In “The Warmth of Other Suns,” Isabel Wilkerson talks about the story behind the Great Migration through perspectives of the Southern Black Americans. The strict social caste system pushed blacks to the bottom of the hierarchy, where they had to work hard to earn a living. Families like Ida Mae’s had to escape to the Northern States to seek for equality and better economic prosperity. After they arrived in their dreamed cities, which turned out to be completely from what they expected; they also faced a lot of obstacles involves racial discrimination and segregation.
In Part I of the reading, Wilkerson give an overview of the heat of migration, people were fleeing to the new world with the intention of not returning; because where they used to live cannot sustain them anymore. They had to leave for good. Looking for better opportunities was probably the top reason for people to move from one place to another. For example, there were immigrants from all over the countries made a long and dangerous trip into the United States to seek freedoms. People from third world countries were willing to do anything just to secure a ticket to the United States; this concept was also implied to the Great Migration within the United States.
The social caste system within the southern states sets limitations on every social classes. The blacks were on the bottom of the caste system; they were mostly sharecroppers, which is the group that’s being suppressed hardly by white population. The caste system was like the prison that kills every opportunities for the blacks. According to Wilkerson, it seems like there were an invisible hand controlling all colored people’s lives. Living in a society that was completely controlled by white population was hopeless for them. It was impossible for these colored people to get a life that they should deserve.
In this book, Ida Mae’s was one of the families that followed the path of the Great Migration; the family worked hard just to secure a ticket to the North, where they thought as a land of freedom and more opportunities. However, sometimes the new world was somewhat different from what these people expected. Although, when Ida first arrived in Chicago, all the buildings and the new things excited her, later she realized that the new world was not any different from what she used to live down the Mississippi. Segregation still happened in the North; depression hit every part of the country, there weren’t a lot of job opportunities for blacks, and even less opportunities for women to be in the work force.
I like how Wilkerson describes the relationship between a white people and a black labor like “a child in those days had to obey a parent, except there was no love between the two parties as there is between a parent and child”. I agree with Wilkerson that it was definitely hard for those colored people to live under white people’s control. They worked so hard, but couldn’t get what they should deserved; instead they being treated badly by their landlords. However, the relationship between Mr.Edd and George isn’t as bad as what Wilkerson describes. Therefore I was wondering maybe there were a lot more positive examples of how the black population were treated by the white people.
