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Evidence: "Travis looked toward the house, then back to Daniel" as if in conformation from his wife that she is witnessing the same interaction he is.

she was "now standing outside the door"

"they stared at him"..."

she "looked up and down the street"

Page 4 helps build the audience's understanding of the type of environment Daniel has endured and how he and other people of color have been treated in his community due to prejudices. While at Travis' house to inspect the car it's as if all eyes are on him. It feels deeply unwelcoming as people's judgmental gazes follow him as if they are waiting for him to do something. Their reactions further solidify an image of a regressive thinking southern town, and the need for the action Daniel is putting in place. Afterwards, as he explains his purchase and the plan that goes along with it, Sarah's discomfort is almost tangible. They both are aware of the type of reactions their community would have to someone fighting the status quo and she even "looked up and down the street" as if just him speaking these words would pose a threat to them both.

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Evidence:

Daniel purchases the truck with a Confederate flag... Is proud of the meaning behind it... "I was just lucky enough to find a truck with the black power flag already on it."

This shows the irony by how he flips the racist meaning behind the flag, which is to exclude groups like African Americans. Him insisting that he really wants it shows that he wants to try to redefine that resistance.

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Evidence: Soon, there were several, then many cars and trucks in Columbia, South Carolina, sporting Confederate flags and being driven by black people.

In the end, it's revealed that Daniel's tactic to reclaim the confederate flag spread throughout Columbia, South Carolina, as other African Americans began to sport it in their communities. Due to this progression, people who originally used the confederate flag to show their support against the rights of African Americans took their flags down, as it now connected black communities together and represented "Black power."

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Evidence: "'Oh, you're Dan?'", "'I couldn't tell over the phone?'"

When Daniel goes to buy the truck from Travis, he first talks to him over the phone and then Daniel shows up at the door, where Travis sees his skin color in person. He is surprised to find out that he is doing business with a black man.

When Travis goes to get the keys, Daniel overhears him tell Barb, his wife, that he "couldn't tell over the phone", meaning he didn't realize he was black until now, and is a bit surprised. This tells us more about the culture of his community in the south, and how the residents see African Americans separate from themselves. Travis does not expect a black man to have the money for the truck or want to buy a truck that has the confederate flag on it, because the confederate flag stands for support for the states that wanted to keep slavery during the civil war era.

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Evidence: "Some nights he went to a joint near the campus of the University of South Carolina"

This tells us that Daniel is living in the south, a region known for being less accepting of people of color. Because he is specifically near a University, we also expect college kids, specifically "frat boys", to be around. People around that age group are known for being immature, so setting being in the south and in a college town sets us up for interactions between Daniel and his community to have undertones of immaturity and outdated thinking.

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Evidence:

Daniel was approached by white men for having the Confederate flag and being called as "brothers"..."The second man pushed Daniel in the chest with two extended fists"..."

This is a subtle moment of tension when Daniel decides to embrace the flag, and it causes conflict with others. People didn't know how to respond back to the appropriation and connotation change associated with the Confederacy.

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Evidence: He fell asleep and had a dream in which he stopped
Pickett's men on the Emmitsburg Road on their way to the field and said, "Give me back my flag."

This imagery of Daniel's dream shows his shift in feelings towards the confederate flag, a flag used to dehumanize African Americans. This introduces and reveals Daniels ultimate goal to rebrand the confederate flag, as he truly believes that it's his right to claim as a Southern Black man after singing the pro-slavery song at the Jazz bar.

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Evidence: "He was busy trying to sort out his feelings about what he had just played. The irony of his playing the song straight and from the heart was made more ironic by the fact that as he played it, it came straight and from his heart"

This reveals to the reader how Daniel uses music as an emotional outlet. However, it also forces him to confront feelings he doesn't fully understand, since he initially found it ironic and strange that he resonated with the song. The fact that he connects with a piece about the “idealized” Southern life, despite its ties to slavery, shows a glimpse into Daniel's conflict and complexity.

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Evidence:

Previously Daniel sang a song that was meant to humiliate people of color like him, and the boys "didn't know what to do"... "Daniel held Barb's eyes until she looked away." when they were discussing about the decal flag on the truck.

This shows Daniel's character and how it correlates to the overall theme. Daniel is not afraid to stand on his feet and redefine "Southern pride". Him holding eye contact shows his confidence and resistance to the racism happening around him. He is not someone to back down, but to reclaim his own identity as a black African American.

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Evidence:

Daniel encounters people puzzled about him having the Confederate flag on his car, and he suggests the other young black teens to "Get a flag and fly it proudly."...and it is "Power to the people,"

Daniel's dialogue is important in illustrating how he appropriates the southern cultural identity. His truck contrasts him with the community. Though they both use the flag, Daniel uses it as "black power" and critiques the culture behind it.

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Evidence: "I'm not buying the truck... I'm buying the decal"

"I've decided that the rebel flag is my flag. My blood is southern blood"

Ever since Daniel's encounter with the frat boys, reclaiming the Dixie song they pushed him to sing, he was led to a revelation that guided his actions throughout the rest of his story. He had "decided that the rebel flag is [his] flag [and his] blood is southern blood". On page 4 Daniel finally voiced his ideas and began to put them into action with the first step of buying a confederate decal to call his own. He goes on to share his actions with his friend Sarah which is like him pushing the first domino in a chain reaction of people coming together to create change. The civil resistance Daniel goes on to inspire is all accomplished through word of mouth. This further develops themes of communities coming together as a unified front to create positive change.

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Evidence: “A woman in a housecoat across the street

watched from her porch, safe inside the chain-link fence around her yard.”

The description of the woman across the street watching Daniel go up to Travis’s house from her porch but “safe” within her fence suggests that she feels distrustful and uneasy about Daniel being in her neighborhood. Because he is an African American going up to a white persons house, the lady feels a certain wariness because of the racist stereotypes she has against him due to her living in this southern town, where a lot of the people are a bit racist. This highlights the uneven racial dynamic in their city that the story explores.

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Evidence: Black people all over the state flew the Confederate flag.

The irony of “Black people all over the state flew the Confederate flag” highlights the tension between the flag's history and African Americans. A symbol once associated with slavery and oppression is now rebranded as something to be proud of, ending the short story with a message of empowerment.

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Evidence: “One night, some white boys from a fraternity yelled forward to the stage

at the black man holding the acoustic guitar and began to shout, ‘Play Dixie for us!

Play Dixie for us!’”

When Daniel is playing guitar in the bar, some frat boys come up to him and ask him to play the song “Dixie”, a song seen as a confederate symbol. This is ironic because Daniel is an African American man, and the confederates believed they had a right to own African Americans as slaves. Instead of expressing any feelings of being offended, Daniel takes the song and sings it to make it his own. This contributes to the idea of cultural appropriation in the story, because Daniel takes a song that is a piece of southern culture that excludes people like him and reclaims it to make the frat boys uncomfortable.

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In "The Appropriation of Cultures", Everett uses plot structure, dialogue, and irony to portray how Daniel, an African American man, navigates his southern town by utilizing his intelligence to challenge the ignorant townspeople, ultimately sending a message about the importance of reclaiming negative cultural symbols.