What is Coates saying, English homework help

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  • What is Coates saying in this quote? Is he telling his son to get woke? Why is it important for Coates to get his son woke?

“Race relations, racial chasm, racial justice, racial profiling, white privilege, and even white supremacy–serves to obscure that racism is a visceral experience, that it dislodges brains, blocks airways, rips muscle, extracts organs, cracks bones, break teeth. You must never look away from this” (pg. 10).

  • What is this “Dream” Coates is speaking of? Is getting “woke” meaning you wake up from this “Dream?”

“I have see that dream all my life. It is perfect houses with nice lawns. It is Memorial Day cookouts, block associations, and driveways. The Dream is treehouses and the Cub Scouts. The Dream smells like peppermint but tastes like strawberry shortcake. And for so long I have wanted to escape into the Dream, to fold my country over my head like a blanket. But this has never been an option because the Dream rest on our backs, the bedding made from our bodies” (pg. 11).