Some prominent authors came up on front to express their thoughts about the racial injustice in American and they did this through their writing skills. Claude McKay was one of them. His work extended from vernacular verse commending worker life in Jamaica to lyrics testing white specialist in America, and from by and large direct stories of black life in both Jamaica and America to all the more rationally goal-oriented fiction tending to instinctual/scholarly duality, which McKay discovered key to the black person 's endeavors to adapt in a supremacist society. Steady in his different compositions is his hate for prejudice and the feeling that dogmatism 's certain idiocy renders its followers pitiable and in addition evil. However, having safeguarded his vision as artist and his status as a person, he can rise above severity.
I feel that Claude McKay wrote this specific poem out of retaliation of the Red Summer that coincided with America’s Red Scare. White America felt like anyone that wasn’t native born, protestant, and shared traditional American values posed a threat to the country. African Americans regrettably fit into this category. Claude McKay wanted to instill a fighting spirit into an already downtrodden
In the poem Heritage by Linda Hogan, Hogan uses the tone of the speaker to demonstrate the shame and hatred she has toward her family, but also her desire to learn about her family’s original heritage. The speaker describes each family member and how they represent their heritage. When describing each member, the speaker’s tone changes based on how she feels about them. The reader can identify the tone by Hogan’s word choices and the positive and negative outlooks on each member of the family. At the beginning of the poem, the speaker has a tone that demonstrates aggravation and shame towards her mother.
The appeal to one’s sight in the use of imagery provokes an image of the clear contrast of being one against all. The uniqueness of being colored among a mass of white builds tension, and the reader can easily mistake the persona’s race for his identity, despite it being otherwise. Furthermore, the author makes numerous allusions referring to specific settings. Yet, when the author alluded to “American” (33), he successfully delivered a broader theme. Since is the only person of “colour”, he provides diversity-- what America was and still is based upon.
The speaker wants his instructor as well as others who read his composition to listen to and fully understand him. In his opinion, his ethnicity should not factor in one’s perception of him. As far as he is concerned, he is more than just a young, African-American male━he is a normal human being. A recurring image in the poem is a mention of “the Y”, which refers to the Young Men’s Catholic Association, more famously known as the YMCA. In the second stanza of the poem, the speaker mentions, “I come to the Y, / the Harlem Branch Y, where I take the elevator / up to my room” (13-15).
McKay 's and Hughes 's writing served as a socially motivated voice for justice. Though these poets told their poems through a first-person narrative, they spoke about issues facing black people as a whole. McKay and Hughes paved the way for the discussion of immoral and inhumane ongoing treatment of black Americans in the early 1900s. Both dedicated to themes centered on black Americans and urban life, their works were seemingly political because of the topic of racial issues which were accompanied by very hopeful and activist
Claude McKay speaks of the negativity that is being produced by both African Americans and White civilians during this time, he writes: I will not toy with it nor bend an inch. Deep in the secret chambers of my heart I muse my life-long hate, and without flinch I bear it nobly as I live my part. My being would be a skeleton, a shell, If this dark Passion that fills my every mood, And makes my heaven in the white world’s hell, Did not forever feed me vital blood. I see the mighty city through a mist— The strident trains that speed the goaded mass, The poles and spires and towers vapor-kissed, The fortressed port through which the great ships pass, The tides, the wharves, the dens I contemplate, Are sweet like wanton loves because I hate. The author uses many different juxtapositions in order to convey his emotions, one being; “And makes my heaven in the white world’s hell”.
When the poem was wrote in the 1800s, many African- Americans were in slavery, and the poet wanted others to know how many of them felt. In the poem "Sympathy", by Paul Laurence Dunbar, he tells a story of a bird who is experiencing lack of freedom by using symbolism, figurative language, and imagery. In the first stanza of the poem the poet displayed sensory imagery. Sensory imagery is the language that appears to a reader’s five senses that includes; sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste. Dunbar used three of the five which included, sound, smell, and sight.
I had a lot of feelings.”, various rhetorical devices are used which assist Kelly with expressing the many underlying meanings and interpretations of her personal story. These techniques are apparent immediately as you start to read the title. The denotation translates to the moon literally rising over the bay, and Donika literally having an abundance of feelings. The connotation is referring to the darkness of life causing her to become overwhelmed with emotion. In the title only the first word in each sentence is capitalized to follow correct grammar of a normal sentence, but also to connect it to the depressed mood of the poem.
In this poem “I Too am America,” Chris McMahon, the author, conveys the theme that it is important to never give up on who you are through his use of the speaker, figurative language, and attitude/tone. One way that McMahon demonstrates the theme that never giving up on who you are is through his use of the speaker, because the speaker allows the author to give the reader a more powerful way of connecting with the reader. Which allows the reader to be more engaged in the poem. For example, when the reader starts reading the poem you can feel that the reader has had a very rough life by just reading the poem. For example in lines 26-28 where it says, “I will beat you with my words/and not your violence/I too am America” (McMahon 26-28).