Racism - Huckleberry finn
...Ernest Hemingway called this the starting point of “all American literature.” At a forum this year by The Mark Twain House, a publisher Lewis Lapham said “You can’t judge history by the light of today. You have to understand what was going on in 1867.” Then Twain House executive director John Boyer said “Twain’s stock is irony. Like any complex idea, if you don’t get it, you’ll never appreciate the punch line.” The author of The Jim Dilemma: Reading Race in Huckleberry Finn, Jocelyn Chadwick-Joshua argues that Twain’s novel, in the tradition of all great literature, is invaluable for transporting readers to a time, place, and conflict primary to understanding who we are today. Without this work, a he argues, there would be a hole in American History and a blank page in the history of African Americans. She also shows how Twain has created not another Uncle Tom but a worthy man of honesty and independence. Jim and other black characters in this book demands a re-envisioning of the southern slave. This novel, she states, ultimately questions readers’ thought of what freedom means and what it costs. Racism is an apparent connection to today’s society. In this novel there are over two-hundred times the word “nigger” was used. In one scene Aunt Sally hears a steamboat explosion. “Good gracious! anybody hurt?” she asks. ‘No’m,” comes the answer. “Killed a nigger.” Aunt Sally later refers to the “nigger” as if they are not even a person, regarding death as if it did not even matter. Mark Twain is using casual dialogue ironically, as a way to underscore the chilling truth about the old south, to drive the point the lady continues. Then she said “Well, it’s lucky because sometimes people do get hurt.” I do agree there a lot of racist sounding phrases, but it’s there for a an...