Just Walk On By Brent Staples Essay

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Brent Staples, who was a journalist for the New York Times, and studied mental philosophy from the University of the Chicago, shows the different subject position in his published version of the “Just Walk on By: A Black Man Ponders His Power to Alter Public Space”, and his own memoir in 1994 of the “another version of ‘Just Walk on By’”. Brent Staples wrote two different versions of the essay, but the each essay’s subject position delivers pretty different meanings and messages to the readers. If the reader reads this essay without the title and the author’s name of the writing, those two personal essays look like entirely different to the readers. Also, each subject position of these essays makes the same event vary. Dissimilar perspectives …show more content…

Each different tone makes dissimilar essays to the reader by explaining same events. Furthermore, the published version in Ms. Magazine in 1986 of Staples essay ”Just Walk on By”, and his memoir release in 1994 of the Staples “Another Version of ‘Just Walk on By’” have different tones relates to subject positions and it changes the angle of victim and wrongdoer in two separate essays. The memoir version of the article has quite the offensive tone to the reader and observer, but published version in Ms. Magazine in 1986 has the entirely defensive tone to the reader and listener. As the reader’s view, these differences are quite clear to understanding with examples of the essays.

In Brent Staples “Just Walk on By: A Black Man Ponders His Power to Alter Public Space” (Published Version in Ms. Magazine in 1986):
I was surprised, embarrassed and dismayed all at once. Her flight made me feel like an accomplice in tyranny. It also made it clear that I was indistinguishable from the muggers who occasionally seeped into the area from the surrounding ghetto. (Staples 240 - 241)

In Brent Staples “Another Version of ‘Just Walk on By’”(his memoir in

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