Racial Discrimination and Gender Inequality In Maya Angelou’s The Heart Of A Woman: A Social Study

Abstract

Maya Angelou’s The Heart of a Woman focuses on adulthood and motherhood of her life. She is a renowned African American autobiographer of six series of her biographical volumes. This study mainly explores the subjects of racial discrimination, gender inequality, political upheavals, black womanhood, racial brutality, motherhood and struggle for survival in the contemporary African American society. Angelou has meticulously documented African American women’s experiences from the earliest stages of the Civil Rights Movement to the present. The majority of Maya Angelou’s writings exhibit resistance to racism and gender injustice. Maya Angelou’s The Heart of a Woman starts with a big change as she moves to Los Angeles with her son, Guy. With this move, she is starting a new chapter in her life, one that is full of opportunity and change. Angelou immediately gets active in the arts after immersing herself in the thriving cultural landscape of Los Angeles. During this time, Maya’s growing involvement in the civil rights movement began to define her life. While living through the exciting and chaotic 1960s, she involved herself in the fight against racial discrimination and the quest for social justice. Her unwavering efforts to mobilize, coordinate, and promote African Americans’ rights demonstrated her dedication to change. Maya had a variety of roles throughout this time. She continually balanced her roles as a mother, an artist, a scholar, and an activist. Her own encounters with racism and discrimination stoked her fervor and genuineness for the cause, establishing her as a believable and approachable change agent.