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Hansol LeeEnglish 123Professor A. KingsleyApril 10. 2015.Final Draft- 1-Harlem Renaissance is the culture of sorrow because African American race were suffered from America. Langston Hughes is significant poet in that trend, and his poems are describing how African American was treated discriminatingly in white-American society. In modern times, African American had experienced sorrowful age, and a lot of poets sublimated their emotion as a poem. Langston Hughes was one of them and he wrote many poems which shows their sorrow, victim mentality, and racial discrimination as who excluded by society. In America, African-Americans were just a kind of latent dangerous elements and criminal. When the crime happened, at first African American were suspected, because people had a prejudice that African American was in lower class. That was normal racial discrimination of America’s Society at that time. Society’s prejudice and oppressions carved trauma in African-Americans’ heart. Langston Hughes’ poems, “Black Maria” and “Silhouette” show the injustice and irrationality that they experienced. Harsh realitiesThe black Maria that I see-But I hope itAin’t comin’ for me.In the first poem, “Black Maria”, author worries that the Black Maria is coming for him. His heart is full of cares, but music playing on upstairs. At the finish, author asks ‘did you ever see the sun?’ to someone. In this poem, the Black Maria means black police car that transport arrested people. Author afraid of that car is coming to him.But that music playin’ upstairsThe music means that the police car’s siren. Author is in hiding downstairs to avoid Black Maria and music. He asks to someone that did you ever see the sun, and it means he have never seen the sun, and he always hide in downstairs to avoid society’s prejudice. However, on the other hand, it could be interpreted as a kind of hope because even his miserable, he loves new day’s dawn.In the second poem, “Silhouette”, it described more cruel reality about African-American’s treatment in society. In this poem, the African-American, called ‘black man’, describes like a criminal. Author says to white gentle lady that they-means Dixie- just hung a black man and be calm.They've just hung a black manThe description is simple and saltless. This shows the black man’s dead like not a big deal.They've hung a black man(…)For the world to seeHow Dixie protectsIts white womanhood.Just to protect white hood woman, Dixie hung black man on the roadside tree for the world can see. The title ‘Silhouette’ means the hanged man’s silhouette. It is from the point of view of Dixie, white man who speaks to gentle lady that they tried to protect her from the black man. In this poem, African-Americans are just latent criminal and victim of prejudice. Those poems are significant because it shows plainly that how the African American was suffered by the prejudices and race discrimination of American society. Langston Hughes appeals African-American’s racial traumas that suffered unfairly through poems.- 2-The most significant point of Langston Hughes’ poem is the race. It is the most fundamental theme of Langston Hughes’ poems, because the Harlem Renaissance culture which he led was begun from racial problems. The background of Harlem Renaissance was African American’s great migration from the country to city. After the World War 1, a lot of intellectuals such as Alain Locke led the Harlem Renaissance, and American had interested in African American’s culture. Langston Hughes is also one of those intellectuals and he believed that there would be bright future for African American when after they endure modern American society’s racial prejudice and oppressions. This belief was showed in his poem ‘Black Maria’. One the other hand, he also tried to accuse American society’s racial injustice through to his poem “Silhouette”. Through to those poems, Langston Hughes sent a message about racial injustice in America and shows the bright future of African American. For that reason, it is impossible that talking about Langston Hughes’ poems without racial factor. There are a lot of scholars who study and analyze about the relationship between Langston Hughes’ poetry and race. James Fountain’s article, Langston Hughes and the Spanish Civil War. Explicator, analyzes Langston Hughes’ poem “Postcard from Spain” as ‘against fascism with its spread of color prejudice and race hatred and working class oppression.’(221) Fountain analyzes that Langton Hughes’ racial point of view. Fountain also cites Langton Hughes’ speaking :We Negroes of America [ . . . ] are tired of a world where, when we raise our voices against oppression, we are immediately jailed, intimidated, beaten, sometimes lynched . . . I say, we darker peoples of the earth are tired of a world in which things like that can happen. And we see in the tragedy of Spain how far the world oppressors will go to retain their power . . . . (344–345) (222)Fountain analyzes that Hughes links poverty with racial prejudice as a European two-prong plug that could potentially be adapted to conduct power United States. (222) He also analyzes that Spain provided Hughes with simple, symbolic tools that he used to expand the polemical debate on race and subsequently injected his verse with these sentiments.”