Discrimination against the African-American community reached its peak in the early 20th century. There had been many writers who emerged during the Harlem Renaissance, a movement about celebrating black arts and blackness. Langston Hughes was a popular author who emerged during this time and his work is still relevant today. Hughes talked about what it was like to be a black man in America in the early 20th century. He discussed important issues such as discrimination through racial segregation. Langston Hughes exemplifies discrimination through racial segregation in his poems “Children's Rhymes,” “Let America Be America Again,” and “I, Too.” Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Langston Hughes illustrates racial segregation in his poem "Children's Rhymes." The title suggests that the poem foreshadows the subject as something sweet and fun to sing. Instead it is a black child's perspective on life. The child narrator states that “I know I can't/be president” (Hughes, lines 4-5). The narrator knows that because he is black, he will not be able to live out his dreams as he would like. The child knows that he will not be able to do the work of a white man and these “racially negative experiences pose a threat to a stable and salient social identity” (Chae). President of the United States is a prestigiously white title. It is the symbol of a man in power and the freedom to run for president. This is something a black man cannot physically do due to segregation laws. Black children and white children couldn't use the same bathroom, let alone argue about being the next commander in chief. In lines 6-8, the child narrator exemplifies his frustration: “What doesn't bother / those white kids / sure bothers me?” :' (Hughes). Black kids get the short end of the stick in segregation laws. White kids' worlds are completely different. White kids don't have to worry about segregation. Richard Wright provides an example relevant to this line in his autobiographical short film, “The Ethics of Living Jim Crow: An Autobiographic Sketch.” When he was a child, he and his friends were involved in a war against white boys. The black boys got their ash and ash volley, but the white boys “responded with a constant bombardment of broken bottles” (Wright). The white children had trees to hide behind and the black children only had the ash blast. This shows that during segregation the white community always had the biggest advantage. They have been given the best tools in life. White children don't care about what they have, but black children are bothered by the disadvantages they are purposely given. The narrator ends the poem with a question to the foundations of America: “Freedom and justice--/ Huh! —For everyone? (lines 14-15). The essence of the word “freedom” is to be free from oppressive restrictions. The word “justice” is about peace and a genuine respect for people. It is ironic to use these words as a slogan for America, as the narrator questions whether freedom and justice are truly for all. Jim Crow laws are literally the opposite of what America should stand for. If it were for everyone, and not just white Americans, there would be no oppression, racism, discrimination, or existence of racial segregation. The poem is a stark description from an innocent child's point of view of the reality of being black in a white man's America. This definitely bothers him. Hughes illustrates racial discrimination through segregation in his poetry“Let America Be America Again.” The narrator of the poem describes the image of an America that is free, but has not had the experience of being a black man. This can be seen in lines 3-5, “Let him be the pioneer on the plain/ Seeking a home where he himself is free/ (America was never America to me)” (Hughes). The narrator refers to a time in history when America was welcome to all kinds of pioneers to explore the new land and make a new life out of it. It has been celebrated as a melting pot of cultures. Then the narrator mentions how America was never the America the white man experienced. Minorities, the black community, have never been considered equal human beings. The narrator correlates with this line of thought when he states that "he" was "torn from the thread of black Africa and came / to build a 'homeland of the free'" (Hughes, lines 49-50). This is a reference to how his ancestors were torn from their free land in Africa and forced into slavery to become the workforce to build America. The use of quotation marks indicates the sarcastic tone in that sentence. A theme in this poem is racial segregation and the sarcastic remark of building the house of the free emphasizes how the narrator does not feel free. Referring to the poem “Children's Rhymes,” the narrator questions whether freedom and justice are truly for all at the end of the poem. This poem, “Let America Be America Again,” seems to answer this question by stating that he has never experienced America. The narrator "speaks of the freedom and equality that America boasts, but never had" (Presley) in lines 63-64. The speaker wants “the land where every man is free./The land that is mine: of the poor, of the Indians, of the negroes, of ME” (Hughes). This is the potential that America has, but it has not lived up to that potential. More than one ethnicity is discriminated against. This poem illustrates the opposite of the freedom America claims to have. The pioneer at the beginning of the poem, at the beginning of America, represents the freedom that America once had. Racial discrimination with the arrival of slaves only made the situation worse. America prides itself on being a land of diversity, but anything other than the white man is not celebrated. The narrator points out that neither he nor his ancestors experienced the freedom of America that the white man experienced. Hughes illustrates racial segregation in his poem "I, Too". The title itself plays an important role in the poem because it sums up the poem well. It affirms the narrator's recognition and very existence. The choice of the word “too” is interesting because the reader can easily hear “two”. This “shifts the ground towards someone who is secondary, subordinate, even inferior” (Ward). This perspective is relevant because the poem talks about how the black, inferior, and unequal man is treated. Throughout the poem, “Hughes presents the miserable conditions of the Negroes by expressing his authentic emotions and says that it is not only the white man who is American” (Subhashe). In lines 2-3, the narrator states that “I am the darkest brother./ They send me to eat in the kitchen” (Hughes). The speaker presents himself as the voice of the black community by using the word “the” instead of implying “one of.” This would leave the word “they” as a term for the opposite race, whites. This immediately refers to the issue of racial segregation. The narrator refers to slavery when kitchen slaves were sent to stay in the kitchen when any kind of company came. They were not invited to sit and eat at the dining table because the black community was not seen as equal but inferior to the white race. This racial segregation, whites and blacks visibly”.