...Maya Angelou “ Still I Rise” The Poem “ Still I Rise “ Immediately drew me in with its powerful words. For example in the first stanza it reflects the concept of slavery seen with the words “ You may write me down in history” “(The Academy of American Poets, Inc.)” .The poem offers a mixture of tones however in the end its tone is mainly victorious. This poem is not only addressed to one person it is addressed to all the public it is extremely political and somewhat controversial. This made me want to analyze the different meanings the poem may have hidden within. The poem was written by Maya Angelou in 1978. This was Angelous most famous point of her career. She had just published three autobiographies and published two other volumes of poetry. “ Still I Rise” is part of “ And I still I Rise” a volume of poetry made up of thirty-two short poems. This volume also included one of her most famous poems “ Phenomenal Woman”. The thirty-two short poems carry a similar theme throughout the volume. Maya Angelou focused a lot on her race, strength and resiliency. Maya Angelou was born on April fourth 1928 in St. Louis Missouri United States of America. She was born Marguerite Ann Johnson. Her father Bailey Johnson was a doorman and a naval dietician and her mother Vivian Baxter Johnson worked variously as a card dealer, boarding house proprietor and registered nurse. Maya Angelou and her family moved to Long Beach, California, however after he parents were divorced, her and...
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...Maya Angelou's Early Life Maya Angelou was born Marguerite Annie Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri in 1928. Maya and her brother, Bailey, moved to live with their grandmother after the divorce of their parents. The move to Stamps, Arkansas forced Maya to encounter much racism. Despite prevalent racism in town, Maya's grandmother always made sure to teach Maya and her brother strong values. At the age of eight, Maya's mother, Vivian, took the children back to live with her in St. Louis. Shortly after the move, Maya was raped by her mother's live-in boyfriend. This traumatic event caused Maya to become mute for a period of time afterward and withdraw from family and friends. It also created a major rift between Maya and Vivian. At thirteen, Maya moved to San Francisco where she attended George Washington High School and received a scholarship to the California Labor School for dance and drama classes. Maya was one of the only black students in her school and found life in San Francisco intriguing and liberating. Maya's Young Adult Life She became pregnant with her son, Clyde, at age seventeen. Maya had just earned her high school diploma and her dreams of attending college were fleeting. Instead, she took various waitressing and cooking jobs and was even the madam of a brothel. Maya yearned for stardom in her young adult years, but her dancing career did not take off. Soon, Maya figured out that she needed to find a way...
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...Maya Angelou Name: Institution: Instructor: Date: Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Introduction 3 Reasons for Choosing Maya Angelou 3 Early Life 4 Educational Life 5 Angelou’s Influence in her Early Career 5 Angelou’s Influence in Africa 6 Angelou’s Career Peak 7 Later Career 7 Qualities That Make Angelou A Great Leader 8 Analysis of Angelou’s Leadership Style 9 Application of Angelou’s Leadership Style to Hospitality Industry 9 Leadership Lesson on Angelou Essential for Hospitality Industry 10 The value of versatility 10 The Value of Spirituality 10 Introspection value 11 Conclusion 11 References 12 Introduction Leadership is essential for the success of a given group, society, or organization. Through leadership, a particular group of people is directed, mobilized, motivated, and encouraged to perform a given task. Leadership is among the roles of a manager. The manager in this case is a person charged with given responsibilities for the success of a given venture. At an individual level, one is supposed to manage his or her own life in an effective way to achieve a lifetime objective. Given that leadership is among the roles of a manager, it means that everyone should cultivate leadership qualities in all aspects of life. This can be done through several ways. One of them is by learning from reputable leaders of both the past and the present generation. The world has witnessed myriads of reputable...
