The Matriarchs of the House in A Raisin in the Sun by Loraine Hansberry

In Lorraine Hansberry’s 1959 play A Raisin in the Sun a number of social issues are both explicitly and subtly exemplified through out the characters experiences and relationships. Living in a cramped Chicago apartment, the Youngers’ display both influential goals and conflicting restraints. Beneatha Youngers is a controversial character; she complicates society’s typical gender roles, introduces the wrestle between assimilation and ancestry of African-Americans, but specifically serves as a paradigm for her generation in the play.

The drama A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry, shows the life of the Youngers, an African-American family living on the Southside of Chicago in the 1950s. In the beginning, the Youngers are about to receive an insurance check for $10,000. This money comes from the deceased Mr. Younger’s life insurance policy. Each of the adult members of the family has an idea as to what he or she would like to do with this money. Mama, wants to buy a house to fulfill a dream she shared with her husband. Mama’s son, Walter Lee, would rather use the money to invest in a liquor store with his friends. He believes that the investment will solve the family’s financial problems forever. Beneatha, Walter’s sister and Mama’s daughter, wants to use the money for her medical school tuition. Ruth, Walter’s wife, discovers that she is pregnant, but

Every person who comes to America has a common motive, with underlying details causing their motives to differ. Some come to America with the hope of freedom from the difficult lives they face in their home countries, while others will arrive because of the various opportunities for success that America has to offer. But most of all, many believe the country can give them the chance to find who they are and figure out what their goals are their new life. Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun surrounds a black family in the southside of Chicago, known as the Younger’s. The play gives insight on the life of the family, and the many difficulties they face as each family member tries to achieve their American Dream. Beneatha Younger, the daughter

“ A Raisin in the Sun” is a play written by Lorraine Hansberry about the life of an African American family during the era of segregation. The play starts off with the Younger family receiving a 10,000 dollar check from Mr. Younger’s insurance policy. The family argues over what they are going to do with it. Mama wants to buy a house with it, Walter wants to invest in a liquor store, and Beneatha wants to use the money to go to medical school. The contrast of the characters’ personalities fuels the conflict and drives the story forward. Beneatha is a young college student and the sister of Walter. She has a dream of becoming a doctor. Beneatha is a dynamic character who is easily influenced by her family and the people

The story of this play is simple and the majority of African-Americans faced such issues in the 1950’s, living on the south side of Chicago, struggles with poverty, dignity and dreams of a better life. Wanting better for your children and trying to fit in, while maintaining family values. A Raisin in the Sun is an excellent example of the relationship between family values and conflict. In this play it portrays: values and purpose of dreams, the need to fight for racial discrimination and the importance of family.

     A Raisin in the Sun, by Lorraine Hansberry, tries to give readers an overall look of what it feels like to be given a chance to make a difference. The play includes Mama, the stronghold of the family, her son, Walter Lee, a dreamer, Beneatha, Walter’s sister, who wants to be a doctor, his wife, Ruth, a realist, and their son, Travis. The play setting is like that of The Glass Menagerie, and is set in post WWII and tells how Mama wants to make a difference for her family. A Raisin in the Sun, unlike The Glass Menagerie, tells how Mama wants something for her entire family to enjoy, unlike Amanda, who wants her family to provide for her own enjoyment. In A Raisin in the Sun, Mama inherits ten-thousand dollars, due to her husband death, and buys a nice house in a white neighborhood. She entrusts Walter Lee, with sixty-five hundred dollars of the ten-thousand dollars, to put into the bank. Mama tells Walter Lee to divide it between him and Beneatha. Instead of putting the money where Mama told him, Walter decides to invest it with friends, in which, he ends up getting scammed. In turn, this made it difficult for the family to decide whether to move into the house or not. Mama lets Walter Lee make the decision to move into the house or to give up. He realizes at the end of the play that this was for his family more

A Raisin in the Sun, written by Lorraine Hansberry, depicts the struggles of an African American family in the 1950s. The Youngers are a poor African American family of five living in a run-down, one-bedroom apartment. Mama, or more formally known as Lena, is the head of the family who lives with her two children. Her son, Walter, is married with a child who both live with them. Her daughter, Beneatha, dreams of pursuing medicine instead of a husband. Soon, an opportunity to escape poverty arises in the form of a $10,000 life insurance check from the patriarch of the family. From buying a house, paying for medical school, and investing in a business, each member of the family has a different plan for the money. When Walter discovers his wife is pregnant and wants an abortion, he says nothing to change her mind. With this, Lena decides to use some of the money for a down payment on a house and gives the remainder to Walter to take to the bank. Walter is supposed to deposit some of the money to pay for Beneatha’s medical school but instead, Walter gives all the money away. Without the excess funds, the Youngers rely on the strength of family and dreams. The American Dream is embodied in the lives of Lena and Beneatha Younger in A Raisin in the Sun.

