As a civil rights activist, Stokely Carmichael once said, “We are told,” If you work hard, you’ll succeed”- but if that were true, black people would own the country. We are oppressed because we are black- not because we are ignorant, not because we are lazy, not because we are stupid, but because we are black!” This quote is still relevant even to this day, blacks are still considered a minority and they get treated differently simply because of the color of their skin. People continue to treat others by the color of their skin rather than their character. In Lorraine Hansberry’s play A Raisin in the Sun, the interaction between the themes of race and dreams demonstrates that your race can affect the dreams that you have and what you choose to do about it. Walter has a dream to own a liquor store so that he makes money from that business and is then is able to financially provide things for his family like he believes a man should, but him being blacks affects his dream.
A Raisin in the Sun is an inspirational book/play that tells the overcoming story of an African-American family Going through the terrible struggles of Chicago in the 1950’s. Greg Kincaid once said “No matter how much falls on us, we keep plowing ahead. That's the only way to keep the roads clear.”. This explains Beneatha younger, a young woman who tries to find herself while dealing with others scrutinizing and being treated like a child in her family. In conclusion, Beneatha younger is an overpowering character that is shaping her life through independence, an education, and growing closer to her
Credibility: While living in one of Chicago’s most known gentrified areas, Lincoln Park, and taking a Latino class at DePaul University I was able to learn about the history of the neighborhood. I learned about the battle low-income Puerto Rican families lost when trying to keep their homes in Lincoln Park. Yes, you heard correctly, Lincoln Park was a Puerto Rican neighborhood. IIII. Preview: In this speech, I will begin by explaining what gentrification is along with a short background on the Lincoln Park gentrification, then I will proceed to explain how the families in these areas fought for their homes, and finally I will be discussing the gentrification that is affecting citizens of Chicago today.
He begins to bring in his personal experiences as he faces racism within America with the intro into part two. The title of, “The Harlem Ghetto” depicts Harlem of being claustrophobic and being an expensive place to live at. Baldwin switches his topic of the location of Harlem towards Negro leaders. James Baldwin describes Negro leaders as they try to help their communities, but they do not attack the bigger issues within the Black communities. Baldwin then acknowledges that they majority of leaders cannot make it into congress due to racism.
Many Americans wonder why once-boomtowns like Chicago and Detroit have deteriorated into little more than ghetto villages surrounded by skyscrapers. The answer may be found in patterns from mid-20th-century urban segregation. Starting around the turn of the 1950’s, segregation laws intensified between whites and blacks, as portrayed in Lorraine Hansberry’s play, A Raisin in the Sun, named after the final line in one of Langston Hughes’ most famous poems. This created an idea of “white flight,” as white, middle-class citizens left urban areas out of fear that the presence of minorities would devalue their neighborhood land. In Hansberry’s story, the black, lower-class Younger family compares to the pattern of white flight observed in the mid-20th century by illustrating the xenophobia of whites, the occasional sleaziness of realtors, and the boldness of the minority groups during this period.
Washington, author of ¨Atlanta Compromise Speech.¨ An example would be in paragraph 7; ¨The laws of changeless justice bind Oppressor with oppressed;...¨ Due to the laws not changing from injustice to justice, black people might have never stopped being oppressed. Another example would be in paragraph 9; “It is important and right that all privileges of the laws be ours,...¨ Even though white people have all privileges of the law, black people do not. A final example would be in paragraph; “This, couple with our material prosperity, will bring into our beloved South a new heaven and a new earth.¨ Even though they do not hate the South, the South hates them. Black people do not deserve to be mistreated by anyone, no one
The betterment of society as a whole is often reasonably prioritized over individual desire. However, it can harm individuality while seemingly compromising with it. In A Raisin in the Sun, author Lorraine Hansberry depicts individuals confronted by covert prejudice. In fact, most instances of prejudice in the play are masked in seeming selflessness and good intentions. The play follows the drama of the Younger family, an African-American family in the ‘50s that fights for their individual dreams that appear to be out-of-reach for their class and time.
What would you do if you were told that your dreams would never come true? Dreams are what we hold onto to motivate us to achieve our goals. In Lorraine Hansberry’s play A Raisin in the Sun, the characters of Mama, Walter, and Beneatha are faced with discrimination that affects their lifestyle, dreams, and education. Mama has lived on the South Side of Chicago for most of her life, but housing discrimination created obstacles that set her dream of living in a nice neighborhood. In this time period many apartments that African Americans lived in were in very poor conditions.
Although it is easy to say that the greatest point of convergence between Paul Dunbar’s poem and chapter eight in Tera Hunter’s book is that race is the ultimate mask, the following discussion aims to problematize that view. Instead, it is my opinion that the greatest convergence is the way in which pleasure and leisure were used as a mask for the pain and frustrations black working- class women endured in Postbellum Atlanta daily. Stage actors of ancient Greek theater wore masks with exaggerated facial expressions to reveal the emotions of their roles thus prompting the audience to interpret the character at surface level. Although Dunbar does not explicitly state the race of the wearer one can assume that, given the background of Dunbar and publication year, the mask-wearer is a subjugated Black body in the in postbellum America. The masks worn by actors in ancient Greek gave universality to the character so that the audience would
I believe that all of these letters prove that equality is necessary. she uses ideas from the lord, whom everyone followed, as well as morals and real life facts. She really shows how mistreated women were and how unfair it was to them. Grimske explains how men took advantage of women and made them slaves when they were in free states. They would make them cook and clean and still deprive them of the right to vote, education, policies, and pretty much everything.