Racial Biases In A Streetcar Named Desire Essay

Race depicts an immoral bias towards people who are not part of the majority, causing a division of power, wealth, and influence throughout society. In A Streetcar Named Desire, by playwright Tennessee Williams, race is depicted as a hindrance on one’s appearance and is viewed negatively by the rest of society. When Blanche comes to visit her sister, Stella, from Belle Reve, she brings her racial biases and her ‘Southern belle’ ideology with her. This perspective makes her view different races as a lower class than herself and inferior to the ‘white’ people of society. Not only is this unethical, but it shows that people of a higher-class look down upon those of a different race. In A Streetcar Named Desire race is closely intertwined with

This derives from the fact that people of a different race getting categorized as lesser, which Stanley does not want, especially from Blanche. This quote also shows how Blanche continues to bring her prejudice and judgment with her from Belle Reve into a completely different environment in which she is of the majority from a socioeconomic perspective. Blanche has been placed out of her element and the new environment can be strenuous for people who are not acquainted with the role race and class plays in a different demographic. When Blanche is being escorted with the doctor out of the Kowalski residence she says, “[w]hoever you are- I have always depended on the kindness of strangers” (Williams 178). This quote is not directed at anyone in the Kowalski residence, or anyone directly around Blanche. Instead this quote accurately depicts how Blanche is in this setting of an easy and relaxed intermingling of races and shows her lack of connection to the people of New Orleans and those who inhabit the city. This quote sums up how out of place Blanche is in a lower class filled with racial figures that someone of her socioeconomic perspective would usually segregate and thus exposes her racism and biased view of the past. It is evident that Blanche’s ‘Southern Belle’ perspective is a extremely racially and culturally biased opinion in the poorer districts of New Orleans. Blanche depicts all of the higher class citizens in New Orleans and shows how they would look down upon and disassociate themselves with other races because they view them as