Response To Langston Hughes Theme For English B

A “Theme for English B” is a poem written by Langston Hughes, in 1949 during the Harlem Renaissance. In his poem Langston Hughes was able to raise the question to anyone who was struggling to find his or hers identity, I was able to relate towards the poem because I too struggle with my identity and what my goals are in life. Hughes was also able to express that two people can learn from each other no matter their race or gender, by trying to relate to his instructor, who is white.

In the mid-twentieth century, white people still upheld the idea that they were "the superior race." They treated other races as if they were inferior, and they demoralized them. Black people had a difficult time finding their true identity because of this. Langston Hughes, a colored American poet, expresses this idea in his popular poem, "Theme for English B."

When I first read Langston Hughes' poem "Theme for English B", I did not particularly like it. But after reading it a second time and discussing it in class, I came to appreciate the poem on several levels. The way Hughes describes the setting of Harlem/New York is brief, but evocative. He also gives us insight into the thoughts and emotions of the main character, the young "colored" student, and ends the piece with several thought provoking passages.

The Harlem Renaissance, America during the 1920s, was still a time of great difficulty -- even though many people today depict the 20s as a grandiose fun time. There was racism, from whites to people of color. It usually wasn’t the other way around, as white people have had the upper hand for the majority of history in the last hundred years. Langston Hughes understands racism, and has most likely experienced it because it is people like him who are often discriminated against throughoutand have been very much in history. He writes the poem, “Theme for English B,” which does not focus on the acts of racism but instead how he feels. As Hughes writeswrote, we all are part of one another, it is the simple way of

The “Poet Laureate of Harlem” as they called him was a very influential writer during the Harlem Renaissance (DISCovering Multicultural America, par. 2). He showed what life was like from his eyes and hoped that racial prejudice would stop once people understood what life was like for him. This is the story of Langston Hughes, who stood up for what he believed in and always fought for African American rights. Langston Hughes was an author during the Harlem Renaissance and he believed very strongly that African American people were not treated right, so he chose to write about racism and equal opportunities.

Langston Hughes is widely renowned for his ability to represent the struggle of the African American community through his poetry during the time period around the Harlem Renaissance. As a world traveler and successful African American man, he was able to use his fame to enlighten the world, namely the white population, on the inequality and abuse of African American population in the United States. Despite his own battle with unhappiness and inequality (Royster, 344), Hughes was able to capture and express the truth of the life of African Americans in his emotionally charged and beautifully written poetry. Contrary to many African American writers during this time, Hughes uses his poetry to display the reality of racism against African Americans and to express his desire for peaceful co-existence and change in America (Subhash, n.pag.). A large aspect of the popularity of Hughes poems is due to the passion and emotion he displays in his writing. Not only is Hughes honest in his representations, he also adds the real, personal perspective as someone who is “in the middle of the fire” and truly understands the world he is portraying in his writing. Two of Hughes major themes, which are evident in his poetry and vital to the deep emotional meaning he expresses, are the issue of racism and the importance of music in African American life and culture. “When the Negro Was in Vogue”, “The Weary Blues”, “Song for a Dark Girl”, “Trumpet Player”, “Dream Boogie”, “Motto”, and “I, Too,

Langston Hughes feels him a negro in vogue is big deal. He has the weight of blacks wanting him to say something and criticizing him if he does not seem as though he representing the black community correctly. Then, he has the bribery if whites who want him to spread their desires of standardization. Langston writes strictly about his life experiences in his poetry. While doing so he still tries to answer questions many of his fellow African Americans have. Maintaining his life experiences in his poetry is important to him because writing about things he has not gone through is conforming to the standards of the white man.

Before Chinua began writing, Langston Hughes was his mentor. Hughes helped Chinua create numerous books and win great awards such as, The Man Booker International Prize. In Theme for English B, Hughes is discussing what is true for Black and White Americans in his assignment, for his College english class. Hughes is African-American and his professor is White. Hughes finishes his poem by confessing that his professor is “somewhat more free” than him. Achebe is also African, from Nigeria. In his work, Colonialist Criticism, he discusses criticism on African-American texts by non-African-Americans. Achebe believes there is European parochialism.

