In The Message, Coates explores the impact of historical narratives on the lived realities of individuals, communities, and nations. In “Journalism Is Not a Luxury,” he focuses on how Black American history impacts the work that he and his students do as writers and journalists. In “On Pharaohs,” he focuses on how communal history impacts personal identity, and in “The Gigantic Dream,” he focuses on the role of nationalism in the stories that states tell about themselves.

In “Journalism Is Not a Luxury,” Coates tells his students that they belong to a literary tradition rooted in the history of Black Americans, a people “whose humanity is ever in doubt” (4). This history means that students must always be aware that their work is “in service to that larger emancipatory mandate” (4). That “emancipatory mandate” is to reveal how dominant groups have constructed historical narratives to maintain their control over the oppressed. To be a writer is to construct counternarratives that allow people to see the world as it is. If writers can be successful in that task, they will have the power to “save the world” (20).

In “On Pharaohs,” Coates thinks more broadly about the impact of history and historical narratives on Black American identity.