The Civil Rights Movement Essay Example for Free

The Civil Rights Movement Essay The Civil Rights Movement is the most significant and eventful era in America and in African American history. The movement refers to the movements in the United States aimed at outlawing racial discrimination against African Americans and restoring voting rights in Southern states. The movement opened new economic, social and political opportunities to blacks. It had a strong effect on the way people thought and acted. The struggle was about far more than just civil rights under law; it was also about fundamental issues of freedom, respect, dignity, and economic and social equality. Significant achievements during this phase of the Civil Rights Movement were passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, that banned discrimination based on race, color, religion, or national origin in employment practices and public accommodations. Further, Martin Luther King Jr. organized the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Finally racial separation on the buses in Montgomery was also declared illegal. After the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968 the civil rights movement, however, begun to lose momentum. The Civil Rights Movement marks a remarkable moment in history. Women’s Movement: The womens movement of the 1960s and 1970s drew inspiration from the civil rights movement. It was made up mainly of members of the middle class, and thus partook of the spirit of rebellion that affected large segments of middle-class youth in the 1960s. During the 1950s and 1960s, increasing numbers of married women entered the labor force, but in 1963 the average working woman earned only 63 percent of what a man made. Women argued that they had no outlets for expression other than finding a husband and bearing children. Women were encouraged to seek new roles and responsibilities, to seek their own personal and professional identities rather than have them defined by the outside, male-dominated society. The womens movement stagnated in the late 1970’s. Divisions arose between moderate and radical feminists and the movement failed to move beyond the middle class. Conservative opponents mounted a campaign against the Equal Rights Amendment, and it died in 1982 without gaining the approval of the 38 states needed for ratification. Oprah Winfrey: Oprah Winfrey is a popular African American television host, actress, producer, and philanthropist. Winfrey was born in 1954 in rural Mississippi to a teenage single mother and later raised in an inner-city Milwaukee neighborhood. She experienced considerable hardship during her childhood, including being raped at the age of nine and becoming pregnant at 14. At 18 Winfrey won the Miss Black Tennessee beauty pageant. She is known for her self-titled talk show. Her show has become the highest-rated program of its kind in history. Winfreys talk show went national in 1986, and as it had in Chicago, Oprah took the top spot almost immediately. Its been the top-rated daytime talk show ever since. There is immense power in Winfreys opinions and endorsements to influence public opinion. She certainly has a place in one of the most powerful women in the World today. The Color Purple: The Color Purple is an epistolary novel by American author Alice Walker. It received the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award. The book has been adapted into a film and musical of the same name. The story is told in the form of diary entries and letters. The story focuses on female black life during the 1930s in the Southern United States, addressing the numerous issues including their exceedingly low position in American social culture. Celie is a poor uneducated young black woman in 1909 Georgia who, aged only fourteen, is raped and impregnated twice by a man she calls Pa. Celie goes through life having a hard time noticing the beautiful aspects and appreciating them. She had a difficult life and was abused as an adolescent. The color purple is continually equated with suffering and pain. Eventually, Celies life is complete, as the two families join as one, despite blood relations and years of separation. The novel was adapted into a film of the same name in 1985. On December 1, 2005, a musical adaptation of the novel opened at The Broadway Theatre in New York City. (www. colorpurple. com) Reference http://www.buzzle.com/articles/1960s-civil-rights-movement-in-america.html