Journal for Mckay

The reading for today is the poetry of Claude McKay. McKay was a Jamaican poet during the Harlem Renaissance era with a very militant style of activism. His poems also exhibit this same militant attitude within them. Many of his poems, like others of the Harlem Renaissance era, are about African Americans standing up for their rights. Personally I find the poem "If We Must Die" to be the most powerful of these poems in how it is written. McKay expresses an attitude of doing everything in one's power to gain rights and equality. Yet throughout the poem McKay neglects to mention race thus making this poem capable of being used in many situations where one is fighting for freedom or right e.g. World War II. This neglect of mentioning race makes the African American struggle more synonymous with the struggles of all men and women.