Racism is a major issue since the colonial era and the slavery era. Heavy burden of racism in the country have fallen upon African Americans. Racism was a huge influence on the Youngster’s family in A Raisin in the Sun, written by Lorraine Hansberry. The Younger’s represent a typical African American family living in the 1950’s trying to survive in the ghetto’s south side of Chicago. This family was filled with dreams, and had a vision to progress, but there was obstacles that were interfering with the younger’s aspiration to move up the social ladder. The issues of segregation, discrimination in employment, and housing sheds light on the suffering that the Youngers faced causing their dreams to be deferred.

A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry shows the life of African Americans in the 1960’s. The Younger family represents a typical black family: a small apartment, not enough money, and low quality jobs. When a $10,000 check is given to Lena Younger (Mama) from an insurance company, the Younger family’s lives change. The family must decide what they want to do with the money. Everyone has their dream – the American dream. The American dream is having a backyard to play in, having a garden, a fence, and a place to sleep. It is a chance to succeed in the world. With the money they have received, they are now able to achieve the dream. The family must realize what is important to them and not themselves. They must work out conflicts and

Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun is a play about segregation, triumph, and coping with personal tragedy. Set in Southside Chicago, A Raisin in the Sun focuses on the individual dreams of the Younger family and their personal achievement. The Younger's are an African American family besieged by poverty, personal desires, and the ultimate struggle against the hateful ugliness of racism. Lena Younger, Mama, is the protagonist of the story and the eldest Younger. She dreams of many freedoms, freedom to garden, freedom to raise a societal-viewed equal family, and freedom to live liberated of segregation. Next in succession is Beneatha Younger, Mama's daughter, assimilationist, and one who dreams of aiding people by breaking down

The racism-steeped social system negatively affects African-American males and females, causing deeply rooted issues. The three women in the story, Beneatha, Ruth, and Mama, represent the different views Black women took during these troublesome times. There were women like Beneatha, who didn’t want to live the typical life of a wife and mother, and openly disapproved the assimilation of Blacks into American culture as well: “Because I hate assimilationist Negroes!” (Hansberry 1500). She wanted to become highly educated, and to change the world somehow. She wanted to be something. Beneatha is a very strong-willed, hard-headed character. This could very well have been caused by the unfair rules of her time constantly being reiterated to her through several mediums. Over and over again she is told that she must

In the story, A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry (1988), the main characters face many difficulties that pertain to their life in the 1950s. One issue the family faces is residential segregation. Another difficulty is pursuing education in a field that is predominantly male or female. A third challenge is dealing with money issues. Hansberry wrote the book to reflect the current events of the 1950s, but these events also relate to before the 1950s and the present, 2016.

In A Raisin In the Sun, Mama’s delicate plant exhibits her family’s deferred dreams for a better future, which have struggled to survive under the difficulties of life in Chicago’s South Side. The Youngers is an African-American family, who received a $10,000 life insurance check as a result of the death of Mama Younger’s husband. The play takes place in the 1950’s and during that time there was a lot of discrimination, oppression, and deferred dreams in an all-white society. But, with the life-insurance check, it was a chance for the Younger’s to escape poverty and try to fulfill their dreams.

The play “A Raisin in the Sun”, by Lorraine Hansberry, takes place in a small apartment on the south side of Chicago. The south side of Chicago at the time was a very poverty stricken neighborhood at a time where there was still a lot of racial tension. The Younger family occupied the small apartment on the south side of Chicago. Lena Younger the mother of the family, and Big Walter had moved into the apartment after getting married, in the hopes of moving into a house after one year. Mamas’ hopes of owning a home soon faded since times were so hard. After the death of her husband Lena Younger received a check from his insurance for ten- thousand dollars. The thought of having that much money started to tear the family apart over what to do with it. Living in the south side of Chicago was a dangerous place, and the Youngers felt like it was a way out of the poor neighborhood. Lena Younger looked at the money as a chance to get the house she always wanted, and something that she would be able to pass down on to the next generations. Many would argue that mama Lena was being hard on her children by forcing what she wanted and her beliefs on the family. I argue that Lena Younger only wanted what was best for her family by showing it through her love for her family, her religious ways, and her determination to give her family a better life.

In the words of Jim Cocola and Ross Douthat, Hansberry wrote the play A Raisin in the Sun to mimic how she grew up in the 1930s. Her purpose was to tell how life was for a black family living during the pre-civil rights era when segregation was still legal (spark notes). Hansberry introduces us to the Youngers’, a black family living in Chicago’s Southside during the 1950s pre-civil rights movement. The Younger family consists of Mama, who is the head of the household, Walter and Beneatha, who are Mama’s children, Ruth, who is Walter’s wife, and Travis, who is Walter and Ruth’s son. Throughout the play the Youngers’ address poverty, discrimination, marital problems, and abortion. Mama is waiting on a check from the