Reminders for the week:
- Take the google forms quiz on Stranger in the Village (use your text and take your time) Stranger in the Village Quiz
- Respond to ONE of the options of questions below. Write a well-constructed response using examples and referencing the use of language/rhetorical devices (something like a perfect paragraph). Comment on this post with your response. Throughout the week, comment and respond on each other’s posts (you will be given a sort of “participation” grade for these discussions). Tell people what you like about their argument, respond to their argument, expand their arguments… here is an example of another class blog and what that might look like : https://bresslercomp2.weebly.com/discussion-l13/james-baldwin
- Begin reading Act I of Sweet Bird of Youth for next week (google forms quiz will be posted next week)
“Stranger in the Village” Review Questions Directions:
For the question you choose, cite the text to prove your answer and try to identify a literary or rhetorical device employed by Baldwin.
- Describe how Baldwin establishes the “dehumanizing” experience of living as a Black man.
- What do you think the narrator means when he says “people are trapped in history and history is trapped in them”? Do you feel like your history is trapped in you?
- What do you think the narrator means when he says, “there is a great deal of will power involved in… naïveté”?
- Baldwin focuses on some of the illusions that propel America, and details the danger of these illusions. What are some illusions and how are they presented by Baldwin in the essay?
- Describe the paradox of the existence of the Black man in America that Baldwin closes the essay with, in your own words.
In his essay “Stranger in the Village”, James Baldwin expresses his distress at the discrimination he is subjected to, in particular through the dehumanization of black people.
Firstly, the writer describes the prejudices the Swiss had against him that led them to the conclusion that «there was yet no suggestion that he was human» : how can a man with black skin in a country of white people be something other than the devil itself ? Baldwin pays special attention to the astonishment caused by his hair : everyone in the village wants to feel it, making it a risky attraction, being scared that it would harm them or give them an “electric shock”. To insist on his experience as being the center of attention, he describes himself as the metaphor “I was simply a living wonder”.
Then, Baldwin uses a hyperbola “white men are the creators of civilization” to emphasize their power over all ethnicities despite the fact that they all belong to the human species. He states that, since white people discovered Africa and America, it is fair that they own their land and population without it being contested. It is also useful to note that, in that period of colonization which Baldwin makes reference to, white people considered Africans and Native Americans as “uncivilized” and therefore from that point of view can indeed be considered as the creators of civilization since they converted them successfully to their culture. Nevertheless having pushed black people on the same cultural level still did not keep white people away from the idea that “to accept the black man as one of themselves […] was to jeopardize their status as white men”.
Finally, James Baldwin expresses his need as well as the need of all black men to “establish an identity”, which is essential in a world where even the most important of them is barely recognized as a human being. He realizes that white people cannot be strangers anywhere as they are the one who created all civilizations; but black people, as equal and as important they can ethically be, are still considered to be intruders. Going further into dehumanization, the writer compares the “Negro-in-America” to an “insanity which overtakes white men” : this statement turns black men into a danger, almost a threatening disease, and still denies their status as human beings.
In conclusion, this essay shows how difficult it was to live as a black person in a century where white people’s common knowledge was mainly made of prejudices.
Hey, Ornella I really like the way you wrote your paragraph, the examples are great and well placed. The only problem I could note is that your sentences are sometimes too long and too charged. You could make the them more shorter. Other than that Good job!👌
Thanks that was helpful ☺️ I’ll try to make my sentences shorter next time !
Hey,
I love your perfect paragraph! You really showed how hard it was for black people to live in those times. You chose great examples and then spoke about them well. However, I have to say I agree with Debora; your phrases are to long, even with the punctuation, it drags it out a bit to much.
Thanks, same as Debora I’ll try to make my sentences shorter 😊
couple of gramatical notes:
1)”To insist on his experience as being the center of attention, he describes himself as the metaphor “I was simply a living wonder”.” he describes himself through (or with) the metaphor…
2)”Baldwin uses a hyperbola”—> thats probably a typo but it’s a hyperbole.
however that being said, i like your first and last paragraph, but at the end of the second one: “Nevertheless having pushed black people on the same cultural level still did not keep white people away from the idea that “to accept the black man as one of themselves […] was to jeopardize their status as white men”.” aren’t you just adding a quote that you don’t actually explain?
