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Tanesha
Butterflies
In Punching the Air, butterflies symbolize freedom and the ability to create change, even from within a juvenile detention center designed to weaken and homogenize its inmates. Amal references butterflies for the first time…
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Officer Beale’s Tattoo
Officer Beale’s tattoo symbolizes the systemic, obvious, unapologetic racism at the heart of the American carceral system. The image—a Black baby with a noose around its neck—is a grotesque threat, a message permanently inked…
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Amal’s Skateboard
Amal’s skateboard symbolizes the innocence, freedom, and joy that are so often denied to Black boys—and, in Amal’s case, weaponized against him. On the night everything changed, all Amal wanted to do was skate…
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