Discrimination Challenges

Growing up in the early 1900’s was not easy especially if you were a women and/or black. Hansberry was both and with that, she faced discrimination challenges. As she grew as a women and writer, a person respected her more and saw her for more than her race and the fact she was a woman. Throughout her life, she fought for her rights and stood up for a cause, until her early tragic death from cancer. Lorraine Hansberry grew up during the American Civil Rights movement, managed to overcome the hard times of segregation, the lack of women’s rights, and the harsh criticism of the critics to become a strong writer, which she used to make a difference for African Americans through all her writings.

#1 Hansberry grew up in trying times with her two parents, from the beginning she wanted to make a difference. “Lorrain Vivian Hansberry was born in Chicago, Illinois, in 1930, to Carl A. Hansberry and Nanny Perry Hansberry and was the youngest of four children.”(#4) “Throughout her childhood, thanks to her family’s deep involvement in the black community, she was surrounded by black politics, culture, and economics. Her father, a relator, was very active in the NAACP and…her mother, a former schoolteacher, was a ward committeewoman…”(#4) When she was eight her family moved into a white community but was later forced out. “Hansberry learned another lesson in pride in 1938 when her father, risking jail, challenged Chicago’s real estate convents, which legally upheld housing discrimination, by moving his own family into a white neighborhood.” (#4). “Hansberry herself believed religion was a crutch… and this belief is reflected in her near-dismissal of both Christianity and the native religion of Zatembe in Les Blancs.” (Paper #2). Facing many ...

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... in the Sun; Canned Film Festavel special award and Screen Writers Guide nomination, both 1961, both for screenplay, A Raisin in the Sun.” (http://libproxy.wcjc.cc.tx.us:2368) (#9)

“Hansberry was named the “most promising playwrite” of the season by Variety’s poll of New York drama critic’s.”(#9)

“But most critics did not perceive Hansberry as a particulary political or “black” writer, but rather as one who dealt more with human universals.” (#9)

With only a short amount of time spent in this world, Hansberry was able to make difference to many people inside and outside of the literature world. She stood up for her rights, which helped her find love and peace.

Hansberry faced many tough challenges throughout her life from race discrimination to harsh critics on her books and plays but she believed in herself and took charge to try to make a difference.