Essay Sample on Application Exercise: Narrative/Book Analysis

The book "Between the World and Me" is more of a letter in which the author Ta-Nehisi Coates writes to his fifteen-year-old son. The book provides profound and awakening thoughts about the concerns of Black Americans. Through the letter, Coates provides an elaborate framework for understanding the nation's pressing painful history of racial discrimination. Ta-Nehisi Coates describes his feelings, thoughts, realities, and symbolism associated with the lives of African Americans in the form of a letter to his son (Montoya 55). Throughout the book, he explains how racial discrimination has been woven into Americans' history and culture; this means that the book takes the form of a book-length letter that adopts the book's structure by Baldwin's "The Fire Next Time."

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Ta-Nehisi's Letter is structured in the form of three parts, and the tone of the book is poetic and is primarily guided by Coate's life experiences including growing up in a low-income family. The first part of the letter describes Coate's life in a ghetto which helps him understand the difference or the gap between the blacks and the whites in the United States of America. The second part of the letter describes a scene of police brutality; he begins writing about the murder of Jones and develops hatred and rage toward the police and the white Americans. Basically, the last part of the letter reflects the Black Americans' power and ends by describing and discussing the assault meted on the Black Americans by the whites. This essay seeks to analyze racism, black bodies, American culture, dream, education, and the American exceptionalism concepts, as Coates explained in his book "Between the World and Me."

The Concept of Racism

The book "Between the world and me" is referred to by many as the book of the race, but the writer argues that "Race itself is flowed, if not useless, concept –it is, if anything, nothing more than a pretext for racism." He also says that "Race is not the father but the child of racism." Primarily the idea of racism has been an important element in America's history since, in most cases, it was used in self-identification. Through the letter to his son Coates explains how his life used to be when he was growing up in America as a Black American. He also tries to advise him on how to live as an African American in America. The book also provides an exploration of the effects of racism on the life of Black Americans from history to the present modern society.

Throughout the book, Coates presents the idea that race comes from social constructions. Hence social constructions develop the realities that one ends up experiencing. In his childhood, Coates writes that he witnessed the control and fear of oneself that comes from racism, this is because, in his life on the streets, he was constantly worried about his physical being more so in the hands of authorities. Coates writes that "To be black in the Baltimore of my youth was to be naked in front of the elements of the world." For example, when he was in his sixth grade one white boy pulled a gun on him and then pulled it back again, this means that racism was deeply rooted in the lives of Americans and Black Americans lived with fear because they were perceived to be the minority group. The acquaintance of the police officers involved in the killing of Prince Jones was also a reflection of how the state treated the blacks in the colleges and universities.

The Dream

The Dream is one of the significant concepts in the book "Between the World and Me," Coates explains how the American dream is built on Black Americans' oppression. Though traditionally, the American Dream provides its citizens with platforms of equality and freedom in which they can achieve prosperity and success as long as they toil hard, this is total contradictory towards the book between the world and me. In his book, Coates emphasizes that America was not created on the foundation of freedom and equality instead of the oppression and the exploitation of the African people (Aaouinti-Haris). He states that "for so long he wanted to escape into the dream, he eventually found that it was not an option because the Dream was rested on the backs of the black people and the bedding made from their bodies."

The exploitation and oppression are deeply and primarily implicated in the aspiration of the Black Americans' security and material success. Coates says that the Dream is not in existence without racial injustices, because white Americans have strongly benefited from African Americans' brutal treatment. Coates refers to "Dreamers" as those people who buy into dreams. This notion demonstrated the difference between the whites and blacks, the dreamers and the non-dreamers, and the prosecutors and prosecutors. Dreamers are characterized by their choice of living in fancy houses and their customs and believes in the false myths of the history of America. While at the University of Howard, Coates realizes that he had created his Dream, one which symbolizes perfection for all the Black Americans. In his Dream, he realizes that others only wrong the African Americans. In conclusion, he writes that Dream is deeply rooted in white supremacy and exclusionary.

Education Youth and Growth

It is not surprising that the book "Between the World and Me" focuses on the concept of education, growth, and youth. Coates demonstrates how young youths are not afforded the same childhood experience as whites’ youths. The black youth are subjected to racism, while the white youths are imagined and portrayed as innocent and require special treatment and protection. In his letter to his son, Coates describes how his childhood life took place in the shadow of unfair and brutal treatment in Baltimore's ghettos. He says that "To be a black youth in Baltimore was to be naked before the world's elements, guns, crack, rape, knives, and disease." Coates demonstrates how also the education system in Baltimore and up to college was structured to provide him with less inspiration and was only meant to "discipline" the blacks. He says "I sensed the schools were hiding something, drugging us with false morality so that we would not see, so that we did not ask: Why––for us and only us––is the other side of free will and free spirits an assault upon our bodies?" His education, especially in the university, was remarkable and extensive to the extent that it looked like an extension of his work and reading. Education teaches him not only America's history but also teaches him different approaches of thoughts and love.

Black Bodies

Throughout the book, Coates extensively deals with the concept of black bodies. He argues that "The questions of how one should live within a black body …………………..is the question of life." He states that black Americans were subject to violence, lynch, rape, and shackles, among others throughout American history. In his book, Coates also demonstrates how racism, manipulation, and exploitation lead to the fragility of the black bodies within the setting of a racist community. He reflects on the fragility of the black bodies back to slavery and colonialism. He says, "Our stolen bodies were worth four billion dollars. The concept of Black bodies helps to explain and demonstrate how the black people were being treated both during the colonial period and beyond the present day. He explains that black Americans were treated like disposable bodies in American society; this makes Coates struggle to think that there is no justice after death. During his time at Howard University, Coates emphasized the Black Americans' physical beauty describing it as attractive and stylish. He says "Even though black bodies are inflicted on violence, black embodiment remains a site of power and beauty."

Conclusion

The three-part essay of the book "Between the World and Me" is both piercing and sweet to the reader. Based on the essay, Coates mainly focuses on the above-discussed concepts which are racism, education, black bodies, and Dream. He explains that the American dream is primarily built on oppression, segregation, and exploitation of the African people. He uses strong and complex words that are inspiring and motivating through his experiences and others. Coates uses a specific narration to create a message of advice and empowerment to his son to prepare him for the inevitable as long as he lives within American society. The book reflects Coate's personal experience more so the struggles he underwent during his childhood.

Works Cited

Aaouinti-Haris, Asmaa. "Re-Presenting Black Masculinities in Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Between the World and Me." (2018). https://mdsoar.org/handle/11603/8765Montoya, Roberto, Cheryl E. Matias, and Michele McBride. "Between the World and Me." Multicultural Perspectives 19.1 (2017): 53-57.

Williams, Dana A. "Everybody's Protest Narrative: Between the World and Me and the Limits of Genre." African American Review 49.3 (2016): 179-183.