Many African Americans in Chicago lived on the South side, which was almost like a slum. Housing was very segregated at the time and African Americans had less opportunities for jobs and education. In Lorraine Hansberry’s play A Raisin in the Sun, Walter, Mama, and Beneatha are just a few examples of characters whose dreams have been deferred by their financial situation, housing restrictions, and gender stereotypes.
Walter’s dream of owning a business or becoming a businessman has been unattainable due to the lack of money that the Younger family has. While talking to Ruth, Walter mentions his aspiration of co-owning a liquor store, “WALTER. You see, this little liquor store we got in mind cost seventy-five thousand and we figured the initial …show more content…
Chicago’s neighborhoods were very segregated in the 1950s, “...white home owners banded together to create racially restrictive housing covenants, which stated that residents must be of a particular race in order to live in that neighborhood”(Housing Segregation). Towards the end of the play, Mama buys a house in an all white neighborhood. This creates a discomfort in the white neighborhood and all the members of that neighborhood pitched in to buy the house back from Mama for more than she paid for it. They were so worried about living that close to a black family that they were willing to buy back the house. Even though this specific neighborhood in A Raisin in the Sun may not have had a restrictive housing covenant, it is still an example of the discrimination that legally went on in Chicago. In the first few pages of A Raisin in the Sun, Lorraine Hansberry paints a vivid picture of the living situations that Southside residents dealt with, “The Younger living room would be a comfortable and well-ordered room if it were not for a number of indestructible contradictions to this state of being. Its furnishing are typical and undistinguished and their primary feature now is that they have clearly had to accommodate the living of too many people for too many years - and they are tired”(Hansberry 23). This description of the Younger’s household is just another example of the way that most African Americans in Southside Chicago lived. A large family sharing a two bedroom apartment and multiple families sharing one bathroom was not an uncommon thing on the Southside. Even if some families were able to afford a house, they were likely to be run out because of racially restrictive housing covenants. Not only was race an issue for housing, but race and gender was
Walter’s dream of owning a business or becoming a businessman has been unattainable due to the lack of money that the Younger family has. While talking to Ruth, Walter mentions his aspiration of co-owning a liquor store, “WALTER. You see, this little liquor store we got in mind cost seventy-five thousand and we figured the initial …show more content…
Chicago’s neighborhoods were very segregated in the 1950s, “...white home owners banded together to create racially restrictive housing covenants, which stated that residents must be of a particular race in order to live in that neighborhood”(Housing Segregation). Towards the end of the play, Mama buys a house in an all white neighborhood. This creates a discomfort in the white neighborhood and all the members of that neighborhood pitched in to buy the house back from Mama for more than she paid for it. They were so worried about living that close to a black family that they were willing to buy back the house. Even though this specific neighborhood in A Raisin in the Sun may not have had a restrictive housing covenant, it is still an example of the discrimination that legally went on in Chicago. In the first few pages of A Raisin in the Sun, Lorraine Hansberry paints a vivid picture of the living situations that Southside residents dealt with, “The Younger living room would be a comfortable and well-ordered room if it were not for a number of indestructible contradictions to this state of being. Its furnishing are typical and undistinguished and their primary feature now is that they have clearly had to accommodate the living of too many people for too many years - and they are tired”(Hansberry 23). This description of the Younger’s household is just another example of the way that most African Americans in Southside Chicago lived. A large family sharing a two bedroom apartment and multiple families sharing one bathroom was not an uncommon thing on the Southside. Even if some families were able to afford a house, they were likely to be run out because of racially restrictive housing covenants. Not only was race an issue for housing, but race and gender was