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Systemic Oppression In Alex Haley's The Autobiography Of Malcolm X

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Eng. IV “Institutional Oppression is the systematic mistreatment of people within a social identity group, supported and enforced by the society and its institutions, solely based on the person's membership in the social identity group.” In The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Alex Haley, the ideas of systemic oppression and ‘social’ or racial identity are frequently expressed through the conflicts and events in Malcolm's life. Every facet of Malcolm's life had been influenced or affected greatly by the socially instituted oppression placed on him by his racial identity. It started when he was young, at the very beginning of his story. From an early age, his father was harassed by the Ku Klux Klan, and then his mother was driven mad by social workers. Upon which his family was very …show more content…

Though even that wasn't enough to get rid of the blight itself. Systemic oppression is an issue still relevant today. In all things from the workforce to day to day living. Things were so bad in Malcolm's time, that in 1964, the US Equal Employment Commission was founded as aid for minorities and women in the workforce and private industry. Beyond that many other measures have been put into places by the US government and private organizations to combat systemic oppression. But the ideal is also symbolic, much of the fight Malcolm Little, his father, Marcus Garvey and Dr. King fought was largely symbolic rather than material. Some of those symbols still remain today. For example in South Carolina, at the capital. Lately on the news there has been the fiasco that took place when people took offense to the flying of the Confederate flag. Whether someone believe they flew the flag based on their appreciation of their history and culture, or flew it in order to continue to perpetuate old ideals of systemic oppression no one can

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