Race and Ethnicity Paper

Race and Ethnicity Paper

Tampiko Knight

Intro to Literature

Patricia Lake

April 8, 2013

The two literary pieces that I will be comparing and contrasting about are The Welcome Table by Alice Walker and What It’s Like to Be a Black Girl by Patricia Smith (Clugston, 2010). Both of these literary pieces represent African American women who have faced racism and stereotypes by the color of their skin. I will show the similarities and differences of the two by giving examples and explanation of the views on race and ethnicity and how it can affect women of color with the difficulties of dealing with prejudice and stereotypes.

In the story The Welcome Table the character that was the main focus is an almost blind, old black woman. She has a lean build and a grayish tone to her skin and is wearing a mildewed black dress with missing buttons and a grease-stained head scarf covering her pigtails. She has blue-brown eyes and wrinkled. She was sweating from her walk and shivering from the cold. She enters an all-white congregation Church and sits in the pew singing in her head. She is physically removed out of the church by the male members. After the woman is turned away she begins to feel a sense of loneliness, and an outcast. She sees Jesus walking down the highway and is enlighten with joy. Jesus tells her to follow him. She begins walking alongside him taking two steps for every one step he takes to keep up. He looks just like she thought he would and he listens to her sing and talk to him. She feels great beside him and can walk as long as he wants (Sec 3.1 Walker, 1970). In my opinion the woman feels that God will reward her at the end of her journey. Not because she is black but because she knows who she is through her faith.

The poem What It’s Like to Be a Black Girl gives us the view of a young black girl that is becoming a black woman. At the time when being a black girl is trying to come into maturity as a woman it could possibly create questions in her life. What It's Like to Be a Black Girl shows a young girl who questions who she is and what she will become in life. Through mistakes and struggles the young girl seems to learn how to accept who she is and embrace reality of becoming a beautiful black woman. It also gives us a view into the eyes of someone that does not feel accepted in society and wants to change who she is to become like the other people around her. The young woman tries to change who she is.  When Patricia Smith wrote the poem What It’s Like to Be a Black Girl she focused on the young black girl’s feelings and the pressure of a racially scarred society. There are things about the character that could possibly make you believe that the young black girl is having a hard time accepting who she is. The character tells us how the young black girl tries to balance her newly formed body with her still child-like mentality. Almost every young girl’s dream when growing into womanhood includes a great white gown which she wears on her wedding day.  On that day when she is joined with a man a chapter ends and a new one begins in her life (Sec 12.2, Smith 1991).