Battle Royal And Mai Chai Lee s My Grandmother The War...

Ralph Ellison’s â€Å"Battle Royal† and Mai Chai Lee’s â€Å"Your Grandmother the War Criminal† use symbolism in the theme of struggling for equality. The narrator in â€Å"Battle Royal† being an African American and the narrator of â€Å"Your Grandmother the War Criminal† an Asian American both struggle to live in America where they are not accepted by White Americans. They both dealt with racism, discrimination, and unfair treatment. Ellison showed this in how the boys were treated at the battle royal and Mai Chai Lee showed discrimination through the camp the narrator and her mother were held in. Ralph Ellison’s â€Å"Battle Royal† is a short story about a young African American man who delivers a speech at his graduation and he was given the opportunity to†¦show more content†¦After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed an executive order to remove any Japanese that he thought could potentially be a threat to the war. Everyone of Japanese decent living on the West Coast were given a week to figure out what to do with their houses and pack up their lives. The only items people could bring was in a bag that fit on a bus. By November 1942, ten camps were built and two-thirds of Japanese Americans were placed. The camps were guarded with eight towers and surrounded by military police outside the walls. While in the camp the narrator and her mother were doing laundry and hanging up clothes on the line. The narrator was watching the seagulls when one of the seagulls was shot down in front of her by the men on guard in the tower. After seeing the seagull shot down and its blood on her clothes her world was shattered. She never caught herself staring at the seagulls flying and she hated them. Her hating the seagull was her loss of innocence. The narrator was so frightened by what she saw that she did not want to look at the seagulls which were also her sense of hope. They were her hope of being freed from the camp. Seeing the birds fly freely helped believe that she too will one day can walk free amongst others in America. The guard ruined that hope and innocence for her. He knew that she was looking at the seagulls when he decided to shoot one to bring her attention