The Beauty of Being Human

            Within Langston Hughes’ poem “Theme for English B” it depicts a young college student struggling with being a minority surrounded by the majority. Hughes places a heavy emphasis on culture and makes the connection that we are united under the category of being American. The color of our skin does not define the type of person we will become which gives prejudice no ground to stand. Prejudices occur because of the society we live in and people wanting to be seen as more important than someone else. “Theme for English B” shows what commonality is shared between people of different races and that it is possible to learn from each other. Despite someone’s ethnicity and differences, we all share the beautiful common bond of being human.

            In the second stanza of “Theme for English B”, the main character mentions that he is colored and this leads to the assumption that the speaker is African-American. The reader also learns that the speaker is “the only colored student in [his] class” which makes him the minority, and it is inferred that the rest of the students are Caucasian. Later in the poem the speaker says that his teacher is white, which is where the inference about the students comes from. Race is an important element within this poem and it signifies a separation of people as if one race is better than the other. Because of the speaker’s ethnicity he is seen as less than the rest of his classmates because he is different. The little information that we are given about the speaker leads to a few conclusions. First the reader can infer that the speaker is from a lower socioeconomic status due to the fact that he lives at the YMCA which provides housing to people with low income. The speaker also moved schools many times which could be because he could not afford it. These two conclusions do not have anything to do with race, but it seems like the people he is surrounded by want to attribute the fact that he is black to a lack of money. This aspect separates the speaker further from his peers that are white.

            Throughout the whole poem there is tension and a sense of separation between the speaker and his entire English class. The tension is purely from a racial standpoint and no other basis. Within the poem, the English class is instructed to write a page about themselves and for the speaker this is a difficult task. He begins to brainstorm what has made him the person he has become, and he comes to the conclusion that he is what he feels, sees and hears (stanza 3). The speaker starts to list things that he enjoys doing such as: eat, sleep, drink, be in love, work, read, learn, as well as understand life to help spark an idea to write about. He further brainstorms about the type of music he likes to listen to and speaks of what he would like to receive as a Christmas present. All of the things that the speaker mentions are common to humans in general; we all need to sleep and eat in order stay alive, and people of all ethnicity can enjoy doing the same activities. The beauty of being human is that we all have so many things in common, but we choose not focus on our similarities most of the time; instead we dwell on our differences.

            Hughes wrote this poem to help shed light on the idea of racism and he basically says that racism should not exist because regardless of race we are all human. Towards the end of the poem, the speaker says, “You are white- yet a part of me, as I am a part of you. That’s American.” In America our unifying bond is that we are all classified as Americans despite our cultural background or race. Sometimes we do not want to be a part of each other, but that is what happens when you live in a world with such diversity. We all learn from each other whether we like it or not, but that is part of the beauty of being human.