Homework Assignment 3:  Reading Black Boy as a Historical Document

For the first essay, you will be asked to make a historical argument regarding a theme in Richard Wright's Black Boy. In this assignment, you will concentrate on tracing a particular theme in Black Boy and coming to conclusions about the historical significance of that theme and of Wright's book.

To learn more about how to form historical arguments based on primary documents, read Benjamin, pages 19-36, and the handouts "Preliminary Guidelines for Reading Primary Sources" and "Use Sources to Make Inferences." 

After you have done the above reading, review chapters 11-20 of Black Boy.  Identify five to six passages that articulate one of the following themes:

• the migrant's experience of grinding poverty and unemployment
• the disorientation and isolation of new arrivals in the urban metropolis
• the recognition of the possibility and promise of political mobilization and collective action.

After you have noted and explained the significance of your passages, write a paragraph that describes how Wright successfully or unsuccessfully uses the theme to demonstrate the representative nature of the African American migrant experience. In other words, how does Wright use the theme to argue that the African American migrant experience represents the larger social and historical realities of Depression-era America?  You may draw on Polenberg and Leffler in your discussion.

Bring your homework to class on Wednesday, January 12.