Thanks for your remarks, I can’t wait to read your perfect paragraph as well 😉
Daniela NUNEZ
In the essay ”Stranger in the village” by James Baldwin, the author uses white men’s attitude and reactions towards black men to establish the ”dehumanizing” experience of living as a Black man. For example when Baldwin exposes the fact that the routine ”smile-and-the world-smiles-with-you” is useless in his situation. He explains that ”they did not, really, see my smile and I began to think that, should I take to snarling, no one would notice any difference.” In the first part of the example the reader can notices that the author uses denial, the perception verb “see” and a Friendly verb “smile” to remark the fact that ”they did not […], see [his] smile”. The fact that he smiled but they did not see that his smile was a friendly gesture suggests that from white men’s point of view he was just showing his teeth. If the reader thinks thoroughly, in the animal world most animals show their teeth to demonstrate that they have weapons and they are willing to use them, that we should be scared. The reader can deduce that him smiling is a synonym of a warning that he is making in order to scare them and make them maintain a distance. If white men think in this way the reader can affirm that they are dehumanising him by comparing him to an animal. In the second part of the quote, the author employs an opposite verb to “smile”, ”snarl”, therefore an antithesis; he also uses denial and another verb of perception “notice”. Again, Baldwin employs these devices to remark the fact that the principal character is dehumanised since he is being compared to an animal. Even if he was being amicable by smiling, the white men, from the begging, always thought him as an exotic animal, so even if he started “snarling, no one would notice any difference”, and every white men’s reaction will remain the same. Another example is when the principal character starts giving examples of how some people treat him and in one of his examples he describes the disrespectful attitude of some men, but only men not women, by saying “there is already in the eyes of some of them that peculiar, intent, paranoia malevolence which one sometimes surprises in the eyes of American white men when, out walking with their Sunday girl, they see a Negro male approach”. This quote uses repetition of “eyes” and a term that shows hostility, “paranoia malevolence”, to reflect these men’s hostility towards him. The author uses also an animal term, “male”, to demonstrate that these men see the principal character as a animal.
wow Daniela, your paragraph pretty amazing!! the only thing you could add might be a little conclusion at the end of your paragraph just to summarize up all the ideas you pointed out:)
I really like your paragraph, especially the part with denial 😄 However I feel like there are a lot of examples (which is great) but few explanation for each of them so maybe you should develop more ? Otherwise it’s perfect 😊
Question 5:
In his essay ‘A Stranger in the Village’, James Baldwin closes the discussion with a paradox: he describes the paradox of the existence of the Black man in America in the last three paragraphs. In the third to last paragraph, Baldwin, describes the battle, “a battle by no means finished”, between white men and Black men, a battle for identity; its protection on one side and its establishment on another. However, the author states that that battle has been won a long time ago by Black men, despite the cruelty they have endured and will continue to endure. “His survival depended, and his development depends, on his ability to turn his peculiar status in the Western world to his own advantage and, it may be, to the very great advantage of that world. It remains for him to fashion out of his experience that which will give him sustenance, and a voice.” The Black Man is now American, not a visitor but an American citizen. The Black Man’s terrible relationship with the White Man is a paradox on its own: the pain inflicted for centuries is beyond imaginable in the White Man’s mind, never mind the American White Man, who is the most involved in the Black Man’s fate. However terrible the white has treated the black, both depend on the other. One depends on the other to keep his status superior while the other depends on one to develop and grow. James Baldwin continues his essay by saying that the history of the Black Man “is not merely shameful, it is also something of an achievement”. All the hardships they have come upon and survived have given them a voice strong enough that “This world is white no longer, and it will never be white again.”
Sorry if this isn’t my best work, writing without a hardcopy is more difficult than i thought :/
I think that in your esay you go straigh to the essential, and it’s very good. Maybe you could put an example from the essay when you talk about the white population needing the black people to keep their status.
