Brent Staples, Just Walk On By: A Black Man Ponders His Power to Alter Public Space
Brent Staples(1951- ) was born in Chester, Pennsylvania and earned a B.A. from WidenerUniversity in 1973 and a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1977. He hastaught psychology at various colleges and has been a reporter for The ChicagoSun-Times and The New York Times, where he currently writeseditorials about culture and politics. Staples also contributes to otherperiodicals, including Literary Cavalcade, Columbia Journalism Review,and the Los Angeles Times. Among his frequent topics are race relations,the effects of the media, and the state of education. His memoir ParallelTime: Growing Up in Black and White (1994) won the Anisfield-Wolff BookAward in 1995. "Just Walk On By: A Black Man Ponders His Power to AlterPublic Space essay was first published as "Black Men and PublicSpace" in 1986 in Ms. Magazine.
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QUESTIONS WITHIN THE CONTENT
- According to Staples, what goes into "the making of a young thug"?
- According to the author, what is dangerous about seeming dangerous?
STRATEGY AND STYLE
- In the first paragraph, the author describes himself as "a broad six feet two inches," in other words he is a fairly large man. What effect does this decision have on the rest of the essay? What would he lose if he chose not to describe himself?
- In terms of rhetorical mode, discuss this piece as either an exemplification essay or as a cause and effect essay.
- Staples uses onomatopoeia (thunk, thunk, thunk) to describe the sound of people shutting their car door locks. What other ways could he have conveyed this information? What is effective about the way he decided to present it?
- Just from the title, what's infamous about it? How can young men relate Staples's use and description of this title to the author's views about race?
http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/0072469315/student_view0/brent_staples/_nbsp_.html
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