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:star:Analysis of Literary Language:star: - Coggle Diagram

- - - - The Ballad of Birmingham
        
        "For when she heard the explosion.
        Her eyes grew were and wild
        She raced through the streets of Birmingham
        Calling for her child"
        
        In the "Ballad of Birmingham", Dudley Randall described the tragedy of the Birmingham church bombing through rhyme, emphasizing the terror that occurred during the Jim Crow Era
      - Incident
        
        "AT the CROSS TRUSSED like a CHRISTmas TREE,
        a FEW men GATHered, WHITE as ANgels in their GOWNS"
        
        In "Incident", Natasha Trethewey highlights the fear of a racist tradition by the KKK through the use of rhythm. She begins the stanza with a harsh rhythm, marking the beginning of the burning of the cross. Then, she switches to a softer rhythm, putting an emphasis on the way this seemed natural during the Jim Crow Era.
    - - If We Must Die
        
        "If we must die, let it not be like hogs
        Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack,
        Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!"
        
        In "If We Must Die", Claude McKay calls for action to all the men and women who face racial discrimination to take a stand. He does so through a volta at the end of his poem.
      - A Litany for Survival
        
        "So it is better to speak
        remembering
        we were never meant to survive"
        
        In "A Litany for Survival", Audre Lorde uses free verse to call for action. By using the free verse, she breaks the "norm" for poetry, ending off her poem with a message: why should we conform to these norms if we don't belong?
  - - - "God was lonely. So he made me
        My father loved me. So he spanked me."
      - In "Mnemonic", Li-Young Lee alludes to the Biblical idea that a father disciplines the child he loves. Even if there's a spiritual confusion about discipline, Lee claims that even when a memory is painful, it Is still sweet.
    - - "Teach me a better strain, a nobler lay,
        O Thou, enthroned with Cherubs in the realms of day!"
      - In "On Virtue", Phyllis Wheatley asks God to guide her towards spiritual peace and heaven. She alludes to the idea of nobility, a trait that represents divine figures, and cherubs, celestial beings found within religious literature.
    - - "I
        lucille clifton
        hereby testify
        that in that room
        there was a light"
      - In "Testament", Lucille Clifton recalls the moment she experienced divinity first-hand. She alludes to the idea of the light, a prominent symbol across religions representing God.
- - - - "Women respond to racism. My response to that racism is anger. I have lived
        with that anger, on that anger, beneath that anger, on top of that anger, ignoring that anger, feeding upon that anger, learning to use that anger before it laid my visions to waste."
      - In her essay, The Uses of Anger: Women Responding to Racism, Audre Lorde connects to the Black Feminist Response to Oppression by showing how Black women transform the pain of racism into power, awareness, and resistance. She explains that anger is not simply destructive; rather, it becomes a tool for survival and change.
    - - "For women, the need and desire to nurture each other is not pathological but redemptive, and it is within that knowledge that our real power is rediscovered. It is this real connection which is so feared by a patriarchal world. Only within a patriarchal structure is maternity the only social power open to women."
      - In her essay, The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House, Audre Lorde highlights the importance of solidarity, emotional support, and community among women as sources of resistance and empowerment. She argues that women nurturing and supporting one another is not a weakness or pathological but instead something redemptive that helps women reclaim their power in a society shaped by patriarchy.
    - - In her essay, Theory as a Liberatory Practice, Bell Hooks emphasizes the importance of creating and sharing feminist theory as a way to challenge sexism and inequality; feminist theory should not exist only in academic spaces, but should help inspire real social change
      - "We must actively work to call attention to the importance of creating a theory that can advance renewed feminist movements, particularly highlighting that theory which seeks to further feminist opposition to sexism, and sexist oppression. Doing this, we necessarily celebrate and value theory that can be and is shared in oral as well as written narrative."
  - - - "I came to understand that in the United States, land of the fabled American dream, it is un-American to be a refugee.
        The refugee embodies fear, failure, and flight."
      - In his essay, Being a Refugee, an American — and a Human Being, Viet Thanh Nguyen connects to the theme of loss of identity because it shows how refugees are often reduced to negative stereotypes instead of being recognized as individuals with cultures, histories, and personal identities. Nguyen explains that in the United States, refugees are only defined by their displacement and suffering rather than by who they truly are.
