The poets were written at a time that the whites consider themselves to be the original inhabitants or true, as opposed to the blacks who were treated as secondary. Both narrators are alike in terms of being black in an age that was riddled with racism.
Langston Hughes describes a typical college student who's grappling with homework, love, and all the normal things that a young person grapples with. Though at the same time he's also challenging a world in which some people are freer than others. Yet, he's open-minded and brave enough to confront that reality, even while surrounded by white students and being taught by a white instructor. This situation resembles Maya Angelou’s point of view when she was younger, Angelou had a misconception that Blacks were inferior to Whites, but now she wants to express that Blacks are not inferior.
Maya Angelou’s poem “Still I Rise” conveys her sense of confidence, feminism, independence and beauty; shows pride in being Black and in her African-American roots. On the other hand, Langston Hughes shows uncertainty of his position in life among his school and neighborhood. The poem shows his lack of self-confidence; the narrator shifts his views from being superior in the first stanza, towards arrogant in the second one ending with an inferior state of mind at the last stanza stating that others are somewhat "more free". Unlike Angelou who feels that all people are equal and show pride in being African-American.
Those two characters demonstrate that you don't have to be in a position of power to ask an important question, or take on a challenging issue. You just have to have the courage of your