Ta-Nehisi Coates Between The World And Me

722 Words2 Pages

TIn the novel Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates, he identifies many issues with the American system and the affected it has on the black community. He demonstrates these challenges through many anecdotes in his book that talk about the disposition of the black culture in America. During the time of revelatory experiences, engagement in education, and the love at the infamous Howard University, Coates goes through a self-searching journey to find out who he is in a society that hates the human shell he walks in. The challenges he begins to identify are significant to understanding the mistreatment of black people. From the Civil War battlefields to the villages in France, Coates begins to recognize how these problems have continuously …show more content…

Coates emphasizes his internal struggle with this predisposition as a black man in America when he truly did not know himself. He makes his audience and his son question: How can the black body succeed in a society that wants the bodies to do the exact opposite? Towards the end of the novel, the audience soon figures out that the journey of stories that tackle the fear and anguish of a community have turned into understanding and liberation. Being a black person in America will be tough for the time being, but being black is not a disadvantage. Between the World and Me, illustrates how the African American individual can learn, live, and gain a true understanding of self, even in situations of …show more content…

This sense of vulnerability spoke to the fear of not knowing who you are among your own community. Coates grew up in violence and rage and that wasn’t what he wanted to be. There is this stereotype that black people are mad at the world. The struggle we have is not with the world, but with each other. In a university where intelligence is pouring out of every single student, the internal fight of self-discovery comes to light and you must fight to differentiate yourself from everyone else. Fighting amongst against one another but cannot identify who you are is a sense of vulnerability. The vulnerability of putting yourself in a situation where you must self-assure yourself in your community is difficult. The educated is strong and that can lead to an understanding of the world. Coates talks about how the realization he made on his journey was “This heap of realization was a weight. [He] found them physically painful and exhausting….”. This self-fulfillment allowed him to have a difference perspective on the world. Understanding who he is, he acknowledged his role the world. Though his finding, the audience was able to understand that “…there was no inherent meaning of black blood. Black blood wasn’t black; black skin wasn’t even black….”. This spoke to me because I realized that my blackness was not some

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