The Black Of The Bus Mary Mebane Summary

The Black Of The Bus written by Mary Mebane, was appeared on the op-ed page of the New York Times. Through this article, Mebane uses her earlier bus ride as a personal experience and represents her life living under the segregation laws before the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Mary Mebane took the bus to the music lesson on a Saturday and she encountered the situation that the bus driver ordered the black man to get up from the “no-man’s-land” for the white man. The narrator points out that how nervousness and tensity between the White and the Black interaction. Even if the bus driver made a threat to the black man and the little lady, they vindicated their rights fearless. In the ending, the bus driver led the black man leave. Mebane utilizes tone shift and dialect of non-standard use of the language to accomplish her goal of recalling her psychological terror under the segregation age. …show more content…
The narrator felt more relaxed at the end of the line of a bus and when the bus had plenty of seats, however, she felt extremely panic when the black man was asked to give up his seat for the white man. The overall mood switched from relaxed to depressed and tense when the seat patterns changed. Mebane emphasizes the age that the Black and White were antagonistic to each other. Living under the segregation, the Black faced threats and suffered from the physical and emotional trauma at every minute of their life. Moreover, the narrator implies that the only safe place for the Black is their own community. By effectively switching the tone, the narrator arouses readers’ sympathy about the unequal living environment the Black lived and the necessity for Black to have their own