Maya Angelou Still I Rise Analysis

Helen has also accomplished so many great things throughout her life. Helen Keller was famous by overcoming struggles and accomplishing many things such as learning how to read and write which are reasons why she has inspired various historical figures. Helen Keller was famous at a very young age. She was deaf and blind before the age of two. When she was seven, Helen was known for learning how to read and write, even with these disabilities.

But Henry always had her. She did have an impact on the world. She helped the soldiers of the Revolutionary War, she helped them which may have been part of what they needed to win the war. By doing this she helped show that even though you may be a women you can still make a big difference. She showed that you can make a difference no matter what.

After informing her family of this traumatizing encounter, the perpetrator was hunted down and beaten to death. Maya didn’t speak for the next five years. Maya found joy in singing, dancing, and poetry, after moving to San Francisco in 1940. However, this joy was put on hold after having a son at age 16, and moving to San Diego. Being young and reckless waitress, Maya got tangled in drugs, prostitution, and strip dancing.

Even though her mother was always working, she wanted her son and daughter to have a good education. Sonia Sotomayor developed a strength of character, knowledge and perseverance to be able to overcome discrimination based on her race, living situation, and the lack of education. Sotomayor developed strength of character to overcome discrimination due to her being a female Latina. According to “Obama Court choice stays true to his vision” Sotomayor was able to obtain a job at the Supreme Court. Many people questioned her ability due to her family background.

In “Play it as it Lays” by Joan Didion written in 1970 focuses on the story of Maria Wyeth. Maria was once a successful up and coming model/actress nonetheless after the deaths of her parents she withdrew from acting. She is married to Carter a man who is extremely uncaring and living in Hollywood. She has a four-year-old daughter Kate, who she seems to adore Nevertheless Kate is in an institution for unknown reasons. Maria displays self- destructive tendencies as she spends her days having sex and getting high and drunk.

Why are you so upset with gloom?” (“Still I Rise”). Angelou used questions to make the reader feel and understand her point of view. Maya Angelou’s work as a poet had very defined themes and styles. One of Angelou’s most iconic compositions is a poem of self-worth and perververenve deemed “Still I Rise.”

She composed now laws and delegated no high authorities, yet the self-learning and significant quietude that contributed her respect for each individual has made the account of her life a profound quality play that lights up the American memory. "There is no individual,"

Context/Purpose/Audience Still I Rise, written in 1978 by African American poet and civil-rights activist Maya Angelou, is a resoundingly courageous and unearthing poem with an inspiring invited reading directly related to the time period it was written in: during the declaration for Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). The poem discusses an African American woman’s struggles against racism and hatred from the society. It consists of nine-stanzas, offering words of inspiration to those who have been oppressed. It sends a message of hope that even in the midst of adversity it is possible to overcome obstacles and find the inner strength and confidence to rise above them. This poem is very straightforward making the message more meaningful and affective.

Despite Sister’s dreams that Carhullan was a sanctuary from oppression, it is, in fact, the invert of the outside world. Similar to the government in the outside world, whom hid Carhullan’s existence for fear of losing what was left of their people, Carhullan also rarely discussed news from the outside world. In fact, one of the commune’s members was born and raised at Carhullan and had never “been exposed to a world of inferiority or cattiness, nor male dominance. She was, in a way, an idealised female” (Hall 109). In other words, this daughter of Carhullan has never experienced male dominance - she has only ever known female dominance.

Resistance to oppression is a fluid theme throughout these two works of literature, Angelou in Still I rise, An ode to the power that brews in us all to overcome our most difficult circumstances, and is truly an inspiration to all homestayers in the sixties no matter Their race. “She speaks not only for herself but also for her gender and race. This extension of self occurs in Angelou's autobiographies and protest poetry” (Hagen 118). Her status as being a powerful black woman in the house, portrays her self confidence to override anything that puts her down as she will always exceed to rise up. While on the other hand Susan Rawlings in To Room Nineteen saw suicide as her only outlet to her lack of freedom in her marriage.

III. a. Maya Angelou was an avid writer, speaker, activist and teacher. As a result of the many hardships that she suffered while growing up as a poor black woman in the south she has used her own experiences as the subject matter of her written work. In doing this she effectively shows how she was able to overcome her personal obstacles. Her autobiography “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1970) tells the story of her life and how she overcame and moved forward triumphantly in spite of her circumstances.

Maya Angelou was a civil rights activist, poet, and award-winning author known for her 1969 memoir, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”, which was the first non-fiction bestseller by an African-American woman; concluding in leaving a great trace in the literary history. Behind Maya Angelou’s successful work, she used to have a difficult childhood; beginning from her parents splitting up, then experiencing racial prejudices when she and her brother moved to Arkansas to live with their father’s mother, to being raped at age seven by her mother’s boyfriend during a visit. As a result, for this sexual assault, Angelou’s uncles killed the boyfriend, since then, Angelou spent five years as a virtual mute. Under those circumstances, Angelou felt

Many people know Maya Angelou for being an American poet, but she was much more than that. She was a memoirist, civil rights activist, author, dancer, actress, and screenwriter. Maya Angelou was born in St. Louis, Missouri on April 4, 1928. Angelou parents slip when she was very young, so she and her older brother were sent away to line with her father's mother. In Arkansas Angelou experienced her first racial prejudices and discrimination.

Both African American men and women have had the strength to put up with racial comments and slurs they have been told all their lives. In the speech, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” by Frederick Douglass and the poem, “Still I Rise” by Maya Angelou, are perfect examples to show how white Americans used to treat the African American people. White Americans back then, and even in modern day, would talk down about them, hoping to break down their self confidence even more than it already has been. This may be true to others, but to Douglass and Angelou, they do not let the heartless words of others define who they are as an individual.

In similarities, the writing is a motivational and inspirational theme using Ethos, Pathos, and Logos to connect to the audience. Inspirational and motivational poems connect to the audience on another level as if the author and the reader are having a heart to heart conversation. “I’ve learned that people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” (Maya Angelou) Inspirational writing are a lifetime piece of art put into words.