Anglais LV1/LV2, A dream come true, Terminale ES

A dream come true ?

Rosa Parks :

Rosa Parks was a black Afro-American woman. She was sitting on a bus and she refused to give up her seat to a white person. Thanks to her, now everybody can sit wherever they want on a bus. She will never be forgotten.

She is important to black America because she paved the way (ouvert la voie) to a lot of things that are happening now.

The law (la loi): black people had to sit at the back of the bus and give up their seat to white people if they wanted to sit down.

Rosa Parks refused to move (she was tired) and black people supported (soutenir) her, they stopped taking the bus and walked and finally the law changed. Rosa Parks took a stand (resist, to fight against).

1-      Text: Let me have those seats!

It is a first-person narrative and an autobiography by Rosa Parks.

The scene takes place in the USA, in Alabama, Montgomery on December 1rst 1955 on a bus in the evening after a day’s work.

Rosa Parks was sitting on a bus to go home after a day’s work, then the driver asked her to give up her sear to a white person, but she refused to move, so he called the police to have her arrested. She didn’t want to cause any trouble, there was a vacant seat so she just sat there because she was tired, without thinking about what she was doing.

There are 2 sections: the back of the bus is for black people and the front is for the white people.

The driver asked four black people to stand up to give up their seat to some white people because the white section was complete. He gives them an order. As nobody moves at first, the driver threatens (menacer) them by saying that if they don’t move, they will have troubles, be arrested. “Make it light on yourselves” (éviter les ennuis/ avoid trouble). All of them stood up to give up their seats exept Rosa Parks who didn’t move. She didn’t really think about consequences of her act but she was also tired and fed up (en avoir assez) with being treated this way, like scum (moins que rien). She thaught it was unfair (pas juste). The more they obeyed, the worse they were treated.                (To threaten somebody into something)

Rosa Parks and the driver don’t speak much, their sentences are short.

She must have felt scared to be manhandled, ill-treated (malmenée/maltraitée), afraid, fearful, frightened (craintive) and must have asked herself questions because she doesn’t know what may happened to her, although (bien que) she tried not to think about it too much.

All the other passengers of the bus don’t react, they are passive, indifferent to what happens. They may have the same opinion as the driver or they don’t care.

2-      Document audio : Martin Luther King

1863: slavery was abolished -> the Emancipation Proclamation signed by Abraham Lincoln.

A score: 20 years

Black people were segregated in the 1950’s in the USA in:

buses, trains / schools, universities / hospital, waiting-rooms / jobs, housing / restaurants, cinemas, libraries, parks, public toilets, drinking fountains / army / prisons and interracial marriage was forbidden.

3-      The Help

A help’s (maid) tasks:

Do the cooking, clean the house (do the housework), take care of the children (raise / bring up), do the laundry (linge), mow the lawn (tondre la pelouse), and wash the dishes…

Social backgrounds: Upper class, middle class, working/lower class.

Hilly doesn’t want to use the same bathroom as colored people and she thinks it is better for them to have a separated bathroom because she thinks the have different diseases (maladies), and she wants to protect their children. She looks afraid and disgusted. The maid overhears/eavesdrops (entendre par hasard) the conversation. She must feel offended, ill-at-ease, humiliated.

It’s rainy, windy and stormy. The maid wants to go to the toilets but Hilly doesn’t want her to use the inside bath despite the storm.

The maid is fired/dismissed for having disobeyed and used the inside bath.

The mistress thinks the maid is happy about having her own toilet yet (pourtant), it’s humiliating/disparaging (rabaissant). The maid and her mistress’s daughter are very close, because she takes care of her and protects her like a mother. She raises her/bring her up.

è Black people were considered/were thought to be inferior to white people. They were treated like scum/animals. They were thought to have different diseases.

4-      Martin Luther King

He was a Baptist minister (pasteur).

The speech was made in Washington, at the Lincoln Memorial, next to the statue of Abraham Lincoln, who signed the Emancipation proclamation abolishing slavery, a 100 years earlier, so the place is symbolic.

His job can be related to the style of his speech though:

The many repetitions, the use of emphasis, the cadences, the pauses, the crowd responding and applauding.

The statement comes from the Declaration of Independence, which was signed the 4^th of July 1776. It maid segregation unconstitutional.

The states mentioned are Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia, all southern States where segregation and racism was more present and violent.

He repeats “I have a dream” 7 times, to emphasize it, so that people remember it/it stays in people’s minds, memories. It becomes a creed (credo). He wants black and white to be treated equally. He wants racism to end. He seems optimistic because he hopes his dream will come true/be fulfilled (to fulfil a dream / to make a dream come true) one day.

5-      Mr Brainwash’s wall painting

The topic of this artwork, is the defense of black people’s rights: the civil rights evolution of their rights, black pride.

Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white person on the bus, she triggered off (déclenché) a bus boycott. Martin Luther King is famous for his fight for the civil rights and for his speech “I have a dream” and his peaceful demonstrations/marches. Barack Obama is the first African-American president.

It was created on January 20^th 2009. When Obama got elected it was a step for the black emancipation, the beginning of the change.

“Sat”: be refusing to stand up on the bus (so by sitting), Rosa Parks changed many things. “Walked” refers to MLK’s peaceful demonstrations (Washington 1963). “Ran”: Obama could run for presidency thanks to the fight of people like Rosa Parks and MLK.  “Fly” is a symbol of liberty/freedom. These verbs symbolize an evolution.

Obama’s large smile/grin and the fact that no one thought an African-American could be president one day.

“Follow your dreams” is a reference to MLK’s speech and to the dream of equality: a pun (jeu de mot). It refers to part of MLK’s dream coming true.

The vanishing point (point de fuite) is out of frame (hors du cadre): the fight for equality is not finished/over/it is still long and there is still a lot of be done.

Red is the color of the fight for their rights (blood). Red is the color of Pan-Africanism movement encouraging the solidarity of black people around the world: red (noble blood), black (color of their skin) and green (rich land of Africa).

Despite (malgré) + GN, although (bien que), yet (pourtant), on the one hand/on the other hand.

Although there is a black president, many black people still live below the poverty line. Despite the voting rights act, discrimination and racism is still present every day in the USA. Many things have evolved, and yet, the average income for black people is still much lower. So on the one hand, a part of MLK’s dream has come true / has been fulfilled, but on the other hand, many things must still evolve.