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"COMING OF AGE IN MISSISSIPPI" (ANNE MOODY) & "SOLDADOS: CHICANOS IN VIET NAM" (CHARLEY TRUJILLO).
Term Paper ID:25044
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Essay Subject:
Examines how coming-of-age books portray racism of 1950s & Vietnam War, falseness of Amer. Dream.... More...
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6 Pages / 1350 Words
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Paper Abstract:
Examines how coming-of-age books portray racism of 1950s & Vietnam War, falseness of Amer. Dream.
Paper Introduction:
This study will discuss how Anne Moody's Coming of Age in Mississippi and Charley Trujillo's Soldados: Chicanos in Viet Nam affect our understanding of the 1950s and the Vietnam War, respectively. Both books are non-fictional coming-of-age narratives and both involve an awakening of the authors to the lies of the American Dream. Moody experiences the reality of racism in the United States in the 1950s, which were seen by whites as the years of the full realization of that Dream. Trujillo's accounts show the racism of the United States military, which was held up as an example of a fully integrated institution representing the equality symbolized by that Dream.
The latter part of Moody's autobiographical work carries her into the 1960s and the flowering of the civil rights movement, but the part of the book which deals with the 1950s highlights
Text of the Paper:
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This study will discuss how Anne Moody's Coming of Age in Mississippiand Charley Trujillo's Soldados: Chicanos in Viet Nam affect ourunderstanding of the 195 s and the Vietnam War, respectively. . Moody'schildhood in the 195 s gives no sign of the guarded optimism which willcome in the 196 s. trying to get other countries to think of them as good people, when they really didn't belong there in the first place (Trujillo 28, 79). Both books also expose the lie of racial stereotypes,showing that blacks and Chicanos are as good and as capable as whites inpeace and in war. . was the United States . Both give portrayals of racism in the history of the nation, one athome and the other abroad. Amazingly, Trujillo reports that until 1979,Chicanos killed in the war were listed as "white." Chicanos were in factrepresented disproportionately to their numbers in the general population: The adage that the poor make more resolute and compliable soldiers is verified when applied to Chicanos. . Moody makes clear that racism is rampant not only in the South but inthe rest of the nation as well, as this letter from her mother's boy friendtestifies: Los Angeles is a big city. . . Racially, the Vietnam War wasa nightmare rather than an extension of the American Dream. Moody's book is more hopeful than Trujillo's because itdepicts an organized struggle against racism, whereas Trujillo's collectiongives individual and separate accounts of racism in Vietnam. "Ain't gonna have nuthin' left when Mr. Carter take out his share." We had to hear this sermon almost every night and he was always snapping at Mama like it was all her fault (Moody 17). . (Chicanos andblacks, primarily, although also poor whites) over to Vietnam to fightforeign victims of U.S. For example, Mrs. Burke is hardly a saintly woman, but Moodyrealizes that working for her will aid her in transcending racistconditions, despite the fact that Burke herself harbors racist tendencies.Moody has an inner strength which prevents her from surrendering to thedespair of racism and which leads her to make the best of the circumstanceswith which she is presented. I am coming back home. I would have quit had she not. . It was a black guy that picked me up and .. Trujillo's point, however, is not to glorify Chicanos but to showthat in war and peace they are good and bad like all human beings. I am just wasting time out here (Moody 113). However, the lessons learnedby the soldiers in Trujillo's book are far more about American racismtoward its own people. Chicanos were often the easiest and most malleable resource the U.S, had for achieving its quota for combat soldiers (Trujillo 1). In fact, the lesson ofVietnam, supported by Trujillo's book, is that the U.S. . Like Moody,Trujillo also expresses not only rage against that racism and its betrayalof the American Dream, but also the determination to force America to faceits racism and change its attitudes and policies so that they are in linewith that Dream. Her book portrays racism at itsworst, but also exposes the stereotypes upon which racism is based--thatblacks are lazy, that they cannot or should not be educated, that theycannot work together to better themselves. I began to hate people (Moody 125, 129). The first words of Moody's book give the reader the sense of the deepscars which have been inflicted on her by racism: "I'm still haunted bydreams of the time we lived on Mr. Carter's plantation" (11). The book is most useful in illuminating the dark underbellyof the American Dream in the 195 s. Both works by Moody and Trujillo expose the lies of the AmericanDream in its application to blacks in the 195 s and Chicanos in the VietnamWar. In a way, working for her was a challenge for me. . However, the book, even in its portrayal of racism in the 195 s, isnot without hope. Every evening when he came from the field he