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Three Prevalent themes


In Robert Ellison’s the Invisible Man there are many prominent themes. Three main themes are racism, stereotypes and discovering your identity. The book is based around the Jim Crow era and racism is a extremely serious matter at the time and is a constant theme of the story. An example of this I seen in the battle royal scene. In this scene we see blacks fighting each other blind folded for the entertainment of whites. This scene showed how whites thought of blacks during this time. Another theme in the story was stereotyping. An example of this was with Trueblood and his daughter. This scene expounded on how whites were not really disturbed by the fact that Trueblood got his daughter pregnant. They were thought this was the norm and actually praised it in a way. And lastly the third theme was finding your identity. I feel as if this is the most powerful theme because although the narrator was faced with many adversities and tribulations, he still fought to find his true perception of himself.

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