What I Learned from “Between the World and Me” by Ta-Nehisi Coates

I initially hesitated to write this post here because (1) its the first blog post of some random Asian-American girl, who cares? and (2) I wasn’t sure if it was even my place to say anything. But, after sitting on this uncertainty and learning more about ally-ship and activism, it just did not sit right with me to knowingly wait until “the right time” to post other “less controversial” content (when lives should not be controversial period). Black Lives Matter right now and always. As an ally, especially as an Asian-American, where there are of course multiple intersecting racial boundaries, it is more important than ever to speak rather than to be silent. We are going to make mistakes as allies. That’s okay. As we lend our voices to the movement, we can learn from our mistakes and actively listen to the Black community. Of course, this means to hold me brutally accountable if I misspeak, get something wrong, or am woefully ignorant. Give it to me straight. Correct me. The entire point of this website is to learn. I post this piece here not because I want to ~show off to everyone~ (since the concept of virtue-signaling is an unfortunate product of social media activism right now). The inclusion of this post is because what I want to blog about, in general, is media, life, and how both these factors influence each other. So, to censor myself from speaking on how this particular piece of media affected me, to not speak at all, would be false and antithetical to what I believe in. There is power in media, storytelling, and giving voice to the tangled feelings inside us. I am not an expert, and I cannot speak to the trauma and experiences of the Black community. But I can amplify Black media and speak on the lessons I’ve learned by reading and watching more diverse stories. We start off with Between the World and Me.

First of all, I want to emphasize that this post will be much more of a analytical reflection rather than a review of Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and Me. I make this distinction not to say that the work should not be taken seriously as a form of art. I say this because in the current situation surrounding George Floyd’s murder, police brutality, the Black Lives Movement, and the countless other crimes and injustices committed against the Black community — it doesn’t feel right to negatively critique a work of this nature when we should be uplifting Black voices and amplifying Black stories, narratives, creatives. This is not to say do not critique ever, because art needs to be analyzed and dissected as much as it needs to be experienced as a whole. Instead, I am merely prefacing how this blog post will focus more on what I’ve learned by reading this book given the current context and that I will only be addressing common criticisms rather than injecting my own. In consolidating my feelings and thoughts on narrative works, I have found that it makes the takeaways much clearer for me and solidifies the reading experience into lessons and learning opportunities. From these blog posts, I can only hope that it can help you do the same. As Coates himself says in the novel:

“I wanted to learn to write, which was ultimately, still, as my mother had taught me, a confrontation with my own innocence, my own rationalizations. Poetry was the processing of my thoughts until the slag of justification fell away and I was left with the cold steel truths of life.”

While I will not be writing poetry, I also believe in this same sentiment — that although language is imperfect, putting words to experiences help to make sense of our lives as we hunt, incessantly, for some truth. Let’s dive in.

To provide some context if you haven’t read the book yet, Between the World and Me is an epistolary novel of letters from Ta-Nehisi Coates to his son. This format lends the novel an intimate, almost paternal tone to the content, and it gave Coates’ words a raw sort of honesty. He speaks directly from his experiences as a Black American man, and I found this forward way of presenting reality as it exists to be part of the reason the book was so powerful. He sounds world weary, and when the book discussion veered towards the concepts of Afro-Realism vs Afro-Pessimism, I found myself surprised at the critical reception this book received for its tone. Where I had only seen steel and strength in admitting to an uphill struggle, there also existed interpretations that this admittance was a resignation and thus fatalistic. This opened up a new avenue of perspectives for me, because I had never considered how, in conveying the generational trauma of the African-American struggle in a manner that suggested oppression was inevitable, Coates was speaking of a hopeless future. There was also criticism towards how Coates spoke through a distinctly Black male gaze, and again, I was again surprised because it was that same paternal father to son format that, to me, lent the book a personal , intimate power. I had to distance myself from own initial perceptions towards this novel, and think critically as to why there were these dissonances in interpretations. From engaging in open conversation on these topics, here are my observations alongside Coates’ own writing.

