Notion oral mythes et héros spécialité anglais

Hello, I am going to speak about 2 documents studied in class and a personal document, a 1964 painting by Norman Rockwell named “The problem we all live with” and an extract from “The Flowers” by Alice Walker published in 1973. Then for my personal document, it is a picture by Gordon Parks named “Willie Causey Jr with Gun during Violence in Alabama” in 1956. All of these 3 documents shows children during segregation. In this case we can wonder how artists use children's innocence to denounce segregation?

The first document I am going to to talk about is a painting by Norman Rockwell who is a famous American painter. This painting is now considered as an iconic image for the Civil Right Movement. It's the story of the little girl named Ruby Bridges who was 6 and was accepted in a white school after taking a test. This painting shows 4 Marshalls who are here to protect her because white people were considering that it was not okay to have a black girl in school. Their armbands are bright which shows that even if it seems that she's protected she's not free. In the back of the picture we can see the word “Nigger” written and a tomato on the ground to show how disrespectful and dangerous were people at the time against black people. However, Ruby stands straight like she didn't care and is just focused on her studies.

Then I will talk about a text from Alice Walker named “The Flowers”. It's the story of Myop, a little girl who is happy and light and she's going on an adventure through the woods near her house. There, she discover a body of a black men who was strangled. The transition between these 2 atmosphere is striking. In the beginning of the text we can see that everything is not important and she is juste a little girl playing and skipping and then, as she walks through the woods, the atmosphere begin to be gloomy and odd. It is obviously not for her because she's probably too young to see something that dreadful. We see that she feels interested because she never seen something like that but we can also feel that she's terrified in a her own way.

The third document is about a black teenager who is holding a gun. We also see in the back of the picture the mother doing homework with her children. The teenager is like holding the gun to protect but he is actually a teen so we can conclude that he has a missing father and he needs to act like the father of the family even if he is young. His face is really dark and we already know just by his face that he went through a lot. The picture is taken in Alabama where the racism was really intense so it's not hard to illustrate how black people were treated there. A young boy holding this type of gun is pretty symbolic because it shows how vicious and aggressive the war between black and white can be. It seems like the KKK can come at anytime to kill someone of his family without any kind of reason. Him having this gun is a safety for his family who looks peaceful because of him. His name is Willie Causey.

Using Children during the segregation is a way for artists to make people understand that this is not acceptable for any kind of human to be treated like this. He wants people to have pity for theses children. They wants children to go to school, be safe at home, be safe when they are walking. All of theses things that a normal child can do. By showing how they are imprisoned while they have any bad intentions or just because they don't know life yet, it have a real impact on people.

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