Comparative vs Contrast
What it 's Like to be a Black Girl by Patricia Smith
Works Cited Not Included
An explanation in its purest form of “What it’s like to be a Black Girl (for those of you who aren’t)” by Patricia Smith, is just that, an explanation. From the first three syllables “First of all,” the author gives a sense of a story being told. She uses jagged sentence structure and strong forceful language to also show the reader the seriousness of her topic. Smiths poem gives the audience an insider’s view into a young black girl’s transition into black woman-hood at a time where both being a black girl and a black woman was not as welcomed.
Puberty is usually defined by the biological changes a young boy or girls body undertakes around the age of 9 up until about 14. “It’s being 9 years old and feeling like you’re not finished,” writes Smith, “like your edges are wild, like there’s something, everything, wrong.” (Smith, 4) These thoughts have run around the minds of almost every puberty stricken youngster. However, Smiths subject seems to also have the added pressures of a racially jagged soci...
first of all, it’s being 9 years old and feeling like you’re not finished, like your edges are wild, like there’s something, everything, wrong, it’s dropping food coloring in your eyes to make them blue and suffering their burn in silence. It’s popping a bleached white mophead over the kinks of your hair and primping in front of mirrors that deny your reflection. It’s finding a space between your legs, a disturbance at your chest, and not knowing what to do with the whistles, it’s jumping double dutch until your legs pop, it’s sweat and Vaseline and bullets, it’s growing tall and wearing a lot of white, it’s smelling blood in your breakfast, it’s learning to say **** with grace but learning to **** without it, it’s flame and fists and life according to Motown, it’s finally having a man reach out for you then caving in around his fingers.
(2011, 03).
Works Cited Not Included
An explanation in its purest form of “What it’s like to be a Black Girl (for those of you who aren’t)” by Patricia Smith, is just that, an explanation. From the first three syllables “First of all,” the author gives a sense of a story being told. She uses jagged sentence structure and strong forceful language to also show the reader the seriousness of her topic. Smiths poem gives the audience an insider’s view into a young black girl’s transition into black woman-hood at a time where both being a black girl and a black woman was not as welcomed.
Puberty is usually defined by the biological changes a young boy or girls body undertakes around the age of 9 up until about 14. “It’s being 9 years old and feeling like you’re not finished,” writes Smith, “like your edges are wild, like there’s something, everything, wrong.” (Smith, 4) These thoughts have run around the minds of almost every puberty stricken youngster. However, Smiths subject seems to also have the added pressures of a racially jagged soci...
first of all, it’s being 9 years old and feeling like you’re not finished, like your edges are wild, like there’s something, everything, wrong, it’s dropping food coloring in your eyes to make them blue and suffering their burn in silence. It’s popping a bleached white mophead over the kinks of your hair and primping in front of mirrors that deny your reflection. It’s finding a space between your legs, a disturbance at your chest, and not knowing what to do with the whistles, it’s jumping double dutch until your legs pop, it’s sweat and Vaseline and bullets, it’s growing tall and wearing a lot of white, it’s smelling blood in your breakfast, it’s learning to say **** with grace but learning to **** without it, it’s flame and fists and life according to Motown, it’s finally having a man reach out for you then caving in around his fingers.
(2011, 03).
Cited: (2011, 03). Comparison Paper of Child of the Americas by Aurora Levin Morales and Whats It Like to Be a Black Girl by Patricia Smith. StudyMode.com. Retrieved 03, 2011, from http://www.studymode.com/essays/Comparison-Paper-Of-Child-Of-The-628599.html