Compare & Contrast Essay
In My First Conk, Malcolm X portrays a story of his first conking experience followed by his inevitable distaste for the habit and the encouragement to stop it. In The Myth of the Latin Woman: I Just Met a Girl Named Maria, Dr. Judith Ortiz Cofer provides some insight on the stereotypes that plague Latina women as well as the reasoning behind it and personal examples that she’s experienced. Malcolm X and Dr. Cofer are both members of minority races who handled their assimilation into the American culture differently.
Aside from being members of minority races, X and Cofer were U.S. citizens that not only tried to fit in with their “white communities”, but eventually discovered their own self assurances and confident …show more content…
For starters, X focuses primarily on a single experience in his life, his first conking (Malcolm X 283), while Cofer’s focus stretches across multiple situations and even background for Latin women (Dr. Cofer 230). In Cofer’s story, she not only provides background information, but relates it to her own personal experiences. In fact, Cofer provides multiple situations of racial profiling that vary from clothing choices, traditions, career status, and even sexist comments/songs towards Latin women (Dr. Cofer 230). On that note, a majority of Cofer’s audience, aside from being Latin, are most likely women and/or feminist, while X leans more towards a male audience. X and Cofer’s stories also take place in different decades, therefore, providing different mindsets in relation to society; My First Conk was written in the early 1960’s and Cofer’s story in the early 1990’s. With that said, their tones and personal viewpoints on their own circumstances are polar opposites. In the beginning of his story, X has almost an excited and amiable tone, but towards the end he quickly changes it to exasperated, resentful, and liberating. In Cofer’s, she has a more oppressed, embarrassed, and even angry tone in the beginning, however, becomes more hopeful and optimistic towards the end. Both stories are actually parts of larger literary works such as X’s The
In My First Conk, Malcolm X portrays a story of his first conking experience followed by his inevitable distaste for the habit and the encouragement to stop it. In The Myth of the Latin Woman: I Just Met a Girl Named Maria, Dr. Judith Ortiz Cofer provides some insight on the stereotypes that plague Latina women as well as the reasoning behind it and personal examples that she’s experienced. Malcolm X and Dr. Cofer are both members of minority races who handled their assimilation into the American culture differently.
Aside from being members of minority races, X and Cofer were U.S. citizens that not only tried to fit in with their “white communities”, but eventually discovered their own self assurances and confident …show more content…
For starters, X focuses primarily on a single experience in his life, his first conking (Malcolm X 283), while Cofer’s focus stretches across multiple situations and even background for Latin women (Dr. Cofer 230). In Cofer’s story, she not only provides background information, but relates it to her own personal experiences. In fact, Cofer provides multiple situations of racial profiling that vary from clothing choices, traditions, career status, and even sexist comments/songs towards Latin women (Dr. Cofer 230). On that note, a majority of Cofer’s audience, aside from being Latin, are most likely women and/or feminist, while X leans more towards a male audience. X and Cofer’s stories also take place in different decades, therefore, providing different mindsets in relation to society; My First Conk was written in the early 1960’s and Cofer’s story in the early 1990’s. With that said, their tones and personal viewpoints on their own circumstances are polar opposites. In the beginning of his story, X has almost an excited and amiable tone, but towards the end he quickly changes it to exasperated, resentful, and liberating. In Cofer’s, she has a more oppressed, embarrassed, and even angry tone in the beginning, however, becomes more hopeful and optimistic towards the end. Both stories are actually parts of larger literary works such as X’s The