The American Dream James Weldon Johnson Analysis

A poet once said, “Unity is strength... when there is teamwork and collaboration, wonderful things can be achieved” (Mattie Stepanek). The American dream is built on a foundation of unity, which is exemplified in the poem by James Weldon Johnson, Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing. In this poem, Johnson thematically illustrates what the American Dream is about. The overall background in this poem eludes the history of slavery and how the contemporary society has change the present of how humans live today. This poem “commemorate the birthday of Abraham Lincoln” who helped abolish slavery, without his collaboration, there wouldn’t be freedom in this country (51). I personally believe that through contemporary society, America has remodeled itself through

In the first line of his first stanza, it describes the conjoining of hands and spirit in the building of happiness and comradery. Thus, the American Dream is built on each individual background or gender to create a whole or in other words a collaboration. “Lift every voice and sing…” represents an individual voice that needs to be heard (51). Each voice that sings in a unison, then creates a louder tone. As each individual sings louder and in sync, it then produces a song making “earth and Heaven ring” (51). The phrase “earth and Heaven rings” harvests a functional gathering of individuals who once didn’t have a voice, do have a voice, but as a whole (Johnson, 51). For every individual voice that create a whole, constructs a better future. Contemporary society has refurbish and made something so unheard, be heard. This is the dream, the unity of dream, the American

In the third stanza, fifteenth line, provides the conclusion that turned from a shady history, into an enlightened new beginning; for the unity of the free slaves who once stand on their weary bare feet. The “gloomy past” is compared to a cloud that hides the sun, which the sun is compared to a “white gleam of our star is cast”, considering that the sun is a star. Unity plays a role in this line because, through the start of a struggle, individuals became a whole when they sang unison, “till earth and Heaven ring” (Johnson, 51), then as a whole they faced the “rising sun” (Johnson, 51), and now they “stand at last Where the white gleam of [their] bright star is cast” Johnson, 52). Above all, contemporary event that had happen are what shaped up the made unity the aspect of the American