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Alexis Cooper

Professor Noone

ENGW 103

3/7/18

“Between the World and Me” – Ta-Nehisi Coates: The Black Body in America

Ta-Nehisi Coates’ book, Between the World and Me, has a strong theme throughout the

writing that highlights the struggle of being black in his world. Coates emphasizes his anger at

the existence of a black man in America, discussing the vulnerabilities and stresses he has

personally experienced. In this letter to his son, he explains how black bodies have historically

been enslaved, profiled, and oppressed. Slavery, racism, and discrimination have been displayed

throughout American history with events like the Slave Trade, Jim Crow Laws, Brown v. Board

of Education, the Civil Rights Era, etc., and today black people are still dealing with unjust

circumstances.

One of the most prominent components of the text is that the black body is constantly

under threat. From being enslaved to now being under continuous surveillance and threat, black

people are subject to struggling to survive in America. This is due to the extensive amount of

racism that has been occurring throughout history. Racism is mainly enforced through the

damage and oppression of the black body. Coates makes it a point to say that racism is the cause

of race, a construct that has been created for white people to maintain superiority. Coates says:

“Racism—the need to ascribe bone-deep features to people and then humiliate, reduce, and

destroy them—inevitably follows from this inalterable condition…But race is the child of

racism, not the father." (p. 7) At this moment, Coates is referring to how white people have the

desire to make themselves look and seem superior to those who are not like them. If one is not
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white, he is to be treated differently and stripped of his dignity. Coates continues to tell his son,

Samori, of the ways people have been slaughtered and reminds him that he is not safe in his

country, nor will he ever be. When Coates says: “And you know now, if you did not before, that

the police departments of your country have been endowed with the authority to destroy your

body. It does not matter if the destruction is the result of an unfortunate overreaction. It does not

matter if it originates in a misunderstanding. It does not matter if the destruction springs from a

foolish policy,” (p. 9) he is telling his son that nothing will matter in any given circumstance. The

police have the authority to destroy his body without probable cause. This is the struggle of being

black in America. Parents of minorities, especially parents of black males, are forced to give their

children the talk of surviving an encounter with a police officer. People are tired of all of the

unjust killings, but due to the systematic racism the

country has established against minorities, they are

stuck in the repeated cycle of struggling to exist.

Coates offers a view of hatred towards the black body, of how the American culture

thrives off of destroying the black body. He says: "In America, it is traditional to destroy the

black body – it is heritage." (p. 103) With saying this, he expresses that it is the routine and

casualty of America to treat black individuals unfairly on all spectrums. White people profit off

of black people and still do today. For example, with police brutality, officers can shoot and/or

kill an unarmed black individual and is placed on administrative leave. It has become so

common, that no one realizes that the dehumanization of black bodies is a business for America.

There is protest after protest for there to be change, but it has left many wondering if they’ll be
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next to lose their body. The image displayed was taken at

a Ferguson protest, after the shooting and killing of Mike

Brown, a black man that was wrongly profiled. His death

caused a lot of outrage and is just one of the many

examples of the destruction of the black body. Coates

continues this idea of destruction by saying: “There is no them without you, and without the right

to break you they must necessarily fall from the mountain, lose their divinity, and tumble out of

the Dream” (p. 105) With the fact that America was founded genocide and enslavement of people

who were not white, this statement is saying that without those very two acts America would be

nothing and that the white man thrives on the destruction black people.

There are various themes in Coates’ book, but it seems that every theme can all come

back and connect to the black body. Coates shows how racism is driven by the regulation,

manipulation, and exploitation of black bodies. This theme explains how black people have been

treated – and still are treated – within American society. In the book, readers are shown that what

it means to be black in America is to struggle and to have the constant fear of the destruction of

one’s body. Coates’ assessment of black existence in America is shadowed by slavery and of the

present reality of mass incarceration and police brutality. No matter how much success or class

privilege black people gain, no black person in America is ever safe from the constant threat of

violence.
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Works Cited

Coates, Ta-Nehisi. Between the World and Me. First edition. New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2015.

Ludwig, Mike. “Several African-American men share with Truthout their stories of abuse at the

hands of police, and after 12 days of continuous demonstrations against the shooting of

an unarmed teen, Michael Brown, it appears that the community is in it for the long

haul.” Why the People of Ferguson Can’t Trust the Cops, Truthout Report, 21 August

2014. http://minagahet.blogspot.com/2014/08/stop-killing-us.html (Image 1)

Olson, Scott. Getty Images. “Demetrus Washington joins other demonstrators protesting the

shooting death of teenager Michael Brown on Aug. 14, 2014, in Ferguson, Mo. Brown

was shot and killed by a Ferguson police officer on Aug. 9, 2014.” Ferguson March.

Retrieved from https://www.theroot.com/2-years-after-ferguson-mo-the-fight-grows-

goes-on-f-1790856337 (Image 2)