Journalist, Brent Staples, in his narrative essay, “Just Walk on By: Black Man and Public Space” narrates a series of events when he was growing up. Staples purpose is to tell personal stories in chronological order of how he was viewed by society. Other people convey the idea of a black man as a dangerous man in society. By the work of other people stereotypes. He adopts a fearful but apathetic tone in order to appeal to what he is feeling by applying a set of rhetorical devices in his narrative essay to his readers.
Staples begins his narrative essay by emphasize that a white woman ran for her life when he was walking right behind her and how he was expressing the depth of her movements as he walked. He appeals to the pathos by establishing a means of sympathy to the audiences by telling the audience what he went through by saying, “as I swung onto the avenue behind her, there seemed to be a discreet, uninflammatory distance between us. Not so. She cast back a worried glance” (394). Staples shows how he was viewed as in order to describe how the white woman looked back at him in a terrifying way.
Staples continues to appeal pathos to the audiences by telling us what she though in her own eyes by saying, “to her, the youngish black man-a broad six feet two inches with a bread and billowing hair, both hands shoved into the pockets of a bulky military jacket-seemed menacingly close. After a few more quick glimpses, she picked up her pace and was soon running in earnest” (394). Staples illustrates what the white woman did in order to show how society view Staples as. This personal experiences of what Staples had gone through by showing a apathic tone in order to get a better understanding of what Staples was viewed as.
In Staples narrative essay the beginning talks about who Staples is by establishing author’s credibility to the audiences. In order to appeal to the audiences in an ethical appeal and a logical appeal by telling the audiences who he is. At the beginning of the essay it talks about Staples and how this make Staples credible to say what he is saying. This appeals to the Ethical appeal which make him more trustworthy to the audiences. According to Samuel Cohen who is the editor of “Just Walk on By: Black Men and Public Space” said “Brent Staples earned his Ph. D. n psychology from the University of Chicago and went on to become a journalist” (394).
It also talks about where the essay was first published. Cohen said, “The following essay originally appeared in Ms. Magazine in 1986″ (394). By incorporating this into the essay it brings up a sense of authority to the readers. And by telling the audiences where it was first published lets the audiences know who it was intended to. In the scene of Logos, it is a cite fact that Staples has a Ph. D. in psychology. Making the arguments that Staples is purposing in his essay.
Throughout the essay, Staples elaborates more on the pathos by telling more personal stories as he was living his life. He effectively shows how he was terrified of being seen as a dangerous person. Throughout the pieces, he incorporates so many stories of what people though he was by assuming he was a mugger, rapist, or a dangerous person. By putting written words and sentences in his writing like, “It was in the echo of that terrified woman’s footfalls that I first began to know the unwieldy inheritance I’d come into-the ability to alter public space in ugly ways.
It was clear she thought herself the quarry of a mugger, a rapist, or worse” (394). Staples is creating an appeal of pathos to show how he is feeling of what is going on for himself. By illustrating this in his essay is trying to create a scene of fear so the audience can feel what he is feeling. And he elaborates how he cannot even hold a knife and cut a cooked chicken. He said, “As a softy who is able to take a knife to a raw chick-let alone hold one to a person’s throat-I was surprised, embarrassed, and dismayed all at once” (394).
Staples is connecting with the audiences that he is just an average person. By connecting with the reader Staples is appealing to pathos by illustrating that he cannot hold a knife and hurt a raw chicken. Staples continues to use the rhetorical device pathos by discussing his childhood experiences. Staples said, “As a boy, I saw countless tough guys locked away; I have since buried several, too. They were babies, really-a teenage cousin, a brother of twenty-two, a childhood friend in his mid-twenties-all gone down in episodes of bravado played out in the streets” (396).
The personal experiences of being a young boy and having to go through with that show how it emotional affect him. By sharing these personal experiences, it causes the audiences to feel what he felt as a boy. At the same time, he feels angry because people think he is a criminal. But his is not a criminal just a black male journalist. As Staples said, “Over the years, I learned to smother the rage I felt at so often being taken for a criminal” (397). This anger of Staples appeals to pathos by feeling emotion to what Staples is feeling to the audiences.
The writer creates a sentimental diction through the use of words that are straightforward by using “I was staking sleep” (394) which show how he viewed himself and by saying “defenseless wayfarers” (394). Staples word use throughout his narrative essay shows how he is telling the story. The word diction refers to the words he uses to project a meaning of a word. Staples explains is perceived as a rapist, mugger, and a dangerous individual in the eyes of woman and by other individual because of the color of his skin.
People come up with these stereotypes that all black man are dangerous people. Staples argument of how society views black man as an offender by telling the readers personal experience when he was growing up. Throughout, the piece staples talk about how he felt when someone though he was a mugger. Staples also explains how nighttime pedestrians felt when he was around them but more of how woman saw him as (394). By reading the essay, Staples starts out by telling us who his first victim was.
The main point is that it starts out by telling a personal story and when it happens then explains how he felt and how the victims felt when Staples was around other people. But Staples mostly explains what he went through when Staples was growing up. But staples does not blame those people for labeling him as a criminal. Staples approach to a conclusion that it might have been because of his hometown Pennsylvania had gang warfare and because of that reason people were not cautious of him. When he was twentytwo.
What Staples Said, “It was not altogether clear to me how | reached the ripe old age of twenty-two without being conscious of the lethality nighttime pedestrians attributed to me” (396). This show how Staples was being affected how people saw him as. Staples tells his story in an order to where it all began and where it ends. By doing this it makes the reader understand what is going on and where did it start and where it ended. The author Staples making an argument and applying it to the rhetorical devices on getting people to notice what other people are doing to black man.
The rhetorical devices that he is apply are helping Staples by making his argument strong on appealing it to ethos, pathos, and logos. This helps the audiences better understand Staples by putting the audiences in his shoes and a feeling sorry for Staples. Staples narrative essay implies how he was seen by society when he was growing up in a chorological order. By explaining what he had to go through as he was growing up by using rhetorical devices to convey his argument to the reader. So, the reader can get a better understanding of how Staples felt.
