Coates's The Pathway: An Analysis

In section two of Ta-nehisi Coates book “Between the World and Me,” he moves forward to discuss the evident issue of social justice. I feel section two of the text is the climax of the book. Coates elaborates on the event that had taken place when he was arrested for no reason which made him aware of his body being vulnerable while sharing the anger of Prince Jones death, he expresses that Jones should not have been subjected to such an absurd death, which was committed by a black person. Jones had all the aspects of a well-rounded African American such as, highly educated and not involved in the streets. Realistically, no black man is not safe of the violent vagaries performed by the police; a black man body can be destroyed at any given time. As a result, this

“And you have seen men in uniform drive-by and murder Tamir Rice, a twelve-year-old whom they were oath-bound to protect.”(Coates 9). This sentence puts the meaning of innocence into the eye of many people. A majority of the people are afraid to face the reality of what was occurring those times. Innocent people gunned down every day by their supposed protectors. Talk about a double edged sword. Through the eyes of Ta-Nehisi Coates’s younger self, he describes the tragic murders of innocent people at the hands of people who don't even consider them equal. He depicts how people just glaze over them as if they had done something to deserve it.

In the memoir, The Prince of Los Cocuyos, the performance of masculinity of the people is illuminated. This is seen with most of the men conforming to the gendered expectations of a man, some confidently defying and conforming at the same time, and Riqui not daring to disturb the universe, but having a hard time conforming to all the expectations. As a child when it was just his grandmother giving him a hard time about acting and looking like a man, Riqui defied many of the gendered expectations. However, when these expectations started coming from friends then he started to attempt to act like he was expected. Riqui defies gendered expectations of a boy through his interest in the girly things like Cinderella, dolls and makeovers; however,

Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man is a riveting novel encompassing the life and hardships of an unnamed black narrator in the 1930’s. Ellison’s beautifully crafted work dives deep into the racism and hardships of 1930 and uses numerous conventions to layer depth onto his subject. Ellison attempts to inform the reader of the extreme racism that was rampant in 1930’s society.

Reparations for slavery is the idea that some form of compensatory payment should be made to the descendants of Africans who had been enslaved as part of the Atlantic Slave Trade. With that being said, I don’t believe this essay is a case for reparations. Coates never gives the breakdown of what the United States reparation would look like. He never tells us, his readers, how the system would work, or how anyone would actually make the political case for it. This argument is not about reparations for slavery, either. Coates leaves little space to talk about slavery but instead talks about black reparations. He doesn’t really demonstrate this throughout the essay. He gives us a long list of slavery victims and their stories, but no overall

The narrator in Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man functions according to his psychological state of mind. Ellison creates the narrator with his own, unique mind, paralleling with the effect he has on the environment and his peers. The narrator's underdeveloped unconscious mind, as well as the constant clashes he has with his unconscious and conscious thoughts, lead him to a straight path of invisibility. Although physical factors also play a role in affecting the narrator's decisions, psychological traits primarily shape the narrator to become an “invisible man”.

Author Ta-Nehisi Coates in his book Between the World and Me discusses impactful racial issues in American history and educates his son on the past and current realities of being a black American.

In the novel, Invisible Man, the narrator is always in pursuance of justice. His consistent search is driven by his inability to be treated as an equal in this white man’s society. As he fought for justice for the “dispossessed” the Narrator was constantly faced with injustice. Although his success seemed positive in the eyes of others, it had a negative impact on his life as a whole.

“’Play the game, but play it your own way…’” (Ellison 153) In essence, Ellison Says that a person follows the ideas of those around him; however, they have their own thoughts and feelings that change as they act. In his book, Invisible Man,Ellison’s narrator has “that outward existence that conforms, [and] the inward life that questions.” He plays the game of those around him, but plays it in a way that he sees fit, changing his opinions and view of the things around him. Throughout The novel, the Invisible Man (the narrator who provides a first person point of view)consistently yields to the whims of more authoritative powers that surround him,but he questions their purpose and his role in society. Eventually, his individual desires supersede those of those around him and he shed his conformity.

Even just by reading pages 5-12, I can tell that Ta-Nehisi Coates is a good writer because his essay is highly thoughtful and provocative, and the well-written narrative provides lots of powerful examples to depicts the racial struggle in the U.S.

Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man addresses double consciousness by directly referring to this concept, as well as W.E.B. DuBois’s concept of the veil placed over African Americans. Throughout the novel, the Invisible Man believes that his whole existence solely depends on recognition and approval of white people, which stems from him being taught to view whites as superior. The Invisible Man strives to correspond to the immediate expectations of the dominate race, but he is unable to merge his internal concept of identity with his socially imposed role as a black man. The novel is full of trickster figures, signifying, and the Invisible Man trying to find his own identity in a reality of whiteness. Specifically, Ellison’s employment of trickster

Charlotte Gilman’s short story, ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’, (1899) is a text that describes how suppression of women and their confinement in domestic sphere leads to descend into insanity for escape. The story is written as diary entries of the protagonist, who is living with her husband in an old mansion for the summer.

As Coates departs from Dr. Jones house he thought over the loss of his dear friend. He thinks of the protesters and how perhaps their bodies was abused because they knew that it was not theirs, to begin with. Coates informs his son that it is unlikely that the dreamers will never come to their consciousness. It is clear that racial justice and the dream does not seem to be going away anytime soon, that the black will suffer from inequality and injustice for a very long time. Despite, our society having a former black American president, the media focusing on the protest against police killings Coates sees no prospect of much change. It concerns me that Coates seems to have all the answers for his son Samori, but if he strongly feels that there

In the article "The Myth about Police Reform". A brief background of cases where the suspect was called by cops are presented. Coates continuously calls upon on the actions taken by police officers and how he believes the situations should have not been handled the way they were. Coates quotes from the 1953 book The Quest for Community by Robert Nisbet in order to explain the difference between authority and power. Authority is based on the consent of the government while power is based on externalities and force. With these definitions in mind, he discusses how throughout history, the African-American community have undergone police power and not authority. Ending the article, Coates then makes the claim that

Between the World and Me, written by Ta-Nehisi Coates is a powerful book written as a letter from the author to his teenage son. This book outlines the race issue in America from a first hand perspective. The author explains his struggles and fears as he grew up and how those fears transformed into a new meaning as he reached adulthood. Through his personal story, the reader is offered insight into the lives of other African Americans and how they may experience racial injustice themselves.