The Process
A detailed Summary of The Process
In April of 1992 a jury in LA comes together to declare a mainly non-guilty verdict on all charges against the police officer that beat Rodney King. In what begins as a peaceful rally against this verdict turns into a three day long riot in the streets of LA. A few years later a woman named Anna Deavere Smith, in an attempt to creatively document these riots publishes a book entitled Twilight: Los Angeles 1992, full of monologues made up entirely of interviews she held with the many different types of people this occurrence affected. Smith has broken down the series of stories she collected into an order that helps one see the process of a riot. She begins with angry stories of police brutality then verging into the fear of those the riots surrounded and then ending with words of hope from the wisest souls of all. Smith took stories that emphasized each of these points and put them next to each other. Since each group of monologues emphasizes one specific point through many sorts of voices. The reader is given comprehensive understandings as to how these riots could have taken place. Many voices speak much more loudly than one.
One is first presented with interviews that explain the backdrop to these riots. The first

Strength from that idea. If enough lights come together things like these riots can be prevented in the future. The last two monologues both speak of being put off as idealistic. Both of the people grew up in bad neighborhoods where many of the adults surrounding them were bitter and disillusioned from years of the same problems that caused these riots in the first place. From their idealism both arrived at nicknames involving the concept of light, the young woman, "Lucia" and the man "Twilight Bey." Their nicknames come from admiration and appreciation for their brilliance, from their friends and family "'Light' is a word that symbolizes knowledge, knowing, wisdom, within the Koran and the Holy Bible." The hope this book ends with represents Smith's belief in change. These two hopeful voices complete the book with a lot of strength. "And one of the things we have was faith, convictions. That we have the power within ourselves, that we can change things."
The last two stories in Smith's piece come together as one entity. These pieces are made up of similar ideas from similar people with a similar sense of hope. These people are used to represent that these "dreamers." In using more than one person Smith draws
Some common words found in the essay are:
Hills Hotel, There's Sheinbaum, Los Angeles, Holy Bible, Uncle Abraham, Officer Sheinbaum, Mexican American, Twilight Bey, , Rodney King, police brutality, gain understanding, police officer, people city, white policemen,
Approximate Word count = 1504
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)
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