Letter To Son Summary

Coates provides readers with a lesson in American history and explains to his son that race is not reality, but that “Americans believe in the reality of ‘race’ as a defined, indubitable feature of the natural world” (Coates 2015; 7) He brings the reader inside the America in which he lives. He argues that “America’s problem is not its betrayal of ‘government of the people,’ but the means by which ‘the people’ acquired their names,” meaning that America has only ever represented and supported white people, that America was founded on a system of racial bias (6). He draws attention to the struggles that peoples of color, especially black people, have faced. Those struggles generate fear, which is one of the main ideas in the

In 2015, the Atlantic magazine published, “Letter to Son” by social journalist, Ta Nehisi Coates. This essay, framed as a letter to his son, addresses social injustice towards black men in America, and how it affects their opportunities for a better life. Coates supports this claim by stating personal accounts and empathizing with black men. He also emphasizes the outcomes of slavery, and the lasting negative effects they continue to have on the black community. Its purpose was to cause the audience to feel a sense of sorrow toward the slaves. He adopts a solemn tone to get his primary audience, black men, to side with him. Coates also supports this claim by repeating phrases in order to highlight their importance. The purpose of his essay

It's a lyrical book, and a rage-filled one, and its angry poetry makes it all the more compelling. Coates returns again and again to certain touchstones: his father, his time at Howard University (a largely black university in DC), his experiences with black people who had attained bourgeois respectability, the "dream" of white, middle-class America, and his all-consuming fear as a black man in America that the state, the police, could take his freedom or his life. This fear is at the center of the message he wants to convey to his son. He wants his son to understand it, to be cautioned by it, to refuse to let it tame him, but to never forget it and put himself in needless risk. It's an agonizing conundrum, and agonizingly told, and viscerally conveyed. Coates rips away the cliches of the discussion of race in America and goes for nuance and contradiction over easy answers. It's a revolutionary manifesto, a love note from a father to a son, and a long and glorious tale all in one. listened to Coates read the book in a DRM-free audiobook edition, and I thoroughly recommend it. Hearing a memoir read by its author, especially one with such a fine reading voice, is surely the best way to experience

The recently awarded 2015 National Book Award for Nonfiction author, Ta-Nehisi Coates, has stirred quite some debate over the author himself and the issue on race in America. He is harsh and direct when it comes to commenting on the political policies in America or even the president. Much of Ta-Nehisi Coates’s works are affected by his life living in America as a black person. The violent and “fearsome” life he has lived became the only form of life he is acquainted to. As a result, he strongly believes that white supremacy dominates, a condition which will never cease to be. Hope – being a central element to the black moment – is absent in his projections; this hopelessness in Coates’s works is a center of discussion to the critics. There exist strong supporters of Coates who applauds him for his truthfulness and there are some who view him as a pessimist and a cynic. All the while, Coates defends himself by saying that he is simply a realist who refuses to hide behind the blind naivete like the rest.

Coates makes in-depth and precise arguments while including basic human morals that inform one of the many ways African Americans were mistreated. Coates also shows many ways of how America tries to cover up their wrongdoings by exploiting them in his article. Coates demands reparation in the most brilliant and flawless way, every chapter was a build up of the previous chapters sharpening the readers understand of the wrongdoings of America. Reparation is demanded because of the hardships of slavery, neighborhood segregation and Jim Crow laws in the

Yet, Coates makes it clear to his son that although his life may always be in danger, he must never be afraid to be himself. This is a conversation more parents need to have with their children. Too often black kids are too afraid to be themselves so they act in ways they believe the whites will approve and that just leads to a life of unhappiness. Consequently, Coates makes a great point in telling his son that his life is not required to go in this manner. Ultimately, I took away various lessons from this text to help myself grasp a better understanding of how I should navigate the world that is not entirely built for me.

Ta-Nehisi Coates is a journalist, blogger, and memoirist incorporates historical comprehension to exhibit America’s most disputed issues, especially racism. His work has been published in local and national papers, including: Village Voice, Washington City Paper, Washington Post, New York Times Magazine, Time Magazine, The New Yorker, and The Atlantic, where he is currently a national correspondent. The Atlantic is a literary, cultural, and political editorial magazine. It targets a national audience as well as

This theme helps illuminate how black people came to be treated in America both when slavery existed and beyond into today’s society. The theme that black people are disposable bodies within American society. Because of the tradition of treating black people as objects or whose value strictly came from their ability to make profit, the idea of what it means to be black in America is imbedded in the danger of losing one’s body. Although slavery has ended, the racism remains as a violence inflicted on black people’s bodies. Coates is more than happy to emphasize that racism is an instinctive practice.

