Analysis Of A Raisin In The Sun By Lorraine Hansberry

A large influx of colored people created many problems. First, there was a major problem in the availability in housing, of which was responded to with racism. This is the root for the hatred between the black and white communities. There wasn’t enough housing in the “black belt” community, so Negroes began to spill into white neighborhoods. The very existence of a colored person in a neighborhood would lower the property values. When a house was sold to a colored person, the rent for the house would be higher than the previous, white owner’s rent. Real Estate companies believed that “it is a matter of common knowledge that house after house…whether under white or black agents, comes to the Negro at an increased rental” (Sandburg 46). They sold housing despite the fact that “the Negro in Chicago, paid a lower wage than the white workman” (47), and that black people would have

During the mid-20th century there was much racial discrimination, specifically in home ownership. During this period there was mass immigration of Southern blacks to the north. In Lawndale Chicago, there was adverse reactions to this. As the

According to Daily Life... (Kaldin, 2000) the population of suburban areas during the 1950s had started to double from 36 million to 74 million. This rise in suburban residents had continued from 1950 to 1970.When more families had started to move to suburban areas, they came together by adding things such as playgrounds, libraries, and schools to the neighborhood to benefit their kids. This “flight to the suburbs” was difficult for blacks because of the racism in society at the time. Many black people were ignored and shunned at this time in society, so it was hard for blacks to move into suburbs knowing that they could be ridiculed in these areas because of their skin color.

Nathie Marbury was born January 20, 1944 in Grenada, MS but grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She was the daughter of Lezera and Rosetta Marbury. Nathie had many siblings; she was the 16th of 17th children. Her parents for some reason did not believe in education, but Nathie as a child who was born deaf enabled her to better her education.

On May 19,1930 a set of events was set in motion that an inspiration and touching to many. May 19,1930 Lorraine Vivian Hansberry was born in Chicago, Illinois, she was the youngest of four kids. Her parents were Nannie and Carl Augustus Hansberry.Nannie and Carl Hansberry were independent, politically active and Republican. Growing up she dealt with many problems involving her race, her family was victims of segregation. The effects of her childhood greatly affected how she went on about her life.

In Detroit, Michigan, there was an influx of African Americans from across the country, resulting in a 24% increase in the population of blacks. Many stayed in the Sojourner Truth homes, located in black-Polish neighborhoods. Source 2 says “when they arrived to move in, they were greeted by white mobs who beat them and stoned their cars”. Many cities, such as Detroit, confined the minority groups to ghettos, generally spanning less than a five mile square. Along with this, tensions began to run high as strikes were conducted throughout the city, opposing the treatment of African Americans in the

Exposition The characters are introduced by Hansberry. It is the 1950’s in a tiny apartment in Southside Chicago. The Younger family has just suffered the loss of Walter’s dad, with a $10,000 inheritance check supposedly to arrive in the near future. Upon hearing about the check, Walter, the protagonist, hopes to be able to take the money to invest in a liquor store. His sister, Beneatha hopes to be able to use it to attend medical school and Mama

    Lorraine Hansberry faced many obstacles in her life which has made her  write this book A “Raisin in the Sun.” As said in Blooms Literature “She was the youngest of four children whose parents were well-educated, middle-class activists centrally engaged in the fight against racial discrimination. Early figures in the Civil Rights movement.” In the book “A Raisin in the Sun,” the first play written by an African American she made through experiences of  black people who live on Chicago’s South Side, Hansberry used members of her family as inspiration for her characters. Lorraine Hansberry life had comparisons in this book dealing with poverty

Do you know what life was like in the 1900’s for an African-American living in Chicago? The truth is, that is was not good, especially during the year 1919, due to the extremely high racial tensions.

After these laws were abolished, caste oppression in the south, the decline of cotton agriculture (which was due to floods), and the shortage of labor in the Northern Factories created the conditions that incentivized African Americans to emigrate towards the North. Here they faced the ghetto. Although they had more freedom and opportunities, many African Americans were forced into a ‘Black Belt’ which became a community with the following attributes: overpopulation, underserved, crime, disease, and dilapidation. Beneath that facade of freedom was a ‘job ceiling’ - restricting Blacks to the most underpaid jobs - and a wall between them and White cliques, keeping them from true ‘social equality.’ Smiley & Fakunle state that overt racism is not

Racial segregation has had a long history in Chicago. While separation by nationality had always been apparent in the city, with neighborhoods typically being dominated by a certain ethnicity, no group of Chicagoans experienced the degree of segregation that African Americans faced in everything from the housing districts to public services. Forced to live only in designated areas by de facto segregation, redlining, and other tactics, they had limited chances to escape the cycle of danger and discrimination of the city. Confined to only their deteriorating neighborhoods,they had little chance.

There was also a big influx of blacks to Chicago. The numbers of blacks migrating to Chicago was tremendous. Many reasons Tuttle states are the cause for this. The major one is just blacks wanting to leave the south. They wanted to leave the segregated south in hope of a better future. They were tired of the Jim Crow laws, lynching, poor school, and constant harassment. A black said, “Anywhere north will do us”(Tuttle, 79). Another reason was jobs. In the time of war, the big manufactories trying to keep up with the needs of the military were in dire needs of people to work. There were actual labor recruiters whose job was to go out and recruit blacks to work in the factories. Moreover, when the opportunity to work opened up blacks took them in full demand. It was a way out of the south.

The immigrants from abroad and the African-Americans both left their homelands of restricted opportunities and sought to find better ones. The African-Americans came without proper clothing and skills, unaware of the future obstacles ahead. Their environment and surroundings were significantly different in the South than the lively cities in the North. Before migrating, the African-Americans lives consisted of mainly working in the fields in the blistering, hot sun, or working as servants or tenants for white property owners; they had never laid eyes upon a building or factory. For the immigrants, coming to urban America was an enormous change as well. They were oblivious to the American culture, American politics and economics, and were unable to read or speak English, in most cases. While settling in the northern cities, there were certain harsh conditions that the African Americans along with the immigrants experienced. They both were forced to live with their families in small, unsanitary living spaces due to the intense persecution and racialization from American outsiders. Families in neighborhoods grouped together, and each family member contributed economically to the family income. To relieve these challenges and harsh conditions, both African-American and immigrant groups were obliged to do certain tasks in the new, metropolitan surrounding.

In my opinion, there are many reasons on why the Chicago’s Housing Authority’s “Plan for Transformation” creates more problems that it solved. The Plan for Transformation pursues to demolish all low-income high-rise building in Chicago. Because of that, in some ways, the Plan for Transformation are continuing racial and class segregation, as thousands of residents were displaced to the poorer south and west sides of Chicago. Thus, in my opinion, all these situations caused the poor African-Americans to be concentrated at the same place and lead them to have more social ties and denser networks that lead to more crimes and deviance among them.

A Raisin in the Sun was written by Lorraine Hansberry and is a play about an African American family who are struggling in the 1950’s to keep the family together. Although the play is portrayed in the 50’s many issues like the economy, racism, and family dynamics the characters had to face; these issues are still issues in the 21st century.