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Summary Of Maya Angelou's Rural Museums-Southern Romance

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The ideal vision of each individual that comes to to the United States is to have the opportunities to be successful and make their dreams come true with hard work and dedication which is known as the American Dream. But how can someone pursue the American Dream if not every individual does not have the same equality as others. In Maya Angelou’s essay “Rural Museums - Southern Romance”, she wanted closure towards her roots by visiting a museum in Baton Rouge. While she is there, she notice her own people unaware of their history. Maya Angelou argues that African Americans lack interest in the history of their ancestors, if you aren’t aware of your own history it won’t give you the motivation to achieve the American Dream. Throughout the essay, Angelou describes her experience and her observations while she is on her way …show more content…

As she states in her essay “I could wish that professors and the fifty volunteers who act as guides would be bold enough to point out not only the architecture and artifacts but the salient missing factor: our historical truth.” (p. 95) This shows us the disappointment she has, She believes that African Americans will not face the truth or will ignore it to move on from injustice. In her essay, she mentioned “The sculptor of Uncle Jack had employed the slavocracy’s wishful romance that cast all blacks as congenitally subservient and only too happy to devote their lives too looking after their white folks.” (p. 93) Angelou mentioned this quote in order to emphasize how the museum is misrepresenting their history and no one is being aware about. In other words, the slaves could not express sadness since they were doing their job which was pleasing their master and that was the “perfect” slave in their own perspective. Angelou also mentioned that the museum misrepresents and romanticized slavery which does not raise an awareness on their

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