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...Maya Angelou Introduction Leadership is essential for the success of a given group, society, or organization. Through leadership, a particular group of people is directed, mobilized, motivated, and encouraged to perform a given task. Leadership is among the roles of a manager. The manager in this case is a person charged with given responsibilities of handling affairs of a given business venture. At an individual level, one is supposed to manage his or her own life in an effective way to achieve a lifetime objective. Given that leadership is among the roles of a manager, it means that everyone should cultivate leadership traits in all phases of life. This can be accomplished through several ways. One of them is by learning from reputable leaders of both the precedent and the current generation. The world has witnessed myriads of reputable leaders with profound influence on the community. Their utterances, Way of life, and formulas of handling situations is worthy emulating. As a result, one ought to assess the same and emulate their style of leadership. One area where leadership is essential is in the hospitality industry. Hospitality generally involves accommodating people at a given place. Accommodation in this case involves providing, comforting, guiding, and instructing people on the type of food, entertainment, and recreation facilities available for them. This paper investigates a reputable leader. The leader in consideration is Maya Angelou. The consideration...
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...NAME: Marion Brooks GENERAL TOPIC: Maya Angelou GENERAL PURPOSE: To inform, persuade and entertain SPECIFIC PURPOSE: At the end of my speech, the audience will be able to list four facts about the childhood, education, career, and achievements of Author, Civil Rights Activist, and Poet Maya Angelou. CENTRAL IDEA: Maya Angelou is an amazing woman and a great Author, Civil Rights Activist, Poet. ***************************************************************************** INTRODUCTION: ATTENTION STATEMENT: Did you know Angelou supported Cuban leader Fidel Castro, despite his rivalry with U.S. leaders? ESTABLISH CREDIBILITY: I have been a big fan of Maya Angelou and have completed research about her life and career. PREVIEW STATEMENT:...
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...Peoples English IV CP Blankenship 3/21/14 Maya Angelou Known as one of the most influential voices of our time, Dr. Maya Angelou is a global renaissance woman, a celebrated poet, novelist, educator and holds many other titles. She has proven the point that sex and race cannot hinder dreams and goals. In this paper, Dr. Maya Angelou’s failures as well as successes will be recognized and discussed. Born on April 4th, 1928, in St. Louis, Missouri, Dr. Angelou was raised in St. Louis and Stamps, Arkansas. Maya Angelou's former name was Marguerite Ann Johnson. Maya got the nickname from her older brother Bailey, who had a speech issue and could not pronounce Marguerite (Longly, 2013). He started calling her Maya because he read a book on Mayan indians, and the name stuck. In Stamps, Dr. Angelou experienced the brutality of racial discrimination, but she also absorbed the unshakable faith and values of traditional African-American family, community, and culture (Angelou, 2012). Growing up in Stamps, AK, Angelou learned what it was like to be a black girl in a world whose boundaries were set by whites (Longly, 2013). As a child, she always dreamed of waking to find her "nappy black hair" metamorphosed to a long blond bob because she felt life was better for a white girl than for a black girl (Franks, n.d.). Despite the odds, her grandmother instilled pride in Angelou with religion as an important element in their home. Maya Angelou contributed to black history by publicizing...
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...English 322.001 December 4, 2014 “Phenomenal Woman” Poem Analysis “Phenomenal Woman” by Maya Angelou celebrates the feminine qualities of womanhood, and highlights the different traits for a woman to become ‘phenomenal.’ Maya shows the reader despite what society tells her she still feels great about herself. She believes that it is your inner beauty that makes the woman “phenomenal” instead of your outer beauty. Throughout the poem Maya illustrates how no one seems to understand what it is that makes her attractive because she is not considered to be physically beautiful by society’s standards. So what exactly makes this woman phenomenal? The woman in the poem is appealing to others because of her internal beauty and how she feels about herself. What makes her so phenomenal is that she does not care how others view her society, as well as the opposite sex. Even other woman try to understand what it is about this woman that makes her so attractive, because she does not portray what is considered beautiful by society standards when you look at her. The poem opens up by saying “Pretty women wonder where my secret lies. I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size” She tells the reader in the beginning that it is not her physical attributes that make her attractive. “Men themselves have wondered what they see in me. They try so much but they can’t touch my inner mystery.” This line illustrates that it is not an actual feature that makes her attractive to men...