Best known for bringing tough issues into his writing, Langston Hughes has an important place in the history of American poetry. Growing up as a young black man in southern America, he saw and experienced firsthand the struggles of a colored man trying to find his place in the world. As a member of the Harlem Renaissance, which was a group of black writers in New York City, Langston Hughes, helped lead the Civil Rights Movement. In Theme for English B, told from the point of view of a young black student, Hughes can relate first hand to the speaker’s struggles. Following this further, Theme for English B focuses on the interaction between a white professor and a black student whose assignment to “write down what comes out of him” forces him

In the poem Theme for my English B by Langston Hughes, a poem that demonstrates the struggle with identity and self-realization. The speaker of the poem goes through a journey from confusion to wisdom, which expands his ideas about racial tensions and segregation. The poem also shows how finding your identity can help you learn new things about yourself, and also about other people that you would never have known. Langston Hughes who was one of the most prolific writers during the 1920s and the 1950s, he was also a big contributor to both the Harlem Renaissance and the Civil Rights Movement. Hughes poems have contributed to helping people get through racial discrimination, segregation, and racial tensions during the 1950s.

In the current political climate, it seems that there is no room for moderation. You’re either watch one side or the other, and there is no room for the other’s side’s views. These political affiliations continue to separate Americans further and further apart, yet renowned African American poet Langston Hughes seemed to find a solution for these problem seventy years ago in his poem “Theme for English B,” where a young black student is tasked with writing an assignment for English class. Written in a time of great racial uncertainty, Hughes uses the seemingly innocuous experience of writing a paper to challenges ideas regarding the complexity of racial unity as Americans and encourages the exploration of a shared national identity.

We’ve have all experienced inequality in some way because we are all inherently different from another. However, do these minor differences justify prejudice and segregation? Is it fair to outcast members of a society because their circumstances differ from ours? These are the themes that Langston Hughes explores in his, Theme for English B. In the text, Hughes makes the statement, “will my page be colored that I write?” What he means by this is that just because he is colored, it doesn’t mean that he does not like the same things that people of other races like. This causes him to question if his page will be “colored” since he is not white; in other words, will the pigmentation of his skin determine the value of his paper? The message that he is portraying is that there is little difference between you and I and that we should not divide ourselves based upon appearances, and that it is wrong for other people to make assumptions about him based off the color of his skin. I do not think that his page will be colored because though he lived during the 1900’s when racism ran rampant, he was brown, a mixed race which was considered to be above being black at the time. Despite this disadvantage and lack of opportunities, Hughes became a successful and influential writer.

Langston Hughes, born in 1902, live through the most divisive part of American history. Hughes grew up during such a time when Jim Crow laws still existed in the South, prohibiting African Americans from mixing with Whites in public places. He was able to live through this and see the beginnings of the Civil Rights Movements. Compared to other poets before and of his era, who were predominantly White, Hughes is able to provide insight on the race relations between Whites and Blacks based on his experiences. While other poets, such as Walt Whitman, might have expressed disgust in their poetry in regard to the mistreatment of African Americans, it does not seem as genuine coming from them as it does coming from Hughes. Hughes was able to provide

The poem “Theme for English B” by Langston Hughes depicts an ebony adolescent adult who is endeavoring to decipher what is true in his life via an English assignment. As the only ebony man in his college English class, the verbalizer is not sure whether to take on the persona of a typical English student, regardless of race, or to stay true to his heritage and culture. The structure of this poem conveys a struggle for identity and truth in an expeditious-paced world whose conceptions are fluctuating.

On December 18, 1865, the 13th Amendment was passed and slavery was at last outlawed in the United States of America. However, while many American citizens take pride in their nationality as they believe that America is the land of the free, racial tensions have continued to exist despite the end of slavery 152 years ago. The American Harlem Renaissance poet, Langston Hughes, addresses the persistence of these racial tensions in his 1951 poem, “A Theme for English B.” Hughes’s poem about a colored college student’s experience in an all-white English class is still of great significance to this day as many of the issues addressed in his piece are still present in modern society, such as the topics of racial tension and the American identity.