Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

It's interesting and heartbreaking to see Cassie discovering the extent of racism in this book. We see many instances where she encounters it, but the first time she experiences it for herself is when they go to Strawberry. We know she already knows that there is some separation in her society between white and black people: in the same chapter, we see her complaining that they can't put their cart with the white people's carts and saying that she likes Mr. Jamison because "he was the only white man I had ever heard address Mama and Big Ma as 'Missus.'" But she doesn't seem to make the connection when they go into the store and Mr. Barnett stops filling T.J.'s order multiple times to fill white people's orders. She keeps asking her brother and T.J. what he's doing, and they keep telling her to hush and that he would be back, as though they understand perfectly what's happening and are more resigned to it, much like many the adults in the novel seem to be to "the way things are." Cassie is so confused and enraged, as opposed to the calm resignation of Stacey and T.J., and seeing this scene, especially from Cassie's point of view, makes you feel that same rage she feels. You want to yell at Mr. Barnett too, and you want make Stacey and T.J. stand up for themselves. This seems to be the first time she is personally targeted as well, and experiences physical violence: being pushed into the road when Lillian Jean demands an apology from her. You get so much more of a sense of the injustice of what's happening when not only seeing it from the point of view of the victim, but seeing her experience this for the first time. The last line of the chapter is "No day in all my life had ever been as cruel as this one," and the bluntness of it leaves you feeling even more terrible for Cassie. You can see in this chapter especially that she is not one to take injustice lying down, even if it hurts her, and this is where you really start both feel glad that she stands up for herself and also worried when she does that she is going to get herself into bigger trouble sometime than she can get herself out of.