Good job Lana, might need more quotes from the text tho
What do you think the narrator means when he says “people are trapped in history and history is trapped in them”? Do you feel like your history is trapped in you?
In the essay “Stranger in the village”, by James Baldwin, the author uses the opposition of the colors and the inhabitant’s ignorance to show how even after century black people are still considered as animals and less than human being by the white population.
For example when the author says “there are black men in the world, but no black men can hope ever to be entirely liberated from this internal warfare-rage, dissembling, and contempt having inevitably accompanied his first realization of the power of white men.” In this quote we can observe the opposition of the “black men” and the “white men” which show the white community in power on the contrary of the black community which is left with an “internal warfare-rage” and this clearly show that the black population still blames the white one for the discrimination put on them century ago and wich are still going on. This passage show that both side are still trapped on the history, by two different ways, the black community are still enraged by what the white population did to their ancestor and on the other hand the white people still have in their heads the same vision of their predecessor on black people. And this is a situation which resume perfectly the phrase ‘ people are trapped in history and history is trapped in them’. An other example is when it says “it’s one of the ironies of black-white relations that, by means of what the white man imagine the black man to be, the black man is enabled to know who the white man is.” In this quote, we clearly see the opposition between white and black man, by the color but also by the fact that white people can “imagine what black man can be” on the contrary of the black man that are “enable” to do it. This create more tension between the two populations which add more to the ones already built between the two communities based on their history. And this show that a lot oftroubles in the black-white relations are based of prejudices from the history of their ancestor relations. Finally, when the children meet James Baldwin for the first time “gingerly put his fingers on my hair, as though he were afraid of an electric shock, or put his hand on my hand, astonished that the color did not rub off.” In this quote the use of diction of surprise/fear as “gingerly”, “afraid” and “astonished”, show that the villagers are not use to see people of color, and it show the igorance or the will to forget this population to feel less guilty about what their ancestors did to them. And this illustrate this vision of people trapped in history and history trapped in them, because at this period people were defined and defined the other by the story and their ancestor’s life they had knowledge on.
I think that in our time, people are not judging through the history of the differents poulations, because the world’s mentality changed, even if some people still treat the other ones because they were treated like this in the past. But i think our history still shape us, because every experiences that we lived in the past and every single lesson of life we learn defined our action and create our mentality for the future.
Nothing to add, clearly a good argumentation ! I am just wondering what you would say if you were taking the opposite side “history doesn’t shape us, we are free from history”
In his essay ‘Stranger in the village’, James Baldwin establishes the dehumanizing of living as a black man by using white people’s attitude towards black people.
Firstly, the writer describes the villagers’ attitude toward his physical characteristics, especially his hair. They thought that his hair had ‘the color of tar, that it had the texture of wire, or the texture of cotton’. It is interesting that the villagers consider that his hair texture is similar to cotton because cotton is what slaves use to farm in plantation in the Southern United States. Additionally, they are scared of his hair, afraid that it could give them an ‘electric shock’. His skin color is also a source of curiosity for the villagers as Baldwin writes ‘astonished that the color did not rub off’. The author even compare himself to ‘a living wonder’, intensifying the dehumanizing conditions he’s living in.
Then, the author establishes a comparison between the way black men and white men perceive the first time they see each other. He demonstrates how a white man discovering a black man for the first time will feel the need ‘to conquer and to convert’ and will immediately consider himself superior. Baldwin insists on the idea of white people feeling superior towards black people by writing ‘whose inferiority in relation to himself is not even to be questioned’. Thus, it seems like it is a logical way of thinking for the white man and that the opposite is not even conceivable. Whereas a black man discovering a white man for the first time will find himself ‘among a people whose culture controls me, has even in a sense, created me’. This amplify the dehumanization of black men, illustrating how they lost their identity and their own culture.