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...Collective Soul, a rock band with the base 90, and the famous poet Maya Angelou is known that they have to make a statement about their thoughts and feelings. They are expressed in two different forms of poetry. Maya Angelou to speak in modern poetry, while the rock band Collective Soul adds an impressive pace and rhythm of his words. These two forms of poetry are too strong to say that he really likes his point of his public activities. Both Maya Angelou and Collective Soul share the hardships and oppression, which had been given to life and other people. Poem Maya Angelou Still I Rise and song Collective Soul December showing the effects of the individual through positive and negative expression. Poetry Maya Angelou and Collective Soul are similar in some respects, when broken down correctly. Collective Soul wrote "Why drink the water from my hand contagious as you think I am?"; reflects the same idea that the actions of Maya Angelou when she said, "Are you annoyed by my boldness Why did you suffer from sadness"; These two parts of his writings to make a similar question. Why do I push one world I that you can not wait for someone else? "Do not cry, do not just think aloud Turn your head now baby just spit me not to worry, not to speak of doubt Turn your head now baby just spit on me";. This is a complicated way of saying why I respect what you missed, because you can not stand the way I am. Just go with me, I try another law that if I shit. What good do it for you, let...
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...Still I rise Favorite Poem Essay Maya Angelou’s poem Still I Rise is an astonishing piece of art. The reason I chose this poem is because it’s not only a poem, it’s a story. The poem is about Maya Angelou’s beliefs being a women of color about discrimination. It’s not just her personal story but a universal experience for those with an African American background. Throughout the poem, Maya Angelou uses many poetic devices to give us more in-depth meaning behind what is in the poem. These poetic devices help her poem flow, create emotion, and makes the read more interesting. The poetic devices Maya Angelou focused on throughout her poem are repetition, rhyme, metaphor, and symbols. These poetic devices work together to create an overall effect on the meaning of the poem, creating the poem to be more thought-provoking to the reader. The first poetic device Maya Angelou uses throughout her poem is repetition. In the poem, she continuously uses the phrase “I’ll rise” (Angelou 12). The repetition of this phrase emphasizes the hope and confidence she has to overcome the struggles she is facing as an African American. The idea of moving forward and being a successful individual despite what society may bring towards someone is given off by this repetition of the strong phrase. The repetition allows the reader to notice the importance of never giving up on their own beliefs even when they’re different. These words at the end of the stanzas gives it strength and brings the poem back...
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...To what extent do you agree that Angelou’s poetry presents the female struggle for identity more effectively than the male struggle? Angelou writes from many different viewpoints, the main one tending to be from a female perspective. The poem ‘men’ focuses on the admiration and vulnerability a woman may feel towards a man – ‘they knew I was there. Fifteen years old and starving for them.’ By saying ‘they knew I was there’ shows the reader that everywhere the young girl goes men are constantly watching her, looking for her even with the age that she is at. ‘Starving’ is a sense of desperation for something, in this case the young girl may want sexual experience this links to a later line ‘it is your juice’ this is also a simile, which may connote to the physical point, referring to a sexual encounter. However, with the sentence being short it shows us that a lack of detachment was there this also relates back to the young girl wanting experience. Angelou portrayed to us the image of a young girl struggling for identity due to want of a man’s touch, making the female struggle more effective than a man’s struggle. Whereas, in the poem ‘Willie’ Angelou shows the struggle for a man’s identity in a more negative view than the girl in ‘men’. During the poem it states that people call him ‘uncle’ ‘boy’ and ‘hey’ this shows us that Willie does not have a true identity to anybody – meaning nobody actually knows him, suggesting to the reader that he is on his own and has no body. This...
