The background of A Raisin in the Sun
“What do you think about the main idea of A Raisin in the Sun?” On the end of
the last class, professor asked this question. In the last lesson, we introduced about the
background of this book, and I learned that the author Lorraine Hansberry is a black
woman, she wrote this book on 1959. So I guess that Hansberry might narrate a story
about the racial discrimination in that time. Because the most common point in every
student’s introduction is the discrimination.
Firstly, we need to find the reason why the discrimination happened, it is helpful
for us to learn how serious discrimination is.
As we known, in the 19century, there
was a very dark trade about black people, the Atlantic Slave Trade. The colonists
robbed population from Africa, and they sold these black people to America as slaves.
Because of this trade, some black people have lived in America, and the Africa has
become more and more needy.
There is a very brutal truth, that if the country is
very powerless, its citizen might be discriminated by other countries. And this also is
suitable at that time. Because of the poor Africa and the dark identity of the black
people, in 1950s, black people were discriminated.
There is no denying that many bills were established for protecting black people.
However, the discrimination was still happened.
In that term, the salaries were
very unfair for different race. For example, in 1959, black man could only earn about
$2500 per year, but for white race, a white man could earn more than $5000 with a
same job.
And the discrimination was happened not only in work, but also in
education.
For example, black people was not allowed to go to normal school, the
only school they went was black people school. These schools always had low
equipment and teachers were not very knowledgeable.
Even for daily life, the
society had some underlying rules. Take Shopping as an example, in many stores,
there were two lines, one was for white people, and the other line was for black
people. And in the bus, if black people took bus, they should sit on the rear of a bus,
this was the special space for black people.
These discriminations made black people be in a weak position, and Hansberry
might want to write a book to appeal people to pay attention on the racial
discrimination. Because of the endeavor of many people, we can live in the society
with a relative equality. Even though the discrimination was disappeared nowadays,
we also need to take care about people who are in a weak position and clear these
unfair treatments, because everyone might be the next one who is in a weak position.