the way people viewed the issues of the day. They each made specific contributions to society during difficult social times. The subject of this paper will examine the specific problems or ideas both of these famous thinkers sought to solve, and the solutions they came up with for implementation. The ideas and solutions met with interference from people opposing the change, and many of the solutions were is a constant state of refinement, but their individual solutions all met the test of logic, enabling them to overcome the difficulties and opposition to resolutions. The thinking of these two men went a long way in changing the way people thought, and shaped the outcome of their individual issues for the better. Russell for analytical philosophy based in realism, and King in defeating the injustice of segregation and inequality. Both men looked at the problem in different ways to find different perspectives that no one else had visited. They both were able to visualize...
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...Ho-Ling Helen Chan Dr. Natalie Neill EN1201 A 31 July 2015 The Effectiveness of Rhetoric; A Comparison of Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal” and Martin Luther King Jr’s “I Have a Dream” In 1729, Jonathan Swift’s (hereafter referred as Swift) wrote a pamphlet “ A Modest Proposal For preventing the children of poor people in Ireland, from being a burden on their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to the publick”. Through his pamphlet, Swift denounced the English’s treatment of the Irish community by proposing a “modest” solution to end Irish poverty. During the Civil Rights movement in 1963 , Martin Luther King Jr. (hereafter referred as King) gave a speech entitled “I have a dream” (Sipra and Rashid 29). Through his speech, King exposed America’s discrimination against the African-American (AA) community, and advocated for a peaceful social revolution. Both classical works of rhetoric exposed the injustice inflicted upon their marginalized community and urged their audience to take action against these injustice. Although Swift’s pamphlet held relevance to his readers, King’s speech was more persuasive than Swift’s pamphlet. King’s vigorous...
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...What Is Equality? Martin Luther King and Thomas Jefferson were two important individuals in American history that focused their beliefs and efforts on obtaining equality. Comparing similarities between these men show that they battled through oppression, desired the abolishment of unjust laws, and were successful in their missions for equality. According to Dictionary.com (“equality”) is: “the state or quality of being equal; correspondence in quantity, degree, value, rank, or ability.” In this paper I will compare how different the meanings of equality sought after by both men were in, “The Declaration of Independence” by Thomas Jefferson and “Letter from Birmingham Jail” by Martin Luther King by identifying their different tactics, methods, and outcomes. Thomas Jefferson penned “The Declaration of Independence” with intent to demand equality. His tactics behind this writing was to require the British government to grant the colonies their independence without option. He ensured the British government, “that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full power to levy war.”(207). This measure of intent indicated that Jefferson was declaring the willingness of the colonies to fight for their beliefs of equality. The colonies wanted to be treated fairly. They wanted to be treated with fairness. The British government was preventing the people of the colonies...
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...GROUP: ONE LECTURER: D.S.K. OGORDOR OUTLINE OF MARTIN LUTHER KING’S “I HAVE A DREAM” SPEECH 1. Participation in a demonstration for freedom. 2. The Emancipation Proclamation signed a century ago. a) The decree as a sign to end the longsuffering of the Negro. 3. A century later, the Negroes are still being stigmatized. 4. The passing of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence presented Americans with rights and privileges. a) Negroes were prohibited from enjoying these rights and privileges. b) The Negroes insisted on their rights and privileges. 5. A time to end stigmatization. a) a time for blacks and whites to unite b) Negroes will not rest until they get equal rights and freedom as whites. i. They must not adopt negative means in achieving freedom 6. The Negroes should not mistrust all whites since some support their struggle for justice. 7. Staying focused on the quest for justice. a) Satisfaction will be attained when there is justice in every state 8. People who have encountered mistreatments should not give up in their struggle for freedom a) There is an assurance for change 9. A dream for a for a better future a) There will be unity in all parts of the country. b) There will be equal rights and privileges everywhere. c) The faith and hope for freedom. 10. A song of true freedom 11. The reign of freedom everywhere. GROUP REPORT MEETING TIMES: MONDAY, TUESDAY...
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...I find this article very powerful, it goes into details by informing the readers what our history teachers never really told us in class. When thinking about the civil rights movements Dr Martin Luther King’s name is the only name I think about as he is revered by all. This article showed me that contrary to popular believe the civil rights movement was not all about Dr King and nonviolence. The civil rights movement did not start from the heroes whose names we all now know, it succeed because so many ordinary people like Robert Williams were feed up of the injustice and one day decided to change their lives by fighting for what they believed in. The beginning of the article that was about Robert Williams’s child hood was very heart breaking, through that little introduction of him, I was able to understand why he did most of what he did while fighting for freedom. Robert Williams was a veteran of World War II, he is a figure that most history books have left out, and he did not preach violence but was willing to use a gun in order to defend women, children, and the community. I was a bit shocked to discover that he practiced self-defense before Malcom x Besides elevating Williams to his rightful place in civil rights history alongside Malcom X and others Timothy B Tyson's article challenges the concept that Black Power and armed self-defense emerged only after 1965. Rather, Tyson points out that the roots of Black Power stretch further back and often worked "in tandem and...
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...Was the legislation that gave African Americans equal rights to ‘whites’ the result of famous, glorified leaders such as Martin Luther King and Lyndon Johnson or was it those who worked behind the scenes, the local groups and individuals, who set the stage for these legal amendments to be possible? The Civil Rights Movement was one of the most significant events in the modern history of the United States that has formed the basis of many of its core values and laws today. The Civil Rights Movement unofficially ended with the passing of the long awaited “1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act” which legally saw an end to the racial discrimination faced by African Americans. However the historiography of the Civil Rights Movement has “undergone some serious revision” since 1965 as it ‘gained popular appeal.’ Initially the Civil Rights Movement was “romanticized” and considered to be a “heroic narrative of moral purpose and personal courage by which great men and women inspired ordinary people to rise up and struggle for their rights” such as the famed Martin Luther King, who was painted as the ‘driving force behind the movement’ ,President Lyndon Johnson and Kennedy and organisations such as ‘The National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People’ (NAACP) This idea of the federal government, prominent leaders and organisations playing the defining role in the passing of these bills soon became less plausible in the 1970’s and 1980’s as the “second...
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