For one, since there exists so few diverse published authors in comparison to their white counterparts, each voice that manages to be heard from marginalized groups carries a burden and expectation of having to cover more ground. Speaking deeply into particular subjects or diving deep into one specific narrative is a luxury, as diverse authors have to squeeze the most out of their 15 minutes of widespread publishing fame. So, in generalizing the Black experience, criticism towards the book focuses on how Coates falls into the same danger he warns of:

“The Dream thrives on generalization, on limiting the number of possible questions, on privileging immediate answers. The Dream is the enemy of all art, courageous thinking, and honest writing. And it became clear that this was not just for the dreams concocted by Americans to justify themselves but also for the dreams that I had conjured to replace them.”

With these lines, Coates claims that creating alternate dreams in contrast to reality is just as much of a delusion as buying into The Dream. When noting this in comparison to concepts such as Afro-Futurism, or even applying it activism, I found myself also wondering if such bold words are truly dangerous and counter-productive to change. And, one has to ask if Coates’ piece itself is ironically an example of providing an immediate answer, one that says struggle is all that is left. It feels complicated and contradictory because this theme becomes something that unravels and branches off into more discourse on the discussion of art, of representation, of the concept of race itself—until tackling this topic is so nebulous that one needs to interpret the place of stories and humanity as whole. It’s intimidating. However, I think the concept of The Dream is part of an important conversation, and its dangers are made more easily understood and grounded by how Coates applies them to his own experience and life. As we spoke more deeply into this topic, I found that a lot of the conclusions from this idea that counter dreams are equally dangerous because they are responses to white supremacy to be unavoidable. Of course, these dreams are reactionary to white supremacy and oppression; there is no way to address a future without taking into consideration the past. Yet, is that inherently wrong or worse than no dream at all? This, in turn, begets an investigation into if hope itself is futile. And on and on and on we go. As such, though Coates speaks from a distinctly Black male gaze, I found that the topics he speaks of are broad investigations into the nature of hope, one that is informed by his own life, but does not necessarily generalize. What he speaks of here, concerning the delusion of Dreams, is that of the human construct of race, and that does not reduce the struggle of the Black community so much so as it provides an understanding for struggle as an unfortunate human condition. It contextualizes his struggle as something existing in an unfortunate overarching narrative. Thus, discussing the nuance of what it means to have representation and diversity in media, many of the conclusions we reached were that if Coates were to speak towards an intersectional struggle he himself did not go through, such an action would dilute this overall message. This is because Coates would have to apply his struggle in the opposite direction, towards more specificity, in which all that he could do is provide a shallow attempt to speak for Black women or Black LGBTQ+. Therefore, what I learned was that, while criticism towards the lack of widespread media on intersectional struggles is something that must be addressed, an attempt to speak towards unexperienced struggles would also, in of itself, have been an insidious form of generalization. The power that comes from Coates speaking so honestly about his own perspectives left such deep impressions on me not because it was supposed to teach me everything about every Black experience, but because its lack of clear answers pushed me to investigate and seek out resources for myself.

Next, in having this work feature descriptions of violence and oppression as being inexplicably linked to the concept of race itself, Coates’ story proposes no answers, no rallying cry, no particular inspiration. By only laying out the landscape of his experiences and speaking of his own lessons, he makes it so that his work is, first and foremost, deeply personal. I also came to understand why the criticism that his perspective leans more toward Afro-Pessimism is valid, since the words “struggle over hope” can make the fight for progress seem futile and much of his narrative focuses on the physicality of the Black body — prompting us to also question if Blackness as an identity is inherently informed by violence, or if that would mean to reduce Black culture as only pain. Following this point, Coates even explicitly says “it is traditional to destroy the black body — it is heritage.” Using these ideas of oppression being inevitable to life in the present/future because of ingrained traditions from the past, there exists this element of constant, irredeemable struggle. Coates himself mentions how the creation of a narrative, that “the enslaved were not bricks in your road, and their lives were not chapters in your redemptive history,” is disillusioning. He tells his son: “You must resist the common urge toward the comforting narrative of divine law, toward fairy tales that imply some irrepressible justice.” Putting this all together, these words can seem damning; he speaks of triumph in any capacity as playing into the same enslaving system because success within oppression is only through the oppressor’s approval. From this sentiment then, we can go on to ask: is hope useless? Is the future cursed because the past has already scorned the present? Coates doesn’t tell us any easy answer—of course, doing so would be antithetical to this work—but I found how he addresses how the depth and breadth of how struggle exists to be particularly interesting. For instance, first, Coates focuses on the physicality of violence and the direct way that enslavement occurs:

“But all our phrasing—race relations, racial chasm, racial justice, racial profiling, white privilege, even white supremacy—serves to obscure that racism is a visceral experience, that it dislodges brains, blocks airways, rips muscle, extracts organs, cracks bones, breaks teeth.”

