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The Life of Oprah Winfrey

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Submitted By ndean0469
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Oprah Winfrey was born on January 29, 1954 in Kosciusko, Mississippi to a young unmarried couple, Vernita Lee and Vernon Winfrey. When Oprah was a young child her mother had her live with her paternal grandmother, while her mother went north to find work. “She described her grandmother as disciplined, strong, and religious and she was raised a churchgoer”, (esbscohost, by Marks-Ellis, Annette, Dehanke, Rowena Wildin, Salem Press Biographical Encyclopedia, January 2014). As a child she proved to be intelligent and strong willed, when her grandmother couldn’t handle her anymore, she sent her to Milwaukie to live with her mother. Her mother lived in a single room home with very little money. After a while, when her mother couldn’t handle Oprah anymore, she sent Oprah to go live with her father and stepmother in Tennessee. She did very well living with them, because they encouraged her academic work and provided a loving environment.
After a summer visit with her mother, Oprah’s mother decided for her not to return to her dad’s. Oprah was not very happy about the situation, her self-esteem suffered badly, and she felt unwanted with her lighter-skinned toned sister. So she took refuge in reading books. Although her school work never decreased, even though she went through many years of sexual abuse by male relatives and acquaintances. So after a few years with her mother, her mother decided to send her back to her fathers in 1968. Her senior year of high school, she decided she wanted to go into entertainment. She wanted to go to a school out of Tennessee, but her father insisted she attend Tennessee State University. She attended Tennessee State University with oratorical scholarship and majored in English. During her college years she worked at a couple of radio stations and then a few months away from graduation, she got a reporter-anchor position with a television

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