Lyric DeRose-Oliver

10/4/16
5
Let America be America Again
1. Langston Hughes
2. The title of this work is Let America be America Again
3. He wrote it in the sometime in the 1930s to emphasize political action in the
face of the crushing social and economic blows of the Great Depression.
4. The intended audience was the people who live in, or are coming to ,
America.
5. In Let America be America Again Hughes wrote about how America was
founded with the idea of being free, and having equal opportunity for
everyone. However, America hasnt practiced what it was found upon. He
talks about how America was supposed to be homeland of the free but
people who were born in a different country, people born with a certain skin
color, or social status arent as free as the privileged. In the closing of his
poem he says that we, the people, must carve America into the way it was
meant to be. (95)
6. This work makes the point that America needs to change its ways and
become the America it was supposed to be. America was supposed to be a
place of freedom and equality. It doesnt matter what your background is,
everyone should have equal opportunity. He said that we should all try to
make equality and opportunity a possibility by standing up to what we think
is right. (67)
7. I thought this work was very inspirational, but it also makes me sad because
although America has changed in some ways since this was written, it still
hasnt in many other aspects. Americans fear immigrants, different religions,
and different skin colors. People of color are pushed into certain
communities with a broken infrastructure. Poor people cant afford to live
even if they work really hard. How could a man support a family off of a
minimum wage job?