How Did Malcolm X View Education? Term Paper

Open, View, and/or
Download this Document

Total Length: 1026 words ( 3 double-spaced pages)

Total Sources: 1

Page 1 of 3

Malcolm X's ideas about education in America and its function in society. Malcolm X was self-educated, and he gained that education while he was serving time for robbery in prison. He believes this education helped turn his life around and give him the opportunity to change his life and create a passion for black rights and individual rights. Education changed Malcolm X as a person, and he believes that anyone can change his or her life through education.

This essay illustrates that education does not have to come from an institution of higher learning, as long as it is serious and taken seriously. It also shows how a good education can make a real difference in a person's life. Malcolm X learned to really read and comprehend what he was reading, while he was in prison and it changed the course of his life. He says, "I have often reflected upon the new vistas that reading opened to me. I knew right there in prison that reading had changed forever the course of my life" (Malcolm X 217). It changed the course of his life because he began to read history, and he began to realize how unfairly most history books treated blacks and other minorities.

Malcolm X's essay is a discourse on education in America, and how it lets many young people down. He left school at the eighth grade, and could not read or write well at all. He says, "I was lucky enough to reason also that I should try to improve my penmanship.

Stuck Writing Your "How Did Malcolm X View Education?" Term Paper?

View All Our Example How Did Malcolm X View Education? Term Paper

Have A Custom Example Essay Written

It was sad. I couldn't even write in a straight line (Malcolm X 211). This shows the sad state of education in the country, especially in poor communities, and how little opportunity many of these young people have to improve themselves when they get out into the "real" world. Malcolm X got along as a hustler and a thief, which is about the only thing his lack of education prepared him for in the adult world.

Malcolm X sees the primary function of education in society as one that primarily serves the white residents of the nation, while essentially ignoring the blacks, and he set out to illustrate this and change it. He writes, "My homemade education gave me, with every additional book that I read, a bit more sensitivity to the deafness, dumbness, and blindness that was afflicting the black race in America" (Malcolm X 217). He does not believe that should be the primary function of education, but that is what he discovers as he continues to read. The function of education should be to educate every child fully, and use correct historical texts in the process, but that is not how education functions, as Malcolm X discovers.

He conveys his message graphically, especially when he describes his readings in history -- regarding slavery and its horrors. Probably the strongest statement he makes about the white view of black history is also one of the best of his statements about the past. He writes, "Because who in the world's history ever has….....

Show More ⇣

     Open the full completed essay and source list


OR

     Order a one-of-a-kind custom essay on this topic


sample essay writing service

Cite This Resource:

Latest APA Format (6th edition)

Copy Reference
"How Did Malcolm X View Education " (2009, June 28) Retrieved May 21, 2025, from
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/malcolm-x-view-education-20908
   

Open, View, and/or
Download this Document
order custom essay example