Carroll 1 Sydney Carroll Mrs.

Hampton American Literature October 10, 2012 Period 1 Life In Harlem During the Harlem Renaissance era, many African Americans migrated to Harlem from the South to explore new opportunities and to freely express themselves culturally. This movement revealed the pain endured by African Americans through music and literature. In the poem Harlem, Langston Hughes vividly describes his life by pointing out hardships within his community. This poem indicates how African Americans couldnt prosper in life due to racism. Langston Hughes hopes to create guilt and anger so that people can stand up for what is right and speak out against the daily issues in their neighborhoods. Hughes utilizes general literary devices of metaphors, personification and isolation to address racism, social injustices, and poverty. Langston Hughes uses metaphors in order to expose the realities about racism. In the second stanza, Hughes writes because we are colored. Hughes reveals how African Americans were treated due to the color of their skin. The word colored is being compared to a persons appearance. This quote is definitely a metaphor because it is applying to ones physical appearance even though the actual skin tone is not literally colored. Langston Hughes states here on the edge of hell to express how difficult and messed up his life is that he compares to hell. It is true that Langston Hughes grew up in the time where most black people didnt have a voice, which made life dreadful but not to the point where he s literally living in hell.

Carroll 1 Sydney Carroll Mrs. Hampton American Literature October 10, 2012 Period 1 Life In Harlem Langston Hughes uses personification throughout the poem to address the message of social injustices. His use of personification is stated in the last stanza where he writes In the face of what we remember.