Blog #4 Malcolm X

            It is interesting that Malcolm X was self-taught and was a major figure in the 1960’s Civil Rights Movement, especially for only having an eighth grade education. Also the fact that he learned a majority of it from copying the dictionary from front to back was amazing. His friend Bimbi was his inspiration for wanting to expand his knowledge and sparked his determination to better himself so his ideas can be heard and expressed through his writings. Malcolm X is pretty inspirational because of his tenacity and tactfulness in the face of adversity. He proves to be pretty resourceful in his ways of learning like his use of phonics and other writing skills that we use now as students is pretty intriguing. The repetition and concentration is definitely outstanding especially how he remembers that aardvark is the first word of the dictionary as well as its description in detail. The writing he learned while in prison gave him a means to fight back against society in his own way and establish himself as an important figure of the 1960’s. He goes on to explain how the prison helped him focus his mind to learn from books and how if he was to attend college instead that he would have been involved more with fraternity pranks then actually studying his homework or in the least bettering himself. In that matter I cannot help but agree with him given that most college students these days spend a majority of their time partying or clubbing instead of learning or taking their homework seriously. It could also be said that people today can find it harder to do what he did due to the fact that most prisons nowadays give prisoners access to Facebook accounts or television as reward for good behavior rather than giving them books. The upside is that most prisons offer education programs that way inmates do not have to go it alone. Malcolm X’s reference to how reading books opened new vistas for him to reflect on while in prison showed how far he had gone in his journey for knowledge is impressive to say the least.  I just think that these excerpts from his autobiography show just how intelligent and dedicated Malcolm X was and that he had the tactfulness to lead and be considered one of the greats right there alongside Martin Luther King Jr. I also don’t think that it was coincidence that Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. were friends but disagreed greatly on the direction the Civil Rights Movement should take.