Not My Business

The protagonist of the poem is Rosa Parks, a seamstress and an active member in the local NAACP, who refused to give up her seat for a white man. Parks was arrested, which led to a boycott against Montgomery bus system. As a result of more than one year of boycott, the segregation law was announced unconstitutional.

The young man in the poem loses his identity as he develops into the ruthless world of adulthood with its dehumanizing competition of ‘money-hungry, back-stabbing’ and ‘so-and-so.’ These exaggerated words and clichés

Throughout the poem, the author chooses simple diction. This makes the tone straightforward and blunt, like a black America who simply expresses himself instead of sermonizing about discrimination. Thereby, readers can accept the poem’s argument more easily. Furthermore, the author writes the poem mostly in long sentences to emphasize on short yet important sentences such as “That’s America.”, “Be we are. That’s true!”

A large portion of this poem is comparing the difference between black and white. In the poem it practically says “what if all the black is now white, and all the white is now black?”, then goes on to give some examples like “Black Presidents,

Secondly, the speaker of the poem can be described as underprivileged, and this is shown throughout the entire poem. For example, line 1 of the poem it states "some are teethed on a silver spoon” and line 5 it states "some are swaddled in silk and down”. This shows that the speaker is not the same as the person who is teethed on a silver spoon or cared for very carefully. This inclusion also shows that the speaker was not born into a wealthy family and so the speaker must fight for what they need pertaining to themselves and the family.

Alliteration and metaphors are two major elements of this poem. The repetition of consonant sounds and alliteration occurs throughout the poem. All of the lines strongly use the repetition of consonants and alliteration except for lines two and seven. In addition to that, the controlling figure of speech in this poem is a metaphor. It is strongly articulated in the first line, and as the one continues to read, it is amplified and extended throughout the rest of the poem. The metaphor compares mask of Line 1 to the fabricated emotive facades that African-Americans had made use of in order to avert provoking their oppressors.

However, the narrator’s story takes a turn for the worse when the world ever so slowly and subtly becomes more harsh towards him and slowly makes him feel even more exiled, till finally, he feels completely cut off and invisible to society. As he began life as the “model” black citizen but was then thrusted into invisibility by the preconceived ideas of those around him and himself. Not to mention the narrator begins to feel

In one way it is symbolic of the African Americans' struggle for equality throughout our nation's history. The various hardships that the narrator must endure, in his quest to deliver his speech, are representative of the many hardships that the blacks went through in their fight for equality.

Throughout the poem, the poet also establishes a theme, created by W.E.B Dubois, that African-Americans live a double consciousness of being black and being American at the same time. The poet celebrates the two sides of the African-American experience as hate and love, pleasure and pain. In the beginning of the poem, Claude McKay describes that America

In one way it is symbolic of the African Americans’ struggle for equality throughout our nation’s history. The various hardships that the narrator must endure, in his quest to deliver his speech, are representative of the many hardships that the blacks went through in their fight for equality.

Poetry has a role in society, not only to serve as part of the aesthetics or of the arts. It also gives us a view of what the society is in the context of when it was written and what the author is trying to express through words. The words as a tool in poetry may seem ordinary when used in ordinary circumstance. Yet, these words can hold more emotion and thought, however brief it was presented.

Race plays a big part in this poem. He speaks on Harlem and its culture and this environment but also about mutual interest with people

The author develops the theme of this poem that white men desire expansion for the greater good of the people through diction and repetition. First, the writer uses diction to both illustrate his theme and connect with the reader. There are many uses of formal diction scattered throughout this

The speaker is uniquely portrayed in this poem through certain qualities that he possesses: being observant and being detached. All positive and only positive events that have occurred in the citizen’s live are recorded by the government; no negative events are to be found in his life. The speaker takes special note of the citizen’s military service (Line 6), perfect employment (Lines 7-8), Union participation (Lines 9-11), social life (Lines 12-13), newspaper customs

“Not My Business” is about four people who are standing up for what they believe in and they are getting arrested by the government to stop them from speaking out. In the last verse the man who is trying not to get involved because he doesn’t want to get punished but when they come after him his attitude changes. Niya Osundare who is a Nigerian poet of whom uses his poetry to speak out against the cruel dictatorship that ruled his country.