Paul Robeson

In the song “Ol Man River” sung by Paul Robeson used the theme of oppression. This song is about the oppression of black people by white. It depicts how black people did all the work and how that hard work was taken for granted. If they did the slightest thing wrong they could get beaten, punished and even killed for it. The song repetitively uses ol man river, the Mississippi as a means of escape from their oppressive lives. In this respect the Mississippi river is a symbol of the river Jordan. The adage crossing the river Jordan refers the biblical context of god telling his followers that once they crossed the River Jordan that they would reach The Promised Land They longed to cross the River Jordan, just so that they could be free from the oppression upon them in the Mississippi. In the days of slavery, the whites exerted total oppression onto blacks.