Coates interview- Brian Nguyen

Many similarities stuck out to me between the NPR interview, “Ta-Nehisi Coates On His Work And The Painful Process Of Getting Conscious” and the PBS interview, “Ta-Nehisi Coates: We accept violence against African-Americans as normal.” The first is that the interviewers definitely were prepared to interview Coates. The PBS interviewer begins the segment by listing Coates’ accomplishments such as being the recipient of a MacArthur fellowship and Between the World and Me receiving the National Book Award for nonfiction. The PBS interviewer discussed many topics relevant in Coates’ book such as it being a letter for his 14-year-old son. The interviewers did not ask any useless questions that would not have benefitted the conversation at hand. They also did not jump from question to question, instead having a smooth transition for every question.

That being said, some distinct differences are present between the two interviews. The NPR one seems to be a little lighter in tone, asking questions like whether Coates still fasts on Thanksgiving and on his father’s reaction to his writing. The purpose of these questions were meant to get to know Coates better on a more personal level. This contrasts with the back-and-forth almost interrogation of the PBS interview. This interviewer was more intent on asking Coates more pressing questions like what he thinks about the critique of his book and how important personal responsibility is for African Americans.

Throughout both of these interviews, Coates speaks as a true intellectual, relying on logos to carry his message. For the NPR interview, he denounces that he is a sort of oracle of race, warning against individuals who label themselves as such. In the PBS interview, he defends the criticism of his novel by comparing the unbelievable duration of the Ku Klux Klan versus the relative youth of the Harlem Children’s Zone.