English 5-6 H Period 4
January 27, 2014
Audience:
Purpose:
Throughout history african Americans have been a race that has suffer a lot. African americans for a long time were treated as animals. People thought they were aliens meaning non human beings . They were slaves for many wealthy people in Europe and in the U.S. Also they had to fight for their rights as well, so they would be able to vote and not be discriminated. That is why Billie Holiday explains in her song that african americans were tortured , people were racist and cruel to them.
The south of the U.S was were many African americans were slaves and were tortured. In the song strange fruit, Billie Holiday mentions ”Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze” which Indicates hows bodies hung from something. In this case it could be a tree, in the southern breeze which is the south were as mention before is where slavery and racism took place. “ The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth’’ is a symbol of when they were hung they would slowly stop breathing. As a result their whole face would swell and their eyes would pop out, the jaws would break, after their necks had been stretched out after being hung for so long. Besides being hung, burning bodies was also very common. For instance, Billie holiday also states how “ the sudden smell of burning flesh” was a another way to torture and when a body burns it is a slow and painful death. to sum up death is not as painful when everyday of your life you have to live upon other people being racist to you.
“ Here is a Strange and bitter crop ‘’ Reveals that people ( white men) saw african americans as weird human beings that were a bad product to society. In consequence of that they turned them into slaves and treated them as animals. “ For the tree to drop “ is a great symbol that connects with the last quote . when something is bitter it is sour, acidic and most of the time it has an unpleasant taste. In this case...