"Learning to Read" - MALCOLM X

Malcolm X is a man of great importance especially when it comes to African American Civil Rights. He became a disciple of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, Founder of the Nation of Islam. Upon is arrival to greatness, I found it very interesting that while he was in prison, he always found a way to learn. He always found away to educate himself and accesses his own literacies whether it be in a library, a dictionary, or a tablet. His determination was quite extraordinary, because I felt it was like no other. He was able to/wanted to write over a million words just for the love of reading and learning.

When MALCOLM X stressed the fact that history had been "whitened" and that the black man had been left out and forgotten, it honestly started to make me think. It started to make me angry that, yes some school do forget about the process of Civil Rights. The idea in which slaves were put in great agony for the white man. As a student in school I always loved to hear about my heritage and my culture, being part of the African American society. So when I hear such things as schools not participating in teaching their students the history of the Negro, it angers me. Why not teach the kids of today all the heritages of the world?

"The American black man is the world's most shameful case of minority oppression.

What makes the black man think of himself as only an internal United States

issue is just a catch-phrase, two words, "civil rights." How is the black man going to get "civil rights" before first he wins his human rights?"

- Malcolm X

Being a woman of color I look upon all the aspects of what "civil rights" is compared to the idea of "human rights". Does civil rights only pertain to African Americans or people of all culture? These are the questions that run through my head as I read this excerpt.

MALCOLM X expresses the idea of how he was able to learn a great deal more while being in a prion rather than he was in college. His curiosity for education was furthermore enabled by his passion for reading and studying. His access to literacy was a strange one compared to other but in the end he was intensely recognized as a man of great teachings, philosophy, and black equality.