Figurative Language In Raising A Black Boy

Raising a black boy, or a child in general, has become a challenge in America. Through the use of figurative language, Clint Smith shares his personal experiences and opinions about how the amount of melanin in a person’s skin shouldn’t determine whether they should live. Figurative language is a speech or sound that creates a certain effect. By using anaphora, consonance, polysyndeton, and imagery Smith allows the reader to feel what he feels, visualize what he experienced, and understand an undeniable struggle.

The most effectively used language is anaphora. Anaphora is the repetition at the beginning of successive sentences or clauses. During Smith’s speech, he repeats something his father once told him, “Son, I'm sorry, but you can't act the same as your white friends. You can't pretend to shoot guns. You can't run around in

Smith inserts the following description: “[ … ]when I was around 12 years old, on an overnight field trip to another city, my friends and I bought Super Soakers and turned the hotel parking lot into our own water-filled battle zone. We hid behind cars, running through the darkness that lay between the streetlights, boundless laughter ubiquitous across the pavement. But within 10 minutes, my father came outside, grabbed me by my forearm and led me into our room with an unfamiliar grip.” The description of Smith’s experience helps the audience develop a visual of a moment of clarity in Smith’s life. Smith relates to the audience by sharing this personal experience. When Smith uses words such as, “boundless laughter” the scene created seems fun and normal, but the scene changes to aggression and fear when he says, “my father came outside, grabbed me by my forearm and led me into our room with an unfamiliar grip.” The final image that is created felt unsafe, and although Smith was uncertain of the reason, his father fully understood why it was necessary to remove Smith from the