(222) Hughes also reported that with the advent of the Spanish Civil War, there was no prejudice.(222) Fountain distinguishes his report as ‘African Americans could for the first time envisage an end to racial prejudice’, (222) and it was significant event.In another article, 'I Knew that Spain Once Belonged to the Moors': Langston Hughes, Race, and the Spanish Civil War., written by Isabel Soto, analyzes Spanish conflict also. She argues that inscribing race at Spanish conflict enables us also to recover a key player in the enslavement of African men and women in the early modern period and to enrich Gilroy's hugely influential paradigm. (130) Soto also situates Langston Hughes’s writings on Spain and its civil war within these two recuperative endeavors—the reevaluation of inter-war African American literary production and of the black Atlantic paradigm—both articulated under the sign of race. (142)Rick Brown, the writer of Bitter Jazz in Langston Hughes's DREAM BOOGIE, analyzes that Langston Hughes exposes the racial misery through to his poem “Dream Boogie”. Brown finds racial injustice and source of Jazz from Langston Hughes’ poem. He says ‘The opening selection from Hughes’s celebrated 1951 long poem Montage of a Dream Deferred, the piece presents an ethereal scene in which an African-American speaker tries and fails to conjure an understanding of racial injustice in an indifferent listener.’(295)George Fishman introduces Langston Hughes’ life story and his achievement in his article, Langston Hughes: Working-class voice for equality, peace and socialism. Fishman emphasizes Langston Hughes’ achievement which related in race, class, and freedom. He comments Langston Hughes as ‘out time’. He says: ‘His linking of his writing with the struggles against racism, working-class exploitation, poetry, war and capitalism is of first rate importance today […]. His writing will continue to be deeply inspiring in the struggle through the achievement of socialism in our land. Through it all, the life and writing of Langston Hughes are unbending in their inclusiveness.[…]’Fishman argues that the heart of Langston Hughes’ word is ‘Dream of freedom’. It is the freedom from race, class, poetry, and conflict. He comments Langston Hughes’ poems gave invaluable support to the resistance and equality struggles of the African American people in the South and in the North in 1960s. Fishman analyzes that Langston Hughes sought basic solutions to oppression.The most of Langston Hughes’ poems are based on the resistance against racial injustice. It was caused from his experience of his youth, but he did not lose the sympathy for life, positiveness, and the dream. His poetry is blue, and describes the racial injustice and discrimination. However, meanwhile, his poetry has warmth also. This small warmth made the people to overcome their racial unfair.BibliographyFountain, James. Langston Hughes and the Spanish Civil War. Explicator. 2013, Vol. 71 Issue 3, p211-214. 4p.Rampersad, Arnold, and David Roessel, eds. The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes .NewYork: Vintage Classics, 1995. Print.Soto, Isabel. 'I Knew that Spain Once Belonged to the Moors': Langston Hughes, Race, and the Spanish Civil War. Research in African Literatures. Fall2014, Vol. 45 Issue 3, p130-146. 17p.Brown, Rick. Bitter Jazz in Langston Hughes's DREAM BOOGIE. Explicator. 2012, Vol. 70 Issue 4, p295-299. 5p.Fishman, George. Langston Hughes: Working-class voice for equality, peace and socialism. . March 29 2002- 3-1. Langston Hughes. "Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain". Description: The video of describing Langston Hughes’ view about race of African American and it encouraging their racial pride. PDF Original text.2. Laurie F. Leach. Langston Hughes: A Biography. Description: The biography of Langston Hughes. This book introduces his life and background of his poetry. References his youth.3. Joel Brouwer. 'Black Maria': Verse Noir. Description: References in-depth analysis about Langston Hughes’ poem “Black Maria”. Also, references the meaning of word ‘black maria’.4. C-SPAN. Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston & the Harlem Renaissance Writers. Description: The video of Harlem Renaissance and this age’s famous writers. Participants talks about Langston Hughes as a Harlem Renaissance writer.5. Shane Vogel. The Scene of Harlem Cabaret: Race, Sexuality, Performance. Description: More in-depth analysis about Langston Hughes. Relation between Langston Hughes, race, and queer poetics.6. Peter N. Carroll. The Odyssey of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade: Americans in the Spanish Civil War. Description: Langston Hughes’ trace in Spanish Civil War. And the American’s position in Spanish Civil War. ................
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