#native amercan

~~~~Racism and Sexism is Alive and Well~~~~~~

Dear Readers,

Thank you for taking the time out of your incredibly busy schedule to read this. I’m kind of breaking a few of my rules that I have set for myself as the author of this blog.

1) Never reveal any personal information or detail of my life.

2) Never discuss my beliefs or opinions.

3) To only post stories, imagines, one shots etc.

4) To stay completely and totally anonymous.

Today I feel I’m coming as close to some of these without breaking them as I can and others I’m outright throwing to the curb so to speak.

I live near a town in Texas called Atlanta. Atlanta, Texas is very small at only 5,638 as of 2016. It is a town where most peoples families have  lived here for generations. My own family came to this area in 1720 from South Carolina. It’s made up of farmers, oil rig workers, loggers and convenience store workers. It’s not very impressive. It’s a town most just stop in for a bite as they travel if they weren’t smart enough to stop in Texarkana. It’s not a town that should really take up any portion of ones mind but the last couple of weeks it has been on my mind for reasons that I find to be appalling.

 I’d like to introduce you to one Bessie Coleman. She was born in Atlanta, Texas in 1892. The tenth of thirteen children. She grew up working on cotton fields, went to a small segregated school that was a four mile walk and due to her savings running out she returned home after completing one term at Oklahoma Colored Agricultural and Normal University, now named Langston University. Early on she developed an interest in flying and went to become the FIRST WOMAN OF AFRICAN AND NATIVE AMERCAN DESCENT TO BECOME A PILOT. In 1916 at the age of 24, she moved to Chicago, Illinois, where she lived with her brothers. In Chicago, she worked as a manicurist at the White Sox Barber Shop. It was here she heard stories from pilots returning home from World War I about flying during the war. She took a second job at a chili parlor to procure money to become a pilot. Since American flight schools of the time admitted neither African Americans, Native Americans nor women, Robert S. Abbott, founder and publisher of the Chicago Defender, encouraged her to study abroad.(Coleman received financial backing from banker Jesse Binga and the Defender.)  So what did she do? This amazing woman who grew up picking cotton saved up her money and went to France.

Bessie Coleman took a French-language class at the Berlitz school in Chicago and then traveled to Paris on November 20, 1920 so she could earn her pilot license. She learned to fly in a Nieuport 82 biplane. Bessie Coleman became the first woman of African American and Native American descent to earn an aviation pilot's license and the first person of African American and Native American descent to earn an international aviation license from the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale.

As you can probably tell, Bessie Coleman is a hero for African Americans, Native Americans and women everywhere even now in 2018. Which brings me to the point of my horror.

After discovering that such an amazing person came from such an unamazing town I started to inquire of those in charge of the city of Atlanta, Texas why no one spoke of Bessie Coleman. Why do we  have the Hall-miller Airport and not the Bessie Coleman Airport? Which if you ask who Hall-miller was they will tell you while chuckling that they were “Just a couple of drunks who hanged out at the airport” (and yes these “Leaders” of the city of Atlanta used “Hanged” instead of hung). Why isn’t there a scholarship program in her name? Why isn’t a street named after her in Atlantas downtown (even if it is a crummy downtown) Why isn’t the library named after her? Why are there no books about her in the library? Why is the only mention of her in this little town a half hidden small plague hanging in the post office? And do you know the answer they gave with sly half-smiles and disgusting gleams in their eyes? “Well..because she was black and we don’t want the blacks comin’ out at night and messin’ up the airport. They’ll just tear it all up if we let em out here. The sooner Coleman is forgotten the better.” Yes, ladies and gentlemen in this day of modern enlightenment of 2018; a group of old (pretty gross) men sitting around the table at the airport early in the morning with their coffee actually did say that. And all because a small, rundown, joke of an airport is where they like to meet up and lounge around all day.

I cannot adequately express my horror over this. A national hero for African Americans, Native Americans and women is being brushed under the carpet because a group of bigotries are threatened by her memory and the inspiration she would be to so many around here. I strongly believe it is the duty of a people to raise each other up, to inspire, build and fight for each other. I believe in equality with everything that I am. I’ve been called a feminazi before…although it really should be considered a compliment from the kind of person they were. And this agenda that these men have is them trying to form an elite with themselves as the elite. I cannot explain how much the actions of these men including the mayor (as to the new mayor or the old one I’ll keep that to myself) disgust me.

A/N: I wrote these opinions for an assignment. These are my interpretations of these specific pieces of American Literature. If you are easily offended, be cautious when reading these reading responses. Honestly, most of these responses are just me trying to meet a word requirement and they should and are meant to be taken lightheartedly. Also, I am editing some of these responses as I post them because my opinions changed, or I wanted to say something better than what was originally written. I will be happy to discuss these responses further, just please be nice :)

Warnings: There is one part about a race issue in Chopin’s piece, and also a rant on having to read yet another piece of Native American literature. I do not have anything against Native Americans or their culture, I’m just annoyed that every other assignment we have in this class is about Native Americans even though we are currently in the late 1800s. As I have said before, if it is overly offensive I will take that part out and repost.

Jewett – “A White Heron”

           I love the way Sarah Orne Jewett writes!!! She is very descriptive, yes, but it is in a way that keeps the reader interested as the story continues. Not many people can write about a cow for that long and keep my interest until the story is over. Also, I love her word choices. The reader can tell that Sarah Orne Jewett was very meticulous in her word choices, because the text of the book sounds so sophisticated, but the dialogue is worded to show the accents of the characters in “A White Heron.” Jewett uses sentences such as, “Suddenly, this little woods-girl is horror-stricken to hear a clear whistle not very far away,” but the dialogue of her characters reads as, “There ain’t a foot o’ ground she don’t know her way over, and the wild creaturs counts her one o’ themselves.”

           The way Jewett described Sylvia and Mistress Moolly at the beginning reminded me of the little boy who has to sell his cow in the musical Into the Woods, in that both have a cow as a best friend. There’s nothing more to add about that, I just thought you might like to know!

Chopin – “Desiree’s Baby”

           I love Kate Chopin, too! She is quite strange, and it shows in her writings when she uses phrases such as, “He absented himself from home.” She could have just said, “He left,” but she chooses to draw out her sentences instead. This is how long sentences should be written. Not just slapping words on paper and creating a run-on sentence, but creating a clear image that keeps the reader interested.

           Another reason I love Chopin so much is how scandalous she was for her time-period! I remember reading “The Storm” in high school and thinking, “I am so sorry, she lived when?” Her taboo writings are what she is remembered for, and “Desiree’s Baby” is no different. Armand thought that Desiree was black, and he was very angry that she did not tell him. During this time period, one did not hide their race from their spouse. So, Desiree’s mother tells Desiree to pack up the baby and come home, and she does. Meanwhile, Armand is burning his wife’s belongings and comes across a letter. His mother had written his father, “night and day, I thank God for having so arranged our lives that our dear Armand will never know that his mother, who adores him, belongs to the race that is cursed with the brand of slavery.”

Sa – “Impressions of an Indian Childhood: My Mother, The Legends, The Big Red Apples” and “The Soft-Hearted Sioux”

           After reading about the Native Americans all semester, I am, in today’s terms, done! The problem is not that I have some sort of vendetta against the American Indians, only that I am bored of reading about them so much – just like I would be bored of reading any other one subject three hundred times in one semester.