Finally, Baldwin demonstrates the fear white people experience against black people. For instance, he uses the metaphor ‘the devil is as black man’ which seems to bear out how white people can be frightened of black people. The writher explains that it is what has been taught to children, making them scream when Baldwin approaches. Furthermore, he writes about the gaze that the villagers give him describing it as a ‘peculiar, intent, paranoiac malevolence’ look. Baldwin continues by writing about how American white men have the same look when they are ‘out walking with their Sunday girl, they see a Negro male approach’. This fear of black people, even in his own country, shows how they are permanently dehumanize, aren’t considered as human beings and that even their own country doesn’t trust them.
Very good answer ! I just would have specified that it’s more white adults who see black people like this, children are freed from racial judgment until an adult tells them “that the devil is a black man .” But you proved your point anyway !
It is very clear in that essay that children have a kind of purity, when they were told by adults that the devil is a black man, they believe it and run away when the narrator is on their way. However curious and careless children approach the narrator as if he is a new friend to make. I would relate this to The Handmaid’s Tale, because, in the following quote, we can see the importance of history and heritage :”You are a transitional generation, said Aunt Lydia. It is the hard-est for you. We
know the sacrifices you are being expected to make. It is hard when men revile
you. For the ones who conic after you, it will be easier. They will accept their
duties with willing hearts.
She did not say: Because they will have no memories, of any other way.
She said: Because they won’t want things they can’t have.” This proves how adults/society forge the mind of children and erase their innocence
This isn’t the answer to the question I have chosen ! Just a thought on the essay
1. Describe how Baldwin establishes the “dehumanizing “experience of living as a Black man.
In his essay, “Stranger in the Village”, James Baldwin describes the strange and disrespectful behavior of the “Whites” towards the “Blacks” and uses powerful terms to show the dehumanization of the latter.
Firstly, the author shows us that the White population perceives him as an animal in a zoo. He describes himself as a “sight for the villagers” and this “sight” is always passed by with a “wind … of astonishment, curiosity, amusement and outrage”. This animalization is reinforced by the use of the name “Neger! Neger!” shouted by children to call him instead of calling him by his real name. By not calling him by his real name, the population associates him with a wild animal. This is reinforced by the comparison of his smile to a “snarl” which won’t make a change to the population. The wildness is reinforced by the description of his features made by the Whites: “hair was the color of tar […] texture of wire, or the texture of cotton”. This description dehumanizes him completely.
Secondly, the identity of the Blacks is taken away. For the Whites, “black men come from Africa”. By making this stereotype they kind of associate them to a category not even letting them talk about their nationality. Indeed, the latter are considered as objects without past present and future that they can buy” African natives for the purpose of converting them to Christianity”. By saying so, the Whites think that they have power over the past and the future of African natives and by doing so they take away their identity. The narrator even says that the White population’s “culture controls [him]”. This shows that the White people takes away the identity of the Blacks without even letting them the choice.
Thirdly, the Black man is compared to the devil: “the devil is a black man”. By teaching the children so, the White man completely dehumanize the Black man. This is the last stage of dehumanization. By comparing the Black man to the devil, the White man compare himself to an angel and both of them can’t be mix up. The devil is something that is horrific, scared of all, ugly, impure and hated. The White man associate these features to the Black man which leave him without a saying. In the essay, the narrator shows the dehumanization of the Blacks by the Whites by not introducing a single compliment to the latter.
To conclude, the Black men are dehumanized by the White population and are considered as strangers in their own country. Their identity are also taken away from them leaving them with nothing other than the White culture.
Describe how Baldwin establishes the “dehumanizing” experience of living as a Black man.
In the essay, “Stranger in the village”, James Baldwin shows the troubles and hard moments, of a black man in society, by dehumanizing the experience of living as a black man. Indeed the author uses numerous devices, such as Hyperboles, repetition and similes to show how badly a black man can be treated as an alien on his own planet.
