"Mascot"

In chapter two of "The Autobiography of Malcolm X," Malcolm describes his feelings after moving into a foster home with the Swerlin family. Malcolm is separated from all of his siblings, however meets up with his half-sister. "I had become a mascot," he recalls, "our branch of the family was split to pieces; I had just about forgotten about being a Little in any family sense" (35). His statement is a response to his half-sister, Ella's, comment about how they must stick together because they are both Littles. Malcolm feels like a mascot because he does not feel equal to those around him. He feels as if he is a source of observation and almost a pet to the white community he is living in. At school, Malcolm is not treated as equal. When he tells his teacher of his aspiration to become a lawyer, even his well-meaning teacher looks down upon him and lower than the other students. He is no longer united with his family and only serves as a representative or "mascot" for his family in the town he is living in. When he moves, he hopes to succeed more than he would have in Lansing. He hopes to be seen as a higher and more important individual, not simply a mascot. The title of this chapter represents Malcolm's goals of escaping a life of feeling like someone's pet.

Blog #1: A Writer's Responsibilities

While a writer writes for millions of readers, he also writes for himself. He has not only responsibilities to his reader, but to himself as well. Nobel Prize winner Albert Camus said that a writer, "cannot serve today those who make history, he must serve those who are subject to it." He is cited for "illuminating the problems of the human conscience." While I agree that this is part of the writer's duty to others, I think there is more. It is important for writers to depict the problems of our time, however the aspects of modern life that are not problems are important too. I enjoy writing that deals with both an individual's experience and general social issues because I do not think that these topics are so different. With an individual's experiences come the social issues and puzzles of everyday life. The writer's main duty to his readers is to draw emotion from them and make them care, even if what they are caring about is not necessarily a problem. Vonnegut describes how powerful simplistic writing can be and how one sentence can "break the heart of a reader" (21). This supports how important it is to make the reader care.

A writer's duty to himself is to always stay true to his writing style and what his values in writing are. A writer should not write about something for which he does not care. Just as Camus says, a writer cannot serve history, however he can impact the future. A writer's words, however, will have no power if he does not believe in them himself. In order to fulfill his responsibilities to others, a writer must first be sure that he is fulfilling his responsibilities to himself by staying true to himself in his writing. A writer must also stick to his own set of basic rules for writing, what Stephen KIng would consider a writing "toolbox." A writer should write what they know and utilize the tools that they have to be sure that what they write is their own. If a writer cannot be true to themselves in their writing, they cannot be true to their readers and cannot be influential in the future and to "those who are subject to it."