Tag Archives: Trayvon Martin

Open Season on Young Black Men

Hilaire Belloc satirically advocates dire punishment for childish misbehavior except when it comes to guns. The NRA would approve.

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“Everybody Wants a Black Man’s Life”

Toni Morrison’s “Song of Solomon” offers a vision of hope for targeted black teens.

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Whoever Degrades Another Degrades Me

Whitman’s “Song of Myself” calls us to imagine the experience of the Other, just as Obama asked us to imagine the perspective of young black men.

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Vague Identity Adjectives Killed Trayvon

Novelist Susan Bender says that a literary understanding would have prevented the Trayvon Martin killing.

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Trayvon Was an Invisible Man

The racial profiling at the heart of the Trayvon Martin killing is captured nowhere better than in Ralph Ellison’s “Invisible Man.”

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Ellison’s Invisible Man, Always Relevant

Ralph Ellison’s “Invisible Man” remains relevant, including to the Trayvon Martin case.

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Vigilante Films Responsible for Trayvon?

Trayvon Martin’s death has Americans rethinking the vigilante film.

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Could Beowulf Have Saved Jews?

In her book about Eichmann, Hannah Arendt praises the Danes for how they stood up to the Nazis. One can draw a parallel with how Beowulf stands up to Grendel and also apply the lesson to the Trayvon Martin case.

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Trayvon Martin, Another Emmett Till

The killing of Trayvon Martin reminds me of Emmett Till and a poem written about Emmett’s youthful innocence.

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