Firstly the author shows this through the fact that he was never called by his own name, despite living in that village for over a year. Indeed he always seemed to be seen as some kind of zoo attraction who’s only here to entertain and amaze. This can be especially be seen at the beginning of the story when the author describes the reaction he gets from villagers when he walks through the village by using enumeration: “a wind passed with me-of astonishment, curiosity, amusement, and outrage”. This idea is furthermore pushed into, when he talks about the children not calling him by his name but by his skin color especially using a pejorative term as we see in the repetition: “Neger! Neger”. This also goes into proving how lowly he’s considered to these people and how badly he’s seen as an animal/alien whose name is worthy learning.
Secondly the author demonstrates the dehumization of the black man in most societies in general by using the image of the white man in his particular situation, being the only person of a specific race to come into a village with people who could be described as different. Indeed Baldwin describes the event of white man coming into an African Village as a moment of astonishment for the former as some kind of happy and astonishing moment as he would welcomed like some sort of king put above all others, as we see in the simile: “The white man takes the astonishment as tribute ”. Indeed the white is from the beginning put on higher scale as the black as he sees himself as a person who knows more and who has come to bless the “inferiors” with his knowledge of life. This is particularly emphasized by the use of the term “inferiority” to describe the situation of the “natives”: “to convert the natives whose inferiority in relation to himself is not even to be questioned”. The particular use of the expression “is not even to be questioned” shows again how lowly the black man is perceived and how is inferiority should not even be something that should be doubted because it surely exists. Furthermore, Baldwin opposes the white man’s situation to the black man’s who is seen as something less, like an unknown animal whose identity depended on the white man and the cruel things he had to go through to get to where he is now as seen : “ find myself among people whose culture controls me, has even, in a sense, created me, people who have cost me more in anguish and rage than they will ever know, who yet do not even know of my existence”. This last sentence could be linked to some way as animal cruelty today, as the black man treated like an animal is constantly attacked, hurt, and then forgotten the next day.
Thirdly, the description of the carnival done by the village every year also shows how badly the Black man is seen as anything but a human being. Indeed the carnival, which consists of children disguising themselves as Black people shows how much the Black man is seen as some sort of entertainment to them whom they can disguise themselves as for fun as seen in the highly detailed description consisting on devices such as similes: “two village children have their face blackened out of which bloodless darkness their blue eyes shine like ice- and fantastic horsehair wigs are placed on their blond heads”. Furthermore the author describes how the villager collect money to buy African people to convert them: “The IJ village “bought” last year six or eight African natives”. The use of the term bought comes to show that the black is also looked at as some kind of exotic, unknown charity case which can be bought at a specific price in order to be saved. This last information also comes to show that the Black man is seen as creature who cannot care for himself and who needs help in order to be saved just like an animal whose bought to a zoo in order to be taken care of.
In conclusion the author uses multiple was to dehumanize the black man but the examples that particularly stand out are the blackface event in the carnivals, the paradox between a white man coming into an African village and a black man going into a European village and finally the fact that the author was always seen as some sort of animal. This comes to show how badly the black man was treated at time and how much he was as anything but a human being who could care himself. However today a lot of things as changed and this seems to be an event which becomes rarer everyday.
Question: Describe how Baldwin establishes the “dehumanizing” experience of living as a black man.
In Stranger in the Village by Baldwin, the narrator is a black man and he tells his story and what he lived when he arrived in a new village. Because he was a black man people looked at him differently, he was, in a way, dehumanized by how white people looked at him. He also explains that black and white men are not equal and probably never will be.
