The Souls of Black Folks by W.E.B DuBois: Chapter 1: Of Our Spiritual Striving - Summary
Black people are regarded as a problem in the United States. DuBois has been aware of his status as a "problem" since a white girl at school refused to interact with him. This causes him to be contemptuous of whites and relish beating them in competition. His contempt fades when he realizes that it is they who have more opportunities than he, and he resolves to attain these opportunities for himself as well. Other blacks were not so competitive but rather subservient, or hateful and angry at whites. Blacks are only able to see themselves as whites see them, thus having no identity of their own. They are both Negro and American and these identities contradict. The wish of the blacks is to merge these identities into one, and to achieve equality. There have been powerful black men in history and now that blacks have been emancipated it is time to find that power once more. The seeming weakness of the blacks stems from their contradicting identities. Blacks are ashamed