Between the World and Me

how does Coates describe the dangerous nature of living in his African American body

how does Coates describe the dangerous nature of living in his African American body

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One of the most salient components of the text is that the black body is constantly under threat. Racism, Coates writes, is a visceral experience. Throughout American history, black men and women were shackled, beaten, tortured, lynched, raped, and sprayed with high-power firehoses. Now, they experience police brutality and senseless shootings - being shot for holding a toy gun, shot for listening to loud music, put in a chokehold for selling cigarettes, arrested and restrained for trying to enter their own home. It is the subtle ways in which a black body must comport itself in public. It is the Dreamer-created "killing fields" of the urban ghettos where blacks navigate neighborhoods beset by crime and poverty. Violence is a constant in a racially divided America.