How do the poet’s response to racially motivated violence and racial stereotypes compare with one another? Support your answer with evidence from the text.

Question

The poems chosen are "The Lynching" and "Mulatto"

Answer 1

In The Lynching, Claude McKay describes the aftermath of what used to be a normal event. Black slaves were lynched and burned which is exemplary of racially motivated violence. The morning after such a ghastly event, white women and children went about their day without a second thought about the bodies swinging from the tree branches.This is reinforced in the text when McKay refers to the children as "lynchers that were to be' thus denoting the sense of normalcy felt during this era.

In Mulatto, Langston Hughes describes a boy of mixed race; a product of a white man and a black woman. The boy exclaims "I am your son, white man!" The text following this describes the inner turmoil this young man faced not knowing where he fit in. He was faced with being treated with racial stereotypes when he didn't belong to one particular race. It is made obvious that the boy feels alone in a world of black and white and he is referred to as "yellow."