Racial Discrimination: A Study of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun

Anju Mehra

Authors

Anju Mehra Anju Mehra, Associate Professor, Department of English and Foreign Languages, MDU, Rohtak https://orcid.org/0009-0001-4401-8611

Keywords:

racial discrimination, systemic racism, African American, aspirations, segregation, identity

Abstract

Aims: This paper explores the expression of racial discrimination in Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun (1959), emphasizing how systemic racism affects the aspirations and struggles of the Younger family.

Methodology and Approaches: The impact of social, economic, and psychological difficulties contended by African Americans in mid-20th century America is explored. Through the experiences of the Younger family, Hansberry’s critique of racial discrimination includes the systems of prejudice and segregation that restrict social mobility for Blacks.

Outcome: The paper addresses the issue of personal aspirations set against the backdrop of racial subjugation, illustrating the impact of institutional racism on family identification and dynamics. It analyzes the responses of the central figures to the discrimination they face and how Hansberry critiques American society’s treatment of Black Americans through nuanced and blunt representations of racism.

Conclusion and Suggestions: The study also examines the critique of America by emphasizing the significance of these issues concerning racial disparity today.

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Author Biography

Anju Mehra, Anju Mehra, Associate Professor, Department of English and Foreign Languages, MDU, Rohtak

Dr. Anju Mehra is presently working as an Associate Professor of English in the Department of English and Foreign Languages at Maharshi Dayanand University, Rohtak, Haryana. She has been teaching for more than fifteen years and has contributed extensively to the field of research and publication. She has to her credit the publication of 5 books and 30 research papers in international and national journals and edited books. She has presented papers at more than 50 conferences in India and abroad. She has delivered many extension lectures and has chaired technical sessions in conferences. Her thrust areas of research include English Literature, American Literature, African American Literature, and Cultural Studies. She is a research guide and thesis reviewer.