An Analysis Of Coats The Black Family In The Age Of Mass Incarceration

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Shakur’s life through Coates' eyes Most people know Tupac Shakur just for his rap career, but he is known for one other career too—he is also a poet—Tupac Shakur’s poem collection, The Rose That Grew From Concrete. His collection is heavily revolved around his personal life and the systemic issues that drowned the African American community, which is also explored in Ta-Nehisi Coates’ essay, “The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration”. Coates’ dives into many matters that revolve around the mass incarceration of the African American community. They both have overlapping issues like, compounded deprivation, discrimination, incarceration and poverty. When looking at Shakur’s work with the aid of Coates’ analysis, we can have a deeper …show more content…

Shakur lived in the same timeline as some of the events mentioned in Coates’ essay, and this is something that should be acknowledged. Shakur struggled in poverty for the majority of his life, and in the community he lives in—he described a violent environment—and in Coates’ essay he writes about the clear line that divides the African American community with the white community. In which, Shakur and Coates seem to acknowledge and want the same thing, peace and equality. The poem from Shakur’s collection that illustrated his concerns about the matter was titled, The unanswerable?, and this poem only consisted of two short sentences, it states, “QUESTION: WHEN WILL THERE BE PEACE ON EARTH? ANSWER: WHEN THE EARTH FALLS, 2 PIECES! !” (Shakur 145). Shakur thinks the answer to the question is when the world gets divided into 2. Shakur might have a different meaning to this, but knowing the background of what time he was living in, concluding that Shakur meant this in a societal way does make sense. To say peace can only be achieved once 2 different communities are split into two would only make a reader assume the problem to be irremediable. And Shaukr isn't the only one who talked about this theme, Coates did too in Section VII. The side note at the start of this section wrote, “And so talking about a white middle class and a black middle class as …show more content…

One of the crime records that stood out from the other was on October 31st, 1993. Keep in mind that this was when America’s incarceration rates doubled again, which still went higher further on. Shakur was arrested for shooting a policeman in the leg and another in the buttocks. Reason being for his actions, Shakur was helping a black motorist who he saw was getting harassed by the policemen. He had chargers dropped as the policemen were intoxicated and were carrying guns stolen from the police evidence room (Margaritoff). Even though the policemen were off duty to be harassing a black civilian is inexcusable. If Shakur wasn’t there at the right time, who could have known what the two intoxicated policemen could have done carrying stolen evidence? This not only furthers our understanding of the community in which Shakur lived, but also gives us the insight of one of the many cases in which black people were treated unequally and discriminated against. And Shakur’s poems hold a lot of meaning, emotions, and insight into his daily community life, too. One of those many poems which showcased his life, one poem clearly described his life in a few words. In Life Through My Eyes, the poem talked about how he saw his life and where he thinks he sits in society, he states, “Life through my bloodshot eyes.

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