was terribly depressed. In effect, she takes on racism as if it were apersonal challenge to her determination to be an individual who succeedsagainst the odds: Soon Mrs. Burke decided to let me do things my way. She was the first one of her type I had run into (Moody 117). But jobs are as hard to get out here as they are in Mississippi. What saves Moody from a life of hatred and fear is herintroduction to the organized struggle of blacks and sympathetic whites forracial justice and equality. Both booksare non-fictional coming-of-age narratives and both involve an awakening ofthe authors to the lies of the American Dream. The government--its military, its police, itseducational system, its politics--is the great purveyor of racism in theUnited States. . If Moody did not know by the age of fourteen how much racist violencewas a part of the country, the murder of fourteen-year-old Emmett Till forthe alleged act of whistling at a white woman shocks her from the idealismof literature into the horrors of the real world of America: Before Emmett Till's murder, I had known the fear of hunger, hell and the Devil. The latter part of Moody's autobiographical work carries her into the196 s and the flowering of the civil rights movement, but the part of thebook which deals with the 195 s highlights the oppression which blacksexperienced at a time when whites were enjoying the juiciest fruits of theAmerican Dream. The hunger and poverty of her and her family areexacerbated by the violence which grows from suffering and frustration.Moody is physically abused by her young uncle who cares for her and hersister (Moody 12, 16). . But now there was a new fear known to me--- the fear of being killed just because I was black. . Thegovernment, however, treated them in the war as if they were less thanthose with money or education or white skin. Instead of giving up on theAmerican Dream, Moody fights to force the country to live up to theprinciples upon which that Dream is based. racism. San Jose, CA: Chusma,1996.----------------------- 6 Overcoming racism requires encouragement from others,which Moody receives from Raymond, from her mother, and from theClaibornes. carried me to safety" (Trujillo 1 2). Just as Moody writes in order to portray racism against blacks inAmerica, Trujillo writes to portray racism against Chicanos. . Soldados: Chicanos in Viet Nam. Moody experiences thereality of racism in the United States in the 195 s, which were seen bywhites as the years of the full realization of that Dream. And Negroes don't live as well out here as people at home think. The economic hardships for blacks in the South in the 195 s are alsocreated by racist conditions which force blacks to struggle to merelysurvive, as this passage about Moody's father makes clear: The crop wasn't coming along as he had expected. . Trujillo'saccounts show the racism of the United States military, which was held upas an example of a fully integrated institution representing the equalitysymbolized by that Dream. Trujillo's collection is not idealistic in its descriptions ofChicanos themselves in the war. Moody's struggle to become educated, to find abetter paying job, to enter the struggle of her people as a part of anorganized movement are all demonstrations of the lie of the stereotypesabout blacks that prevailed in the 195 s. government saw Chicanos asa "malleable resource" for the Vietnam War, the South Vietnamese themselveswere seen as mere tools to be used in the Cold War against communism. . . . At the same time, the book hardly gives hope to all blacksunder such racist conditions, for Moody is an extraordinary individual whois determined to take advantage of every educational and spiritualopportunity. In both books, this racism is not only a matterof individual hatred and fear, but is more importantly a matter ofinstitutionalized bias. . . simply exported itsracism abroad, sending the victims of racism in the U.S. Coming of Age in Mississippi. She really had no complaints about my work so she let me be. Such abusive violence is a by-product of racistconditions which create poverty and misery. . New York: Laurel, 1976.Trujillo, Charley. There wasnothing noble about American involvement in Vietnam. Just as the U.S. And I think she knew it. Trujillo also shows how the Vietnam War expressed American racism notonly against minorities in the military but also against the Vietnamese.Americans of all colors are shown to be prejudiced against the Vietnamese,and especially about their inability or unwillingness to fight in a warwhich was far more theirs than the Americans. Works CitedMoody, Anne. If the war itself were worth fighting, and if Chicanos were somehowrecipients of the good the war was supposed to be doing, then perhaps thedisproportionate sacrifice of Chicanos would have made sense to these men.However, as two different Chicano soldiers write: We were brainwashed into thinking that we had a noble cause, which I don't think we had. One soldier writes, for example, that whenhe was wounded, "There were a couple of Chicanos who i thought were myfriends and they didn't help me. Indeed, as history has shown, the United States was in Vietnam as acontinuation of the colonial policies of the French, and as a way ofexpressing its Cold War fear and hatred of all things communist. The Viet Nam War .
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