An Analysis of Henry Gates Jr. and “the Signifying Monkey”

Midterm Essay An Analysis of Henry Gates Jr. and â€Å"The Signifying Monkey† It is certain that when you are exposed to an author’s work you want to categorize that author into a certain group. Perhaps this practice of categorizing a composer can help the reader understand the piece of literature. Henry Gates has helped understand and criticize many African American Literature authors that are exposed through the canon in secondary English Education. As a teacher, it is essential to introduce Postcolonialism into the classroom as well as postcolonialist critics such as Henry Gates Jr. Furthermore, as I teach my African American literature class I have found myself searching for supplemental material to suppose the authors that I introduce†¦show more content†¦It is sad and unjust to think that as Americans we are introduced to many Greek mythologies through our formal education then African American mythology; when will we re write the curriculum and change this ill to society? The first step to this would be having teachers introduce Gates wo rk into a secondary classroom. Gates examines how, in oral culture, the trickster figure of the monkey outsmarts the stronger lion through signifying: using language to play tricks. In its general outlines, the monkey’s story goes like this. Although the lion claims to be king of the jungle, everyone knows who the real king is: it is the elephant. The monkey, fed up with the lion’s roaring, decides to do something about it. He insults the lion publicly and at length and when the lion grows angry, the monkey shrugs that he is merely repeating what the elephant has been saying. Furious, the lion heads out to challenge the elephant, who impassively trounces him. The monkey either gets away with his deception or does not (there are differing versions), but in any event he is a success at signifying. Of course Gates includes several versions of the signifying monkey poem, many containing almost shocking renditions all were contained the principle of a play on words or even being the bearer of language. If I were to introduce Gates concepts into my inner-city classroom I would use the example of battle rapping to address many of the concepts that GatesShow MoreRelatedEssay on Race and Class in Alice Walkers Color Purple1622 Words   |  7 PagesWalkers domestic narrative undertakes a sustained analysis of race through the careful development of family relationships - or kinship - as an extended textual trope for race relations. Any attempt to oppose political and personal discourses in the novel collapses when one recognizes that the narrative adopts the discourse of family relations both to establish a domestic ideal for racial integration and to problematize that ideal through the analysis of specific integrated family groupings in AfricaRead MoreManagement Course: Mba−10 General Management215330 Words   |  862 Pageseffort; and skilled workers could produce only a few cars in a day. Although these cars were of high quality, they were too expensive. Managers of early car companies needed better techniques to increase efï ¬ ciency, reduce costs, and sell more cars. Henry Ford revolutionized the car industry. In 1913, Ford opened the Highland Park car plant in Detroit to produce the Model T Ford, and his team of manufacturing managers pioneered the development of mass- production manufacturing, a system that made