“A Dream Deferred” April 11, 2012

LEADING UP TO THE PLAY “A Raisin in the Sun”

Jim Crow  Jim Crow songbook This songbook, published in Ithaca, New York, in 1839, shows an early depiction of a minstrel-show character named Jim Crow. By the 1890s the expression “Jim Crow” was being used to describe laws and customs aimed at segregating African Americans and others. These laws were intended to restrict social contact between whites and other groups and to limit the freedom and opportunity of people of color.

Advertising Cards of the Jim Crow Era

Continued:  Insulting racial stereotypes were common in American society. They reinforced discriminatory customs and laws that oppressed Americans of many racial, ethnic, or religious backgrounds. The cigarette holder and early 20th-century advertising cards depict common stereotypes of African Americans, Chinese Americans, Jews, and Irish Americans.

Fighting against Jim Crow  Plessy v. Ferguson In 1890 a new Louisiana law required railroads to provide “equal but separate accommodations for the white, and colored, races.” Outraged, the black community in New Orleans decided to test the rule. On June 7, 1892, Homer Plessy agreed to be arrested for refusing to move from a seat reserved for whites. Judge John H. Ferguson upheld the law, and the case of Plessy v. Ferguson slowly moved up to the Supreme Court. The Out Come: On May 18, 1896, the U.S. Supreme Court, with only one dissenting vote, ruled that segregation in America was constitutional. (Courtesy of National Archives, Washington, D.C.)

The Legalization of Jim Crow Laws:  Separate but Equal: The Law of the Land African Americans turned to the courts to help protect their constitutional rights. But the courts challenged earlier civil rights legislation and handed down a series of decisions that permitted states to segregate people of color. In the pivotal case of Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that racially separate facilities, if equal, did not violate the Constitution. Segregation, the Court said, was not discrimination.  The Supreme Court The members of the United States Supreme Court, Under Chief Justice Melville Fuller, the Court established the separate-but-equal rule. Courtesy of Supreme Court of the United States

Jim Crow Laws  “It shall be unlawful for a negro and white person to play together or in company with each other in any game of cards or dice, dominoes or checkers.” —Birmingham, Alabama, 1930  “Marriages are void when one party is a white person and the other is possessed of one-eighth or more negro, Japanese, or Chinese blood.” —Nebraska, 1911  “Separate free schools shall be established for the education of children of African descent; and it shall be unlawful for any colored child to attend any white school, or any white child to attend a colored school.” —Missouri, 1929  “All railroads carrying passengers in the state (other than street railroads) shall provide equal but separate accommodations for the white and colored races, by providing two or more passenger cars for each passenger train, or by dividing the cars by a partition, so as to secure separate accommodations.” —Tennessee, 1891

Jim Crow Laws Enacted

The Setting of: “A Raisin in the Sun”  Between 1945 and 1959  The South Side of Chicago  Time and Place Written: 1950s New York

Placing the Play in History 1954 In the "doll test," popularized by social psychologists Kenneth Bancroft Clark and his wife, Mamie Phipps Clark, children were given a black doll and a white doll and asked which one they preferred. Most black children preferred the white doll, to which they also attributed the most positive characteristics. During court trials relating to segregated schools, the NAACP and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund enlisted Kenneth Clark's services as an expert witness on the detrimental effects of racial exclusion and discrimination. The Defense Fund lawyers also submitted a report that explained the test results to the Supreme Court as evidence in the Brown v. Board of Education case. In a unanimous ruling in 1954, the court found that separate schools were inherently unequal and specifically cited the Clark report.

Continued…  Brown Decision-- Separate Is Inherently Illegal  Brown v. Board of Education  Beginning in 1950, the NAACP and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund attorneys worked on a school desegregation case originating in Charleston, S.C. In 1952 the case came before the U.S. Supreme Court, whose members decided to hear it with cases from Delaware, Virginia, Kansas, and the District of Columbia under the collective title Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. Thurgood Marshall and other NAACP lawyers argued the case and won. Brown marked a landmark victory in the fight for full citizenship, offering hope that the system of segregation was not unassailable.

Continued…  Little Rock Arkansas After the 1954 Brown school-desegregation decision, Little Rock school board officials decided to begin desegregation of Central High School in September It was not easy, but President Dwight D. Eisenhower made sure that it was successful by federalizing the Arkansas National Guard and deploying paratroopers. 1957

The Connection:  Through out history many people of a different race and nationality other than the Caucasian American have had their dreams challenged and deferred.  The successful integration of schools was not the end of the fight for equality. The fight continued, because dreams were still being stifled by the majority in power. So, as we start reading “A Raisin in the Sun” keep in mind the time Period in which it was created.

A Preface:  The preface to “A Raisin in the Sun” is Langston Hughes’ poem “Montage to a Dream Deferred”  What is the purpose of a preface?  Definitions: montage: any combination of disparate (essentially different) elements that forms or is felt to form a unified whole, single image, etc. defer: to put off to a future time Fester: to form pus or rot

Montage to a Dream Deferred "Harlem“ What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore - And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over - like a syrupy sweet? Maybe it just sags like a heavy load. Or does it explode?

Montage to a Dream Deferred  What central question does the poem ask? Even though the poem is phrased in a list of questions, Hughes is still making a statement.  What is Hughes’ message about dreams deferred?  What are the contrasts that he uses?  What type of figurative language does he use?  How do “dreams deferred” relate to the American Dream?  Does this preface to the play give you insight into what the play will be about? deferred?src=related_normal&rel=