But at the same time, he also addresses how plunder exists as not occurring singularly, and this concept shows most clearly in his example of Prince Jones. The plunder, Coates says, was not just of Prince’s life, but the effort that went into his upbringing, the time invested into loving and educating and raising him. He also shows how the plunder exists as both on an individual and generational level through this quote:

“‘Slavery’ is not an indefinable mass of flesh. It is a particular, specific enslaved woman…’Slavery’ is this same woman born in a world…in which these same professors hold this woman a slave, hold her mother a slave, her father a slave, her daughter a slave, and when this woman peers back into the generations all she sees is the enslaved.”

By describing this woman with such life, detail, personality, Coates shows what a disservice to life it is to not look at enslavement on a personal, human level, and at the same time, he examines how this disservice continues to perpetuate itself in the generations to follow. This quote, in combination with how he also establishes that “history is not solely in our hands,” showcases the effects of slavery as being pervasive on every level—individual and generational, body and spirit, life and legacy. Coates shows how these are also all connected when he says “…our bodies are our selves…my soul is the voltage conducted through neurons and nerves...my spirit is my flesh.” The plunder, then, is both grand and minuscule. It is something threading through family trees as generational trauma, but it also exists in the very bone and blood of bodies. While the reality of this is depressing, it is a reality that Coates outlines for his son as a way to survive. Coates addresses the differences of passing on this message of survival between him and his father (namely through violence), and subsequently the difference between him and his son. And, though there is a world-weariness that exists within him, he still goes on to say to his son:

“But already you have expectations, I see that in you. Survival and safety are not enough. Your hopes—your dreams, if you will—leave me with an array of warring emotions. I am so very proud of you—your openness, your ambition, your aggression, your intelligence. My job, in the little time we have left together, is to match that intelligence with wisdom.”

In this, the premise of this novel—that of being letters from father to son—is once again relevant to this conversation. This book may be imperfect, but it never needed to perfectly address every facet of the Black experience in the first place, . It offers the barest glimpse of the reality that Black people face every day in this country. But from here, from this admittedly bleak admission of reality, what we choose to do with this knowledge, lies on us. Again, Coates says “history is not solely in our hands.” As allies, we need to educate ourselves to fulfill our part in changing the present, and we can do so by consuming more diverse media, by seeking out the narratives of intersectional struggles that Coates didn’t speak of, by  critically engaging with these stories and asking more upon more upon more questions. This is art at its most powerful—not only on how it speaks of life, but also because it prompts us to evaluate our current existences, mindsets, biases. Maybe the answer really is just the struggle, but acknowledging our role in The Dream is better than indulging in ignornace and complacency.

In all, I found that Coates’ power resides in his ability to eloquently ground nebulous, intangible concepts by showcasing how they manifest physically in life. I found that his way of describing The Dream, and how he outlines his journey and evolution and education, is why this book is required reading. It is human and honest to the core. The criticism towards the book’s hopeless tone is valid, for Coates truly does not provide answers. However, after ruminating on the book myself and engaging in fruitful discussion on this work, I found that Coates, in telling such a personal account of his life and views, accomplished what all great works do: he made us ask ourselves questions. Yes, the critiques towards facets of the book are areas that should be deeply investigated, but that does not take away how Between the World and Me is truly a masterful work, one that is both specific to Coates’ life and is also incredibly insightful of how entrenched racism persists today. Above all, there is a wealth of topics I haven’t even come close to addressing in this post, and the few quotes I have included to show Coates’ mastery of the language barely even scratch the surface of how eloquently he is able to put words to experience.

So, Between You and Me, I’d go read this book as soon as possible.