    - - "Where are you from? people still ask me, but the answer is not simple. I am from a place beyond the scope of any map or road atlas. I am from a house of borrowed things... I am from nomads who moved in search of water, carving a home wherever they ended up like water carves its shape into rock. I am from a wild
        hope, a blinding courage, a blur and madness uncharted by any cartographer. I am from a land unmapped and entirely my own."
      - In her essay, A Map of Lost Things, Jamila Osman shows the struggle of defining oneself after displacement, migration, or cultural separation. Instead of belonging to one clear homeland or culture, Osman feels caught between different places, histories, and experiences.
    - - "Papá was about to dig in when I insisted we say grace, proudly announcing I would read a special poem I had written as a prayer...None of them understood a single word of my prayer in English. 'Bueno, ahora en espaňol porfavor,' tío Mauricio requested, and I had to do an impromptu translation of my prayer in Spanish"
      - In The First Real San Giving Day, Richard Blanco highlights the tension between language, culture, and belonging. Blanco proudly reads a prayer in English, showing his adaptation to a new culture and language; however, his family cannot understand it, which creates a disconnect between him and his culture.
  - - - "We have always known that the plants and animals have their own
        councils, and a common language. The trees, especially, we recognize
        as our teachers. But it seems no one listened that summer when the
        Pecans counseled: Stick together, act as one."
      - In The Council of Pecans, Robin Wall Kimmerer highlights the relationship between nature and humanity by showing nature as a source of wisdom and guidance. Furthermore, Kimmerer suggests that plants and animals are not separate from humans, but instead are living beings with their own councils and common language.
    - - "The jackfruit rinsed us clean of any worry about how we'd be
        treated in this country that felt familiar and unfamiliar to me."
      - In the Jackfruit chapter of "Bite by Bite", Aimee Nezhukumatathil emphasizes the connection between nature and humanity by showing how nature, specifically fruit, can provide healing and comfort during moments of uncertainty.
- - - - "And it was as though he had been lifted out of his isolation, back into the world of men"
      - In the short story by Ralph Ellison, he describes the situation of a black men who had traveled to Wales on a military trip. Unexpectedly, he finds himself being accepted by the Welshmen. It is an experience unfamiliar with the man, as he is isolated from other American army men.
    - - "Our meals, our actions, were only a shadow
        of what had already happened there, a lagging ghost of where Mr. Pirzada really
        belonged."
      - In the short story by Jhumpa Lahiri, she describes the situation of Mr. Pirzada, a man displaced from his home due to war. However, Mr. Pirzada finds himself within the hands of a welcoming family, encountering a home far away from home.
  - - - “I will go where the whale will guide me. Bendiks dove then, into the sea, to let the whale consume him. To let the ocean overtake him. He would become immortal.”
      - In the short story, Talia Lokuri uses the motif of the whale to symbolize hope: follow the whale and be consumed by it. Millions of Americans feel stuck; some even think of themselves as being tied down by the chains of society. So what if we were to chase that whale? What if we were to allow ourselves to become a part of it? I believe it would mean taking grand leaps into our pursuit of happiness.
  - - - "My weight shifts, and with it, gravity seizes me. My husband’s face falls away, and then I see the ceiling, and the wall behind me. As my lopped head tips backwards oﬀ my neck and rolls oﬀ the bed, I feel as lonely as I have ever been."
      - In the short story, Carmen Machado uses the violent image of her head falling from her body to symbolize how misogyny destroys women's autonomy and identity. The ribbon represents the one boundary the unnamed woman possesses, and yet the husband's extreme obsessiveness takes that away from her.
    - - "At fourteen, she has the kind of beauty that makes the local pastor blush. Male teachers pretend not to notice her as they watch to see who is watching her; the female teachers dislike her confidence."
      - In the short story, Krys Lee portrays a girl who is not treated as a person, but rather as an object constantly observed and judged by male desire, symbolizing the destructiveness of misogyny. The fact that even the pastor blushes suggests that the male desire intrudes everywhere, even in a place meant to be holy.
    - - “When your body takes up more room than your voice you are always the target of well-aimed rumors, which is why I let my knuckles talk for me. Which is why I learned to shrug when my name was replaced by insults. I’ve forced my skin just as thick as I am.”
      - In the novel, Elizabeth Acevedo portrays Xiomara's efforts to combat the way she is sexualized, highlighting the destructiveness of misogyny. Xiomara is treated like a sexual object, and it changes who she is and how she thinks about herself. As a victim of misogyny and sexism, Xiomara learns that her voice is not enough and that she will be judged and stereotyped based on her body.