To Portray American Dream

in the darkness of life but she still tries her best to climb to a better life. She motivates her son to keep trying and climbing for the best. The writer only figures out multiple negations in this poem in the sentence Where there aint been no light and And life for me aint been no crystal stair. These two sentences reflect the hardship of the perso na‟s life. She never achieve prosperous life. She has to struggle a lot during the darkness and there is no path as crystal stair in her life. Hughes uses the multiple negations to emphasize the hardship of the persona‟s life. The second poem is entitled “Teacher”. It tells about the persona‟s opinion towards teacher that symbolized two things: stars and darkness. The persona described his story as a struggling teacher yet he was neglected. He tries his best to teach in a more humble way yet he was not accepted because he is an African- American. At that time, education was full of Whites, and African-Americans were seen as uneducated people. Furthermore, even when they graduated from higher education, they were seen to be lacking of capability. The poem can be read in datum 102SD01. The writer figures out three syntactic deviations which are inversion, adverb displacement and prepositional phrase displacement. The syntactic deviations are used to show how hard the persona tried to live his life. First, inversion can be seen in the sentence More humbly did I teach. This sentence shows how hard the persona tries to improve his way of teaching and he tries to teach more humbly. The next syntactic deviation is adverb displacement. This can be found in the sentence Humbly I tried to learn. If previously the persona has tried to improve his way of teaching, here the persona tries to improve his learning style. He tries his best to absorb the knowledge through studying. The third is the prepositional phrase displacement. The prepositional phrase displacements can be seen in the sentence And in this narrow bed of earth No lights gleam and In this narrow bed of earth Star-dust never scatters. These two displacements show the reality of life from the persona‟s point of view. After a long struggle to overcome the hardship of life, he sees no brighter side of his life. The next poem is entitled “Ballad of the Man who‟s Gone”. This is a story of a man who died because he is too poor. Even when he was about to be buried, his wife have to ask for some pennies from people around. The poem can be read in datum 62SD03. The poem describes that the man‟s funeral process cost much money for burying and paying the minister ‟s preach. At the end of the poem, the author is asking a question on how the price of the funeral is expensive . The man‟s death is actually not the man‟s business, but why he has to pay such expensive funeral. Hughes wants to show this reality to the readers. The writer only figures out multiple negations in this poem. It can be seen in the sentence A poor man aint got No business to die. This sentence implies an unfair treatment of the African-American life. Hughes wants to emphasize the struggle of the man‟s life even after he passed away. Overall, multiple negations are mostly found in the poems to show the African- American‟s struggle at that time. Hughes uses multiple negations to emphasize how hard African-American people have put their best in their life, yet they still receive the unfair treatments.

d. To Depict Racism in America

Hughes also uses syntactic deviations to depict racism in America. He wants to depict the discrimination that African Americans experienced, in which they are not allowed to own the American Dream because of their race. In this function, the writer figures out eleven poems and several syntactic deviations. The eleven poems are entitled 1 Mulatto, 2 A Ruined Gal‟, 3 The Negro Mother, 4 Black Gal ‟, 5 Florida Road Worker, 6 August 19 th ” , 7 Southern Mammy Sing, 8 50-50, 9 Dime, 10 Argument, and 11 Hero-International. Although there are many poems found in this function, there are less syntactic deviations found in these poems than those in other functions. The writer selects five poems out of eleven poems to be discussed in this function. The first poem is entitled “Mulatto”. The poem tells about the author, Langston Hughes, who has a biracial background and must deal with the difficulty of his ethnicity on a day to day life. The poem can be read in datum 164S01. The second poem is entitled “A Ruined Gal”. The poem tells about a black girl who feels disappointed towards her mother and this world because her mother is black and because of her race, nobody wants to be her friend. The poem can be read in datum 208SD01. In the poem, the persona feels desperate and lonely since no one wants to be her friend. She wants to jump onto the river and be drowned. She blames her mother for having a daughter like her. This poem depicts racism of African-American at that time. People do not want to befriend with African-Americans because they are black, and they come from a low social status. The writer figures out two syntactic deviations in this poem, which are multiple negations and adjectival phrase displacements. The multiple negations can be seen in the sentence Wont be nobodys bride; Wont meet nobody; Cause I aint got no friend; and Aint nothin for a ruined gal. The multiple negations are used to show the unfair treatments from the society towards African-Americans. On the other hand, the adjectival phrase displacement can be seen in the sentence Damn ma black old mammys soul for ever havin a daughter. Hughes uses these syntactic deviations to show how mean racism is and also how it affects someone‟s life. The third poem is entitled “Black Gal”. The poem narrates the persona as a girl who always does not get what she deserves. She always treats her friends fine but they do not care because she is black. The poem can be read in datum 209SD01. The persona is a working girl who is always kind to her boyfriend. However, she is always mistreated. Her boyfriend takes advantage from her, and leaves her right after. She realizes that she is treated like that because of her race. However, she really loves Albert, her boyfriend, and she wants him back. The writer only figures out multiple negations in this poem. It can be seen in the sentence Aint cut him wid no razor; Aint never been unkind; and Yet I aint never been no bad one. The multiple negations are used to show how the persona