Instructor ENG 111 2 September 2014 Brent Staples' essay Black Men and Public Space, explores racism and its difficulties. Staples tells his experiences with racism and what growing up as a black male was like. Staples describes his hardships with racism in order to show how he overcame these incidents and become a better man. The intended audience could be anyone really, particularly people struggling with racism themselves. Staples suggest that people still tend to portray black men as violent and dangerous individuals from racial tendencies without rationalizing and thus causing stress to the victims (black men) because they’re seen as threats despite their true nature.
Caroline Reinicke Professor Swart English 101 October 11th 2012 The Consequences of Racial Stereotyping In Brent Staples Essay “Just Walk on by: Black Men and Public Spaces” He talks about being mistaken for a robber, rapist or almost any type of criminal. He talks about all the consequences that have come upon him because people racial stereotyping him. He tells us about several occasions where he was just going about his everyday life when people thought that he was a criminal, judging him based only on his skin color. Even though he’s not a criminal Staples tells us that he knows a lot of black men, like himself, are and that he’s seen them locked away and even helped bury some. At the end of his Essay we see how he has changed many things about himself for the benefit of other people.
I also liked Lee’s intimate describing of his experience, and how some of his films had interesting elements to them because he was part of the black society. We don’t view his films in first person, which doesn’t make it appear simple, yet it still contains complex and structured ideas. These ideas derived from Lee’s own encounters with chaotic struggles he faced. From Lee’s films, I chose She’s Gotta Have It, School Daze, Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X and Jungle Fever. I choose these because they all revolve around a similar idea: Racism.
Critical Analysis #1 In “Black Men and Public Space”, Brent Staples chose to use his personal experience on what it was like to be a young black man in the 1970s. Although slavery was well over with, racism was still present. It was hard to be accepted by society for Mr. Staples. People usually perceived him as a violent person.
In this essay, Brown relates his personal hardships of being a minority of a colored race. The story itself was fairly easy to follow and he clearly addresses his point. It is manifestly meticulous. It makes the reader want to read more. He focuses on the anger created by racism within the American society and proves his point by telling his own life story about protecting his “manhood.” It exposes anger, revenge, and violence as the solution in facing the racial society to preserving his “manhood.” The gun symbolizes the past and the present.
Despite common expectation, that members of such a community should "know better", various forms of racism in the community have become so normalized that they are simply brushed off. Racism however is prevalent in the LGBTQ community and as a result Black Gay males suffer from the invisibility of a black gay voice as well as conflicting social identifiers, and even worst black gay stereotypes. In this essay, using the works of Rinaldo Walcott, Audre Lorde, and Ron Simmons, I will identify and analyze instance of racism in Toronto’s LGBTQ community, How stereotypes and the conditional acceptance within the community are the cause of black gay males being marginalized, excluded, and suffering while living with inequality on a regular basis. I will also explain how improving the current state of racial communications between individuals in the community can change the lives of the community and society. Within the LGBTQ Community, there are several instances of racism, that are swept under the rug.
Ralph Ellison's "Battle Royal" is more than a short story about the hardships faced by an individual African-American male. Ellison utilizes the events experienced by his naive narrator in "Battle Royal" as symbols to depict the struggles and humility of African-Americans attempting to progress and to achieve success, and the satisfaction derived by white society in controlling and intimidating the black community. The foremost symbol in the story is the battle royal itself along with the blindfold, and the electric rug. The battle royal symbolizes the difficult struggle for equality for the black culture. By participating in the battle royal, the narrator learns that life is a struggle for survival; however, at this point he still believes in the philosophy that blacks can achieve success through education and hard work.
Waynick 1 Victoria Waynick Mr. Jones English 101 03 November 2014 Rhetorical Analysis of… In his narration “Black Men and Public Space” Brent Staples shows examples of racial profiling (stereotyping) and the risks, dangers, and the alienation of being the suspect associated with it. Staples uses Standard methods of development such as, argumentation (?) and exemplification to show a level of distrust as well as, fear towards the african-american male. Staples executes examples from his personal life to show his “ability to alter public space in ugly ways.” (Staples 314). Staples writes to the american society to show the nature of racial profiling that often occurred in the United States during his time.
Because of the omnipresent power struggle, Wright makes it clear that Bigger Thomas’s thoughts and beliefs are not just those of his own, but also representative of the thoughts and beliefs of the black community as a whole; in the end, this power struggle reflects upon not only the two communities as separate entities, but also about 1940’s society as a whole. Through the use of Bigger’s perspective, Wright clearly conveys that Bigger’s feelings and hopes for revolution are not just exclusive to him, but are representative of the black community as a whole. As Bigger rides a streetcar away from his friends, he observes the black people as he passes by, and the narrator explains: Of late [Bigger] had liked to hear tell of men who could rule others, for in actions such as these he felt that there was a way to escape from this tight morass of fear and shame that sapped at the base of his life. He liked to hear of how Japan was conquering China; of how Hitler was running the Jews to the ground; of how Mussolini was invading Spain. He was not concerned with
Critical Analysis Essay Scott Whitebird English 1301 Brent Staples In Brent Staples' "Black Men and Public Space", he talks to us about the stereotypes that he had to deal with being a black male and the ways he sometimes dealt with it. He uses several writing techniques to show us different things he wanted us to see or understand. In the first paragraph of this essay, Staples chooses a rather unique choice of words. When he says "My first victim" (Staples 314), the audience is led into thinking that this essay will be Staples talking about some type of criminal activity, when in fact he is leading us in a completely different direction. What is also unusual about this beginning sentence, is that Staples describes himself as an offender, even though he is the one being stereotyped.