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FINAL PAPER As we learned in class, James Baldwin was multifaceted, a complicated individual who grew up in a culture that treated him as being less than human because a) he was black and b) he was gay. We could see, by reading that passage from “Notes of a Native Son,” and watching the film, “I Am Not Your Negro. Write a three to four page term paper, using MLA style about James Baldwin. For this paper, I expect you to study and cite at least three sources — either journalists or academic writers — who have written about Baldwin. Here is the thesis I want you to pursue in this term paper: “James Baldwin was a key voice from the Civil Rights era who spoke out against the racist attitudes in the United States toward black people. Yet today, the average American who recognizes the names of black leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X might be utterly unaware of James Baldwin. The literary record, however, is filled with journalists and scholars who have studies him as a person and a writer. In this paper I will discuss the perspectives of three of those writers.” Now, the three writers you use is up to you. If you are interested in his Paris years – what he wrote, what he did, who he knew in those days – you will probably find three writers who focused in on him during that time period. If you are interested in what he wrote about being gay, you will likely find writers who studied that part of him. If you are interested in his perspective on being a black man in a racist environment, hell, yes you will find plenty of material. If you are interesting in religion in Baldwin, that is a possibility. Finally, you could also choose three writers who looked at him through three different lenses. I think, if I were doing this paper, I’d choose that because it would interest me. You, too, should choose an aspect of this very complicated man that interests you. And bear in mind, some writers are better than others.

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