What effect does Coates’s use of figurative language have on the emotional appeal of his argument? Consider at least four examples. For instance,
“The earthquake cannot be subpoenaed. The typhoon will not bend under indictment” (para. 9).
- By using figurative language such as those above, Coates expresses his abstract anger and other emotions through concrete objects such as typhoon and earthquake. These all help to constituted to express the sad situation of the blacks.
What role does Prince Carmen Jones play in Coates’s argument? Who was he as an individual? What larger meaning does his life and death take on for Coates in this excerpt?
- Prince Jones is the perfect embodiment of all the adversities American society have on the blacks. Jones is a friend of Coates, and his is an student from Howard University. The death of Jones, for Coates, signifies all the fears he have for the circumstances of the blacks in America. He thought that to be extremely unforgivable.
Coates brings up religion in several passages —— to explain, for instance, that he has no “God to hold me up” (para. 26) and, thus, cannot feel the solace of religion that others around him do. Why does Coates take this position? What is it about organized religion that he cannot accept?
- Coates might have stand on that position as he can’t see the help of the supposing god to the blacks. The killing of the blacks is true, yet the preyer might have been answered by the gods——they are still suffering. He don’t like the disembodiment as he thinks that as terrorism.
What does Coates mean by the Dream and the Dreamer in this excerpt from Between the World and Me? To what extent do you think he is using the term ironically?
- The dream and the dreamer here refers to the American Dream promised by the nation where everyone can have a good life living in the use, and the dreamers are those who believe in the American Dream and tried hard to pursue them. However, the term here is being used ironically as Coates clearly lived a life of fear as PJ was killed. The is the what "the American society looked like"---- full of violence and pain. No like the American dream.
Coates has been criticized for offering an unyieldingly bleak view of the future for his son. Do you agree with this critique of his message? If so, to what extent do you believe his purpose and message are out of sync? If not, what details from this excerpt challenge the assessment of his writing as relentlessly grim? How would you respond to a similar letter from a parent or elder written to you in a similar tone or conveying a similar message?
- The statement about the unyieldingly bleak view make a bit of sense, we can see from the opening anecdote that Coates is under control by the police, which is violent and shows the grim reality faced by the blacks in America. This is something very frightening. If I have receive this letter, I probably to accept some of the massage depending on the context.
Ground Zero: Place of death and tragedy