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The Illegal Stereotypes

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The novel that I chose to read for this project is “The Illegal” by Lawrence Hill. Many of you may know him from an earlier book, called “The Book of Negroes”. In “The Illegal”, Hill takes on the complex, pressing issues of our moment in time, including race and discrimination, the movement of refugees across borders and the political fight to define who belongs and who is “an illegal.”
In this story, the main character is Keita Ali, who, like every boy in the fictitious island of Zantoroland, wants to be a runner. In one of the poorest nations in the world, running means respect. Running also means riches, until Keita is targeted by the dictatorship government for his father’s outspoken political views and discovers he must run for his family’s …show more content…

Many of the characters in this book suffer, both physically and mentally, from their lack of true freedom. In the text, Keita says “My existence is a violation of the law.” Because he is an “illegal”, he is being hunted down by two governments, the one he fled and the one he’s hiding in. Keita cannot live a normal life because he is constantly worried about being captured or killed. He and others like him are also not free from the negative stereotypes and prejudices that follow them everywhere. In the text, it says “Keita inhaled the scent of pine. Odd, to find such welcoming trees in this hostile land. Perhaps if he were free, he could appreciate all of this beauty.” This demonstrates how Keita is so affected by his lack of freedom that he cannot enjoy life. Another character in the book, an elderly woman named Ivernia, struggles with her ideas about freedom as the government decides whether to take away many of her privileges, the ability to drive for example. In the text, it says “Ivernia wondered how this judge enjoyed making decisions about the lives of old people-their freedom or loss of independence. Did this man ever think that he would one day be old?” Ivernia has such a hard time dealing with this that she contemplates suicide. These characters reflect the greater idea of how, without a sense of freedom, one cannot be genuinely …show more content…

In the text, it says “Men and women, all white, mostly over forty, gathered at the pier. There were hundreds of them, screaming at the shivering refugees, with placards like: ‘Enough is Enough,’ ‘Send Em Back’ and ‘Who Invited Them?’” The use of fictitious countries make it easy to apply the problems within the novel to any nation around the world with similar issues. Freedom State stands in for wealthy, democratic nations, which benefit economically from global inequity and whose citizens fear inundation at the borders, or from within. Yes, this includes Canada, too. In fact, this novel is at times specifically hinting at Canada, in particular with AfricTown. AfricTown is a direct reference to Africville, which was a African-Canadian community in Halifax that was demolished by the government, and is now seen as an act of racism. The novel discusses how Freedom State’s rise to prosperity, like many real nations, is due to its unacknowledged history, its economy built on the enslaved labour of those whose descendants are now excluded or marginalized – and blamed for their own exclusion. This novel does an amazing job of changing the point of view to show the many different perspectives of people intertwined with these issues. From an “illegal”, to a minister of immigration, to a police officer,

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