Examples Of Marginalization Of Men In The Great Gatsby

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In an article titled "Black Male Marginalization in Early Twentieth Century American Canonical Novels: The Great Gatsby and Of Mice and Men" Agnieszka Lobodziec examines the issues of black male marginalization and white supremacy within the novels The Great Gatsby and Of Mice and Men. Throughout The Great Gatsby, there are several examples of "the nation's historically evolving conceptions of white superiority and black inferiority" (Lobodziec 289). The most obvious illustration of this ideology is clearly shown through the marginalization of black men within the novel. Lobodziec writes "the marginalization of black males bears particular significance in that this phenomenon enunciates the gendered politics of race" (Lobodziec 289). With this …show more content…

Specifically, Fitzgerald characterizes Tom Buchanan as an extreme racist. This is proven during Tom's conversation with Nick and Daisy when he says that "civilization's going to pieces … the idea is if we don't look out the white race will be … utterly submerged" (Fitzgerald 12-13). Tom is worried that if the white race does not take control now, then the other races will eventually take over and threaten the power balance that the white race has held for so many years. It appears that Tom is very scared to lose this power, and even the thought of not being the dominant race is too much for him to handle. Additionally, Daisy and Nick are not even phased by what Tom is professing to them. As a matter of fact, Daisy admires what Tom is saying, and "considers his suppositions as expressions of true scientific knowledge not pseudo-science" (Lobodziec 292). Both Daisy and Nick are a part of the privileged white aristocracy along with Tom and they all fail to recognize the racism that they are listening to and supporting. This gives the reader an insight as to how the white aristocracy viewed black people and other people of color during that time period. More importantly, this reveals "the systematic, more deeply rooted anti-black racism which advocated multifaceted exclusion from the mainstream American, and supposedly global, community" (Lobodziec 292). With this statement, Lobodziec suggests that due to this denial of recognition of black men that it makes black people as a whole inherently inferior even though Fitzgerald never explicitly writes this. By denying the existence of a whole race of people, specifically black men, Tom and other characters in the novel gain a sense of power over those people by controlling whether or not they have a place in a "perfect" white

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