The Souls of Black Folk

Let me begin by saying that, even though I've read the book, I still don't know how I feel about W.E.B. Du Bois. But I know I like him better than Booker T. Washington.

I don't like Washington simply because I feel that he tends to alienate his own race in his "political" views, or whatever you want to call it. He's too quick to settle for inequality when, quite honestly, the African-American race already has endured such inequality for too long. Though I cannot say that I completely agree with everything Du Bois says, I can say that I agree with Du Bois' acknowledgement of Washington's "triple paradox," or so Du Bois calls it, where Washington advocates "Negro artisans business men and property owners" but not the right to vote; "thrift and self-respect" but expects "silent submission" to their white counterparts; and "common school and industrial training" rather than "higher learning" though even his own institute in Tuskegee needs its teachers to be of "higher learning" (49). In contrast to Washington, Du Bois outlines his three basic requests, as follows: "political power," "insistence on civil rights," and "higher education of the Negro youth" (48). In all honesty, I certainly don't find any of those conditions to be too demanding, so that is exactly why I find it so amazing that Washington would not also want that for his race. I guess that I just dislike how Washington puts so much emphasis on the "economics side" of rising within American culture in that time-period while completely disregarding the individual rights that the people definitely deserve.

I have decided that I will focus my last paper for the class on comparing Washington and Du Bois based on the two texts we've read. I'm not sure what kind of specific take I'll go with, but at any rate it interests me how different they are and yet how influential they are simultaneously during this time in history.