The novel starts with Coates addressing his son, Samori.He begins recounting a time when he was invited on a talk show and the host asked him what it meant to lose his body, looking for an explanation as to why Coates “felt that white America’s progress, or rather the progress of those Americans who believe that they are white, was built on looting and violence.” This turned out to be a very heavy, intense, and loaded question. Coates went on to explain to his son that America was built on the oppression, abuse, and exploitation of black people, of their bodies, which only intensifies the hypocrisy of the democratic foundation that America prides itself on. The recent murders of Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Renisha McBride, and other black people and “the destroyers who were rarely held accountable” prove that the disregard and mutilation of black bodies is embedded in America’s DNA, and no one gives it a second thought. The American “dream” that is built on the purity and innocence of wanting happiness was only ever made plausible by the oppression of black people, who still struggle to achieve that dream because they were abused into a life of silence and fear. “The Dream rests on their backs, the bedding made from their bodies.” Coates went on to explain how this history of exploitation and the fear that’s been rooted into the lives of black people in America followed him throughout his schooling and on the streets of his neighborhood. The schools that he was sent to discouraged black children, rather than encouraging growth and facilitating a healthy learning environment. The streets were carefully orchestrated for self defense. You had to protect yourself, because you knew the law wouldn’t. At Howard University, “the Mecca”, the excitement of witnessing the diversity that flooded the

Coates’ allegory of the “Dreamers” and their detrimental impact on the lives of African Americans in the US is highlighted with this declaration: “But do not pin your struggle on their conversion. The Dreamers will have to learn to struggle themselves, to understand that the field for their Dream, the stage where they have painted themselves white, is the deathbed of us all” (151). Coates is essentially claiming that the people who refuse to live in reality are subsequently robbing those who do because they instill a sense of false hope and unrealistic expectations that make every injury inflicted upon the African American community hurt even more. By extension, Coates is affirming that living in the moment rather than always thinking about the future and how to make things better is the most authentic route to happiness. Much of the misery in life derives from people in power abusing the privileges society has granted them, and the exploitation of black people in American society has solidified the idea that civilization breeds barbarism in Coates’ mind. This is further supported by Coates’ assertion that, “The enslaved were not bricks in your road, and their lives were not chapters in your redemptive history. They were people turned to fuel for the American machine” (70). This image of black lives being chewed up and spit out by industrial America is visceral and jarring in that it shows a complete failure on the civilization’s part to protect and raise its citizens to a more prominent status and improve their lives. To Coates, the ideas of patriotism and “the Dream,” or

Racial injustice and Black oppression is a topic seen in every newspaper and on every news station today. A topic considered taboo in most social situations, is taken on by Tu-Nehisi Coates in “A Letter to My Son”. Coates creates an environment of familiarity, acceptance and relatability for the reader by using powerful words choice and language that invokes emotions. Vulnerability and anger from his experience incorporate a personal view and stake in the heated topic which is enhanced by a letter which eases tension on a heated topic.

One of the most powerful messages encountered in the book is the importance of valuing yourself as a black being in a predominantly white and racially divided society. Coates explains how despite the fact that this nation has been built on the bones and bloodshed of blacks, the black body has lost almost all

Between the World and Me is Ta-Nehisi Coates’ book written as a letter to his son, Samori that entails Coates’ hardships of being African-American and the racial injustices he experienced in America. Although Coates explains his experience of racism as an African-American, he does not impose solutions or actions on the racial inequality he describes in the book, but instead asks questions and addresses his concerns. It is unknown why Coates, who is known to be a “solutionist” in his essays in The Atlantic, did not give any solutions in his most popular book to date. The book’s skepticism does not settle well with his audience, nor does its content resemble Coates’ previous articles or works. From these differences, how should we view Coates as an activist and an author? How do we reconcile these differences in his approaches to writing that amount to the differences in his

America is supposed to be the land of opportunities. A place where you are free to do anything and become whoever you want to be but this does not apply to everyone. One of the reasons for Coates disagreement is the permanent racial injustice in America. People might think that the war between black and white people is over but this is not true. Daily, we can see many cases about racial injustice like when a white man with power treats other black workers as if they were inferior to him. Not only white people treat black people this way but there are many other cases in which you can see black folks discriminate white folks and this can also be seen through public media. Coates thinks that the war between black people and white people will be a permanent one, and because of this, he is also afraid that his son needs to be more prepared for the

America is seen as the country of liberty and equality; however, internal conflicts ruin such perceptions of America. Ta-Nehisi Coates writes about an American internal conflict of racial inequality in his open letter “Letter to My Son”, which was published by The Atlantic on July 4th in reference to Independence Day. He claims that the American Dream that many citizens strive for is creating a racial gap in socio-economic equality. Throughout Coates’s open letter to his son, Coates uses his ethos appeal as an educated individual and pathos appeal as a loving father in order to build up his convincing argument of African-American inequality and to appeal to his intended audience, who are parents of all ethnicities; however, his lack of logos and use of situational experiences weakens his argument due to the lack of compatibility with his intended audience.