Throughout his passage, “Just Walk on By”, Brent Staples sends the message that discrimination has affected the lives of many in several negative ways. He particularly uses irony and satire as tools to prove his point, using them almost like a verbal blade to cut through public image and stereotypes, as well as his proficient use of powerful diction and syntax to strike rememberable points into the reader’s mind.
Staple’s use of irony is very simple yet effective. His message is that he is not a stereotypical black criminal, so he portrays himself as one to show how ridiculous that it really is. When he says “My first victim was a woman”, he tries to conjure up images of a stalker or a murderer or even just a plain old mugger, which is what …show more content…
This is that not all people act the same or conform to racial stereotyping. Obviously, his diction ties in with his use of irony as well, as diction and syntax are very versatile and powerful tools in a writer’s arsenal. For example, His opening hook, which is perhaps the best example of irony in the whole passage, uses the word “victim” to describe the woman who first caused Staples to recognize the discriminatory bias against him. Despite the retrospective irony behind this statement, Staples’s word choice here is extremely important to the tone of the passage. As this is the first thing the reader sees, his choice to present himself in the light of some sort of dark murderer or psychopath allows the reader to see his point that there is a disposition against people like him in which the audience will automatically see him as a criminal. However, towards the end of the passage, the audience might start to notice that the structure and style of Staples’s writing shifts minorly, changing the tone entirely. At first he starts off in a dark, almost murderous tone, but one might slowly notice how educated Staples is or how he uses high level words or that he is an amazing writer, which is logical because he is a journalist. What this does is create a classification for Staples that is contrary to the popular belief of
Staple’s use of irony is very simple yet effective. His message is that he is not a stereotypical black criminal, so he portrays himself as one to show how ridiculous that it really is. When he says “My first victim was a woman”, he tries to conjure up images of a stalker or a murderer or even just a plain old mugger, which is what …show more content…
This is that not all people act the same or conform to racial stereotyping. Obviously, his diction ties in with his use of irony as well, as diction and syntax are very versatile and powerful tools in a writer’s arsenal. For example, His opening hook, which is perhaps the best example of irony in the whole passage, uses the word “victim” to describe the woman who first caused Staples to recognize the discriminatory bias against him. Despite the retrospective irony behind this statement, Staples’s word choice here is extremely important to the tone of the passage. As this is the first thing the reader sees, his choice to present himself in the light of some sort of dark murderer or psychopath allows the reader to see his point that there is a disposition against people like him in which the audience will automatically see him as a criminal. However, towards the end of the passage, the audience might start to notice that the structure and style of Staples’s writing shifts minorly, changing the tone entirely. At first he starts off in a dark, almost murderous tone, but one might slowly notice how educated Staples is or how he uses high level words or that he is an amazing writer, which is logical because he is a journalist. What this does is create a classification for Staples that is contrary to the popular belief of