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Essay / Metaphorical and literal prison: Frederick Douglass and Malcolm While Malcolm prison. Prison, to take the concept broadly, is a place in which people cannot exercise their civil right to liberty. For both Malcolm X and Douglass, such limitations on freedom impacted their lives in ways they never imagined. They might even claim that prison has made them better and more influential people than they would have been if they had not experienced such hardships. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Douglass was born in 1818 and Malcolm X was born in 1925. Even though the two men were born one hundred and seven years apart, they faced similar experiences and beliefs. Before prison, Malcolm X received a seventh grade education. He could read, but he was not literate enough to understand the documents presented to him. Only in prison did he learn what many words meant and how to write them correctly. The dictionary was a valuable asset to Malcolm X's literacy development. For Douglass, the process of learning to read was a little different. His mistress taught him the alphabet, but once his mistress adapted to the "southern" way of thinking that slaves should not be allowed to read, she ended his lessons and gave him forbidden to read anything, but which she did not do. realize it was too late. Douglass already knew the alphabet and was ambitious enough to discover the path to literacy for himself. This ambition that Douglass carried was also a trait carried by Malcolm X. Malcolm X spent fifteen hours a day reading and expanding his knowledge in prison. Douglass couldn't spend as much time reading, but he spent every second he could find reading everything that was available. This included the journals, Master Thomas's notebook, the dictionary and the Columbian Orator. Since reading was not allowed for slaves in Douglass's time, Douglass learned to deceive his masters and negotiate with poor white boys on the streets in order to learn to read. Malcolm To read until four in the morning, as Malcolm Once the guards left, he would crawl out of bed with his book and lie down on the floor to continue reading late into the night. In a way, Douglass' masters represent the same authority figure as Malcolm X's prison guards, and Douglass's poor white boys represent the same knowledge figure as Malcolm X's library. Malcolm both practiced their writing by copying. what they read. Malcolm X used many prison-issued tablets while copying the dictionary. He says: “Eventually section A of the dictionary filled an entire tablet – and I moved on to sections B… It went much faster after so much practice helped me improve my handwriting speed” ( Malcolm X 2).While Malcolm X copied from the dictionary onto writing tablets to improve his handwriting, Douglass had more of a graffiti style of writing. Douglass copied from his master Thomas's notebook when his mistress left him to watch over the house, but when the poor white boys taught him to write, he said: "...my notebook was the board fence, the brick wall and pavement; my pen and ink were a piece of chalk” (Douglass 105). The difference between the materials Malcolm X and Douglass used to learn to write shows the differences in the harshness of the prisons in which they lived. Malcolm X lived in a prison where reading and writing were not only allowed, they were encouraged. This allowed him to spend more time reading and writing. It also allowed Malcolm X to have more freedom, so to speak, than Douglass to expand and develop his knowledge. Douglass was not allowed to read or write, so his prison was stricter than that of Malcolm also showed that he had to sneak around his "guards" (masters) to learn to read and write. Douglass is like a scavenger, seeking literacy in all its forms, while Malcolm X is more like a scholar, studying literacy of all kinds. Malcolm X talks about his experience reading about slavery. He says, “I will never forget how shocked I was when I began to read about the utter horror of slavery” (Malcolm x 4). While Malcolm X read about the horrors of slavery, Douglass had already experienced it. Malcolm abolition”. As a slave during the abolitionist era, Douglas learned roughly what the word “abolition” meant by listening to white men talk around him. By reading the newspapers, Douglass learned that there were people in the North who really wanted to abolish slavery. The irony is that Douglass was one of the most prominent abolitionist leaders of his time, and over a hundred years later, Malcolm he and Douglass are actually similar. Although Malcolm X and The Douglasses share many similarities, their experiences made them view reading in a completely different way. Malcolm Malcolm X cherished his books and the knowledge that came with them because he saw them as a source of freedom. He says: “Between… and my reading of books, months passed without me even thinking about being imprisoned. In fact, until then, I had never been so free in my life” (Malcolm X 2). This view is quite different from that of Douglass. Once Douglass knew how to read, he envied the other slaves who could not read because they were still naive to the world around them; however, his eyes were open to the world his masters tried to prevent him from seeing. Douglass says, “…I sometimes felt that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing…In moments of agony, I envied my fellow slaves for their stupidity” (Douglass 103). He saw how horribly other slaves were treated and heard stories of how..
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