Malcolm X or Malcolm Little has become one of the leading black movement leaders. He influenced a whole culture and race of people, and his teachings are still influential today. Malcolm lived through many major changes in his life, and each change helped to define his philosophy and his life. The three major changes in Malcolm X's life that will be examined in this essay are his life in Boston, his life in prison, and his pilgrimage. Influenced by others and learning from observation and experience he was able to build his beliefs and teach others why he believed them.
Malcolm is still just a teenager when he moves to Boston where his sister Ella lives. Previously, when he visited the summer before, he saw the influential middle class blacks that lived in her neighborhood. It was this experience that made him change from a placid young man to one who bristled at the word "nigger" and wouldn't take the mockery of being a "pink poodle" for the white people he lived around and with. (Haley 1992, 32). That experience allowed him to see black people who were moderately wealthy, as compared to the ones he experienced, and who had independence. On his arrival to Boston, Malcolm is not exactly fashionable. His sister, wanting him to experience the culture first, allows him to explore. It is through this exploration that he sees the stark contrast between the middle class blacks, including his sister, and the blacks who live below the hill. .
He is drawn to the blacks below the hill believing them to be more real and less fake. He dislikes the way the "Hill Negroes" raise up their positions when in fact they can never hope to be on the same level as the white people during the time. It disgusts him to think of them glorifying jobs and fake positions, some putting on pretenses and saying they are from, "old families" (Haley 1992, 52). Being drawn to the blacks below the hill, he takes up a job at a pool hall.