“no black man had ever set foot in this tiny Swiss village before I came. I was told before arriving that I would probably be a “sight” for the village” even before arriving he knew that because he was a black man he would be looked at differently than if he were a white man. “Everyone in the village knows my name, though they scarcely ever use it, knows that I come from America though, this, apparently, they will never really believe: black men come from Africa-and everyone knows that I am the friend of the son of a woman who was born here, and that I am staying in their chalet. But I remain as much a stranger today as I was the first day I arrived, and the children shout Neger! Neger! as I walk along the streets” there is this cliché of black people coming from Africa and nowhere else here, people know his name but don’t use it, children only yell “neger” as if they were in a zoo and saw an elephant they would shout elephant but not its name even if it had one, they would only identify it as a “special” and different specie then themselves and only consider the elephant as an elephant but not as a living being, here it is the same with this black man even though he is also human, white people don’t consider him as a human like themselves but as a different and inferior specie. “there was yet no suggestion that I was human: I was simply a living wonder” people just looked at him like this special creature they don’t see often. “There are, no doubt, as many ways of coping with the resulting complex of tensions as there are black men in the world, but no black man can hope ever to be entirely liberated from this internal warfare-rage, dissembling, and contempt having inevitably accompanied his first realization of the power of white men. What is crucial here is that since white men represent in the black man’s world so heavy a weight, white men have for black men a reality which is far from being reciprocal” How white men act about black man hurt and enrage them, it is very hard for them and the worse is keeping that inside so they don’t prove that white men are right about being afraid of them. They can only live with it and try to go by. “The black man insists, by whatever means he finds at his disposal, that the white man cease to regard him as an exotic rarity and recognize him as a human being.” “other children, having been taught that the devil is a black man, scream in genuine anguish as I approach.” People, children, are taught to be afraid of black man just because they look different they don’t bother trying to know if it is true, if they should really be scared, they just live with what they are taught and black men can’t really do anything about that except proving them wrong by being nice and maybe with the time some people would finally see. “But some of the men have accused le sale negre-behind my back-of stealing wood and there is already in the eyes of some of them that peculiar, intent, paranoiac malevolence which one sometimes surprises in the eyes of American white men when, out walking with their Sunday girl, they see a Negro male approach.” When people see him approaching they notice him as if it was an animal and not a normal, other, living human being. “they decided that these black men were not really men but cattle.” They were seen as animals, unusual and dangerous ones that would speak and walk as human beings but would not be one. All of that just because they don’t look exactly the same as most people in most countries, just because their skin is darker and their hair curlier. All of that pain is caused to those human beings because they are not considered as human beings but the majority, because white men thought they were superior than dark skinned human beings.
Maxine Coelho
*Describe the paradox of the existence of the Black man in America that Baldwin closes the essay with, in your own words.
In James Baldwin’s essay, “Stranger in the Village”, Baldwin describes the existence of the black man in America as a paradox. To illustrate how Baldwin does not properly understand why black people are put down and ashamed fro their skin colour.
Do begin with, a definition is needed of paradox to truly understand Baldwin’s technique. In everyday language, a paradox is a concept that seems absurd or contradictory, yet is true. Which would mean that Baldwin believes that the black man is seen as something of absurd and contradictory to the normal American image. It can make some wonder if Baldwin himself believes in this, but when you study his essay you realise that he does not strip the black man of his pride on the contrary, he indicates many times throughout his essay how he is proud of his people. For example, in the first paragraph Baldwin speaks of people never having seen a “Negro”. Baldwin’s pride is shown it the capital “n”, he believes that his people, negros are indeed worthy of a capital letter, it gives an importance to his people. It can be seen again in the third paragraph, where the writer explains how he was being insulted, “the children shout Neger! Neger!”, even though he is being insulted and stripped out respect by the children in his town he still puts capital “n”s to the insults, almost as if he takes pride in this. As if he would much rather be seen and insulted about his origine then to be ignored and never looked at. The insults can also show how absurd it is that he is being targeted for his skin colour but also shows us how real it is by describing these lonely moments he went through.
Secondly, Baldwin does a paradox of the black man in America by showing how they looked at him, how they observed him. For example, “a wind passed with me-of astonishment, curiosity, amusement and outrage”, Baldwin uses a metaphor instead of actually speaking of the villagers, he illustrates them as a wind that follows with. This shows how Baldwin felt the absurdity of it all, the way he speaks of the villages being a wind that follows him, it shows how he thinks that him being there is absurd because the villagers watch him but also how it is real because he feels like a wind that blows over him, he feels their stares and feelings toward him to well.
In conclusion, Baldwin shows us through métaphores and capital letters that it may feel absurd for him to be the Black man in America but it is definitly real, not a dream and that he will take pride in it, even if it hurts him.