Today in class, Mattessich told us that we should try to make our blog posts personal, and I couldn't think of how I had been personally attacked by racism. She told us to think back about our heritage and the origin of our family, and then I remembered a story my dad told me recently about how my grandfather immigrated to America when he was four years old from Italy. He was the youngest of his six siblings, and the most determined to succeed. When he got to the US, he started school with all of his siblings, and was the only one in his family to finish high school and go to college. In order to do this, he had to face being made fun of every day and be called derogatory names, but he didn't let that stop him. If I put myself in his shoes, I honestly think I might have dropped out of school like my great aunts and uncles did. It must have taken so much courage and strength to continue throughout all the hard times he faced and all the mocking he had to put up with, and I don't know if I could handle it.
Malcolm was strong enough to put up with all of the harsh things people would say, too. Both him and my grandfather possessed an immense amount of courage to keep strong, and I admire them both, even if Malcolm did fall at one point.
For my weblink, I found an article on Italian immigration in the early 1900's. It does not mainly focous on racism, however, it gives an in-depth description about poor living conditions and how hard Italians had to work in order to live here, like Malcolm's family.
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