Analysis Of Henry Giroux s Hoodie Politics - 1518 Words

Brianna Sasson WRT 105 Moore â€Å"Hoodie Politics† Henry Giroux’s â€Å"Hoodie Politics: Trayvon Martin and Racist Violence in Post-Racial America† is an opinion piece written by a renowned cultural critic. This writing is meant to draw attention to the way American society treats its poor minority youth. Giroux’s audience in this circumstance is the readers of the left-wing magazine, The Smirking Chimp. With most of his readers being liberal, he does not have to try hard to convince them that his argument regarding the mistreatment of poor minorities is correct.That being said, Giroux is attempting to get his audience to consider the wider societal issues that cause the unequal treatment of black and brown youth. Giroux employs the case of Trayvon Martin to showcase society’s bigger issues surrounding the institutionalized racism directed towards the â€Å"disposable† colored youth. The media played a large role in narrating the story of how and why the boy’s death occurred. Giroux uses the term â€Å"privatized discourse† in discussing the treatment of the case within American media and culture. â€Å"...Dangerous because they invoke wider social considerations and prevent [them] from wallowing in a purely privatized discourse that, in the end, for instance, only allows [them] to focus on the most narrow and restricted of issues such as the personality of the shooter, George Zimmerman† (Giroux 2**). The preceding quote highlights one of Giroux’s main focuses, the tendency for the public