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...“Still I Rise” Maya Angelou I could tell right away from the poem’s description, imagery, and repetition that she was directing her thoughts towards someone who was trying to hurt her. “Still I Rise” and “I rise” were her saying over and over you can keep trying to put me down but I’m going to keep getting up. She portrays a strong woman with supreme attitude and stresses that the person didn’t like her how she was. She identifies that she has a strong attitude with words like “sassiness”, “haughtiness” and “sexiness”. Her self-described attitude can be compared to today’s reference of a “Diva”. I am interested in her strength in an era where the woman’s movement was just beginning. She was so far ahead of her time and willing to talk about it. I can tell in her words that she has been brought down in the past by this person. She describes being shot down by their words, being glared at and having hate directed at her. She keeps telling the other person that I will not let you bring me down and every time you do, I will get stronger and stronger. She references that she creates waves like the moon and the sun, that she is challenging and the other person doesn’t like it. She felt the other person was trying to break her down and be dominating but she was a strong woman and would not let that happen. In the end, she says she is leaving all her negatives in the past and focusing on the future. She is a wanted person and she has pride. Maya Angelou was an author...
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...Freeing the Caged Bird: Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings as a Call for Revolutionary Action Maya Angelou’s memoir, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, exhibits the connection between cultural structures, such as language, religion and art, and the modern capitalist hierarchy of modern American society. Her portrayal demonstrates the need for revolutionary action over silent or reformative protest by explaining the failures of the latter. Overall, she argues that in order to end injustice, the oppressed must freely develop individual identities and perspectives, each subjective, but in total encompass an objective truth. Caged Bird explores the intrinsic connection of language and class, defining power as the ability to force another to conform to one’s own dogmata. For instance, Marguerite disdainfully observes that “Momma persistently [uses] the wrong verb” (94) while in the presence of the comparatively upper-class Mrs. Flowers, such criticism, one...
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...Diana Hocker January 20, 2015 English Period 8 _______________Maya Angelou was an African American poet, singer, and actress who influenced the world through her writing. Her compositions, including songs, poems, and speeches, relate to her experiences in life, in which she faced racism, rape, and the stereotypes of African Americans. Angelou’s poems were written with various underlying themes, based upon the events that she faced, but was then able to overcome. Maya Angelou, through her autobiographical poems, “Phenomenal Woman” and “Still I Rise”, conveys to readers the importance of inner strength and perseverance to overcome obstacles.__________________ One of the most prominent themes in both “Phenomenal Woman” and “Still...
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...cage While researching the lists of the authors, I was attracted to the author Maya Angelou, because I am personally interested in civil rights. In this essay, I am going to research whole biography about her which includes lots of work that she has completed, her general perspective and important event which affected people in that century. The reason why I chose her is to explore whether she should have been much popular or not. First I will find historical background of her so that every audience can know at least who she is. And then I will find her major works that she has done, popularity of work at that time, popularity of herself and hidden work which has potential to be popular at that time so...
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...Irene Lange Intro to Humanities Task 1 Still I Rise Prior to beginning this assignment, I had never heard of the poem, “Still I Rise” by Maya Angelou. I had only recently been introduced to her and her works after she passed away in 2014. It was then that I had seen what an impact this woman had in the lives of so many people. My first reaction to the poem was that it appeared that she was being defiant. Her questioning in several paragraphs, made it seem as if she is almost taunting the reader with her responses. There is the repeating theme of her “rising” throughout the poem. In the last paragraph she addresses “slaves” which suggests that the entire poem is about racism, sexism and black rights. To me, the poem seems to make it clear that she has risen above the racism and sexism of other people and what they may think of her past or her actions. This poem was written in 1978, and while there were no “slaves” at this point in history, there remained many areas in the south that were segregated. The women of the Post Modern Era had to work hard to defend their rights. Angelou’s works became part of the Black Power Movement of the 1970s. She was a civil rights activist and worked with both Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr to help improve the rights of the African American. Maya Angelou was a remarkable woman. Into adulthood, Maya had held various job titles including “a cook, a waitress, a madam, a prostitute, a dancer, an actress, a playwright and a calypso singer.”...
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