Malcom X
Having read Malcom X for a class last year, I can appreciate this article. I think the whole concept of education is very interesting, especially since most of us never really consider our literacy. I can’t even imagine what my life would be like without reading and writing; our worlds revolve around these things. Amazingly enough, when Malcom was locked away in prison, he felt the most free. Having the ability to teach himself, and then utilize the knowledge, set him free of frustration, embarrassment and struggles relating to his illiterate function in society.
The other topic that interested me was his discussion of our history. His claims are powerful, but I disagree with what he believes. History is socially constructed, meaning that the leaders in society, at the time, record the facts. Therefore, there will always be some bias, opinion or falsehoods. However, I do not think history is recorded manipulatively or with an agenda to prevent black people from knowing their backgrounds.
Finally, I especially enjoyed what Malcom said about colleges. “I imagine that one of the biggest troubles with colleges is there are too many distractions, too much panty-raiding, fraternities and boola-boola and all of that,” he said. In some ways, he is right; the distractions that surround us prevent us from becoming immersed in education. But, do we really want to be immersed in education?
The other topic that interested me was his discussion of our history. His claims are powerful, but I disagree with what he believes. History is socially constructed, meaning that the leaders in society, at the time, record the facts. Therefore, there will always be some bias, opinion or falsehoods. However, I do not think history is recorded manipulatively or with an agenda to prevent black people from knowing their backgrounds.
Finally, I especially enjoyed what Malcom said about colleges. “I imagine that one of the biggest troubles with colleges is there are too many distractions, too much panty-raiding, fraternities and boola-boola and all of that,” he said. In some ways, he is right; the distractions that surround us prevent us from becoming immersed in education. But, do we really want to be immersed in education?
posted by Courtney at 5:26 AM
13 Comments:
I think that education was something different in the time of Malcom X's. Today it is what you do, you go to school to achieve some standard and then you move on. Education is not always perfectly connected to school. This is something that I have taken from the article for sure. The whole distractions thing that he talked about at college, dead on. Why wouldn't an enviroment like a college campus breed distractions. There is no place like a college campus, and without a doubt there are better palces to learn. I think colleges could have been brought together like this simply because of its amazing convienience, the amount of book knowledge that is on this campus is overwelming. So if you can avaoid the distractions, lock yourself in Alden like Malcom X did jail, then maybe you will be given the opportunity to be as inlightened as Malcom X was becuase of his punishment for robbery.
I thought that out all the articles that we've read this quarter, this one was the most interesting. It's incredible how Malcom X was able to literally teach himself everything he knows. I can't even imagine having to sit down and write out an entire dictionary... or heck, even find enjoyment in sitting by myself in a cramped jail cell. Either way, Malcom X was an an inspriation to many and his teachings can help those who aren't as fortuante as the well educated.
I found this article to be one of the most interesting we've read for the class. I didn't really know anything about Malcolm X, except that he was a Muslim, and didn't like the white population.
I had no idea he was illiterate, and the one of his fellow prison inmates made him want to learn. I don't know how anyone could have the patience to copy down an entire dictionary, but he did and that was what taught him to read. From there he pretty much devoured every book he could find in the prison library. He later said he was always reading on planes and things of that nature. He said you would never find him with a free fifteen minutes when he wasn't reading about how to help the black man. It's amazing how a prison sentence can change someone so much for the better.
In my history class we are learning about Islam. Malcom spoke about his hajj, which is the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia. He said it was amazing to see everyone in white clothing, and no one cared about race or job status. I love the fact that people are willing to change
I enjoyed reading this article and found it very interesting. The face that he learned so much about reading and writing while in jail astonishes me. It also is amazing that he completely changed his life around in jail. Most people would just wait around until they got out of prison, but Malcom X made something of his life in there and learned. Once he got out of prison he became a very successful leader, and prominent figure in our society. I do not agree with a lot of his opinions or thoughts, but I do think he was a very influential person that got people to think about several different issues.
First off I would like to say that i was really amazed at how he spent his time in prison and improved his life. There are some distractions at college, but i think this is for the better. If we had to give all of our time to studying kids would go insane. I think a big part of college is also the social skills you learn, that you wouldn't learn if you spent all of your time studying.
I agree with what Courtney said: I can't imagine what my life would be like if I couldn't read or write. I can't imagine always feeling embarassed or stupid because I didn't understand the language.
Spending so much time just copying the dictionary seems so boring to me. But Malcolm enjoyed it because it was the only way for him to pass time, and to further his education.
The part I find interesting is how motivated Malcom X is to get an education. I think that we sometimes do not realize the opportunities we have here at school, because we are forced to complete our assignments. Like Courtney stated in the post, we have a lot of distractions while we are here and we're never fully concentrated on our education.
One that I have learned through volunteering at physical therapy clinics is that motivation is everything. The individuals who are most motivated will improve the most in a shorter amount of time. Now if we could all just find our motivation to perform better here at school, we could all find ourselves in better academic position.
This article was not too bad. I like the fact that someone in prison actually took the initiative to learn. I could see how he could be very bored while in prison during the era. Unlike now where they have tvs, "recess", work release and etc. The history of this article did not interest me that much.
I see Malcolm's point about being able to truly learn when he was in prison. I have said to myself many times if I were to go to prison, I would occupy my time with two activities: weight lifting and reading. What else do you have to do? You need something to keep your mind off the fact that you are in an eight by ten cell. I can imagine that jail would be an ideal environment in which to learn. In college, there are so many distractions to deal with. I don't know if, as Malcolm says, there can be too much panty-raiding but there is certainly too much boola boola. As far as history goes and how it is recorded, I do think certain things are recorded in a way that is meant to rob peoples of their heritage. It would be an easy way to opress people and make them believe they were never anything. If not for word of mouth, false history telling would be more prevalent.
The Malcolm X article was pretty inspiring to be able to reach a different level of education. In school many are normally pushed by teachers and parents. However, Malcolm X pushed himself becuase he wanted to better his race. The concept of education was completely turned around becuase he was able to teach himself how to read, extend his vocabulary and learn history all on his own through reading in jail. I do agree with the comment he made that in college we have many distractions, however I don't think anyone would be able to be as disciplined in education as Malcolm X, at least in this generation.
This article was interesting because I know that I spend a ton of time studying and for him to read and learn what he learned in that time is amazing. I think though that not only does school bring you an education in books and papers, but it brings you social structure. When he refers to prison being easier because college has distractions, I think that is how we learn new societal issues by getting distracted.
This was a very interesting article. It is is extremely ironic that it was not until he went to prison that he felt free. I admire his ability and motivation to educate himself. However, I do not necessarily think that colleges are a bad learning environment. The college experience serves not only to teach things about books, but also to teach things about life. There are always distractions in the real world and without certain distractions at the college level, we would not be able to succeed in the real world.
It was very interesting that someone can learn so much about language just from simply copying the dictionary. Malcom X was in prison so really didn't have much to do other than learn language which ended up being very beneficial to him in helping the "black man." This in a way shows how much we take our education for granted in the early years where we do learn the simple things that Malcom X learned in prison.
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