George C.Wolfe uses plot, character, and dialogue in his play Colored Museum’s exhibit “Git on Board” to implicate the audience in order to force them to realize how they are simply being a part of the racial issues that have been existing. Throughout the play, using a sense of humor and satire, Wolfe continuously makes the audience feel uncomfortable. For example, Wolfe sets up the story in a “Celebrity Slaveship” that takes place into an airplane in order to give the audiences a taste of slavery in a familiar but unpleasant setting; Wolfe intentionally does so to forcefully implicate the audience to make them feel guilty for just being a part of the issue and not taking any action to stop it. To elaborate, Wolfe shows how our society has …show more content…
Wolfe portrays the character of Miss Pat to the audience in a questionable manner. To elaborate, Wolf presents Miss Pat as a symbol of perfectionism, an African-American woman who is taking the charge of the slave ship as a flight-attendant and pretending as nothing has happened through her “little jokes” although she knows that the worst is yet to come. Moreover, Miss Pat walks the audiences through the history of African-American’s and their struggles to overcome white dominations. For example, she suggests the audiences abandon their “god” and “Worship a new one”. Meaning, they must lose their own self-identity in order to fit in. Although Miss Pat tries to act as a strong figure, just like rest of the audiences, she is also conflicted by her own “rehearsed” presentation. For example, throughout the play, Miss Pat speaks “reassuringly” in an attempt to clear up her own self-doubts in order to play her role better. Miss Pat’s character forces the audience to feel sympathetic towards African-Americans and guilty for overlooking their everyday struggles to fit into a society that often takes away their power and
The play “Permanent Collection” focuses on an African-American man who has just taken over an art museum named Sterling North. While digging through storage, he finds eight African sculpture pieces and wants to add them to the collection at the Morris Foundation on the campus of a college. The Director of Education Paul Barrow is hanging on to the words of Mr. Morris and his vision because he doesn’t want anything to change at the museum according to Mr. Morris’ will, which contributes to the title of the play “Permanent Collection.” In the play, there is no answer as to who is right and who is wrong. North told a journalist that he believed Barrow to be a racist but Barrow doesn’t feel this way.
Some critics have argued that Richard Wright’s women are “flat, one dimensional stereotypes, portrayed primarily in terms of their relationship to the male character”. (Quote, p540) However, in Uncle Tom’s Children, Wright resents three very distinct types of female characters who did not fit this description. Wright portrays women as an Avenger, a Sufferer and a Mother figure whose actions propel the stories to their final conclusion. In the story “Bright and Morning Star” Wright places the protagonist, Aunt Sue, in a domestic environment. “Her hands followed a lifelong ritual of toil” (pg222) as she cleans and cooks. Interestingly, Aunt Sue is the only heroine in the stories, who shows a different type of bravery than perhaps shown by the male figures in other stories. She is brave in the face of the loss of her two sons; she is brave as she does not show weakness to the white men who attempt to control her and make her do their bidding. She does not allow herself to be bound by the conventions of society. She speaks her mind to the white men who invade her home and states “Ah don’t care who Ahm talking t!” (pg238). Aunt Sue is portrayed as a cunning woman, who hides behind men’s perception of her as weak and uses it to her advantage. Her final act of bravery in the story is to giver herself up to death, before the white men can take her life from her. Wright also portrays women as sufferers in his work. Sarah, in “Long Black Song” suffers from isolation and is stuck in a loveless marriage. The gap between men and women is very much evident in this story. Sarah is very much dependent on Silas for company, security and items of comfort. Silas is allowed to exceed from the isolation imposed on his wife. Even when Sarah flees from ...
Then, in the play, Wilson looks at the unpleasant expense and widespread meanings of the violent urban environment in which numerous African Americans existed th...
One of the main themes is slavery, mainly the evil of slavery. At the very beginning of the book, readers are shown the idea that not all slave owners are indeed evil and only care about money. There are some owners who do not abuse or mistreat their slaves, however these ideas are not placed to show that the evil of slavery is conditional, but as a way to show the wickedness of slavery even in the best-case scenario. Due to the fact that even though Shelby and St. Clare show kindness towards their slaves, at the same time their ability to tolerate slavery renders them hypocritical and morally weak. In fact, this is first shown when Shelby shamefacedly breaks apart Tom’s family by selling him. Yet, the most evil of slavery does not render its head until Tom is sold to the Legree plantation, where it appears in its most hideous and naked form; the harsh and barbaric settings where slaves suffer beating, sexual abuse and murder. The play then introduces the shock that if slavery is wrong in the best of case scenario, then in the worst cases it ca...
The submissive and sacrificial role, that the only canonical non-white character inhabits, paints a clear picture on how the writers view the role of black female
Alexander Hamilton, One of Americas founding fathers, author of “The Federalist Papers,” and the gentleman on the ten-dollar bill, has a riveting Broadway musical biography on his life by the great Lin-Manuel Miranda. What makes this show absolutely unique is that it not just white men dressed up in powdered white wigs, it’s a contemporary piece with scores of music in pop, hip-hop, R&B and only uses Black and Latino actors. In theatre, the concept of colorblind casting has been used for a long time but it is still a debate whether or not it’s an effective practice. Even the celebrated Black playwright August Wilson, in his speech addressed to the Theatre Communications Group National Conference “The Ground on Which I Stand” states that, “colorblind casting is an aberrant idea that has never had any validity other than as a tool of Cultural Imperialists who view American culture, rooted in the icons of European culture, as beyond reproach in its perfection … to mount an all-black production of a Death of a Salesman or any other play conceived for white actors as an investigation of the human condition through the specifics of white culture is to deny us our own humanity, our own history, and the need to make our own investigation from the cultural ground on which we stand as black Americans.” Nevertheless, Hamilton does the exact opposite, it opens the audience to understanding that talent can transcend the characters and still tell the stories of our cultures history using both a serious, comedic, and musical approach.
In the novel, the author proposes that the African American female slave’s need to overcome three obstacles was what unavoidably separated her from the rest of society; she was black, female, and a slave, in a white male dominating society. The novel “locates black women at the intersection of racial and sexual ideologies and politics (12).” White begins by illustrating the Europeans’ two major stereotypes o...
Many different depictions of gender roles exist in all times throughout the history of American culture and society. Some are well received and some are not. When pitted against each other for all intents and purposes of opposition, the portrayal of the aspects and common traits of masculinity and femininity are separated in a normal manner. However, when one gender expects the other to do its part and they are not satisfied with the results and demand more, things can shift from normal to extreme fairly quickly. This demand is more commonly attributed by the men within literary works. Examples of this can be seen in Tennessee Williams' “A Streetcar Named Desire”, where Stella is constantly being pushed around and being abused by her drunken husband Stanley, and also in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's “The Yellow Wallpaper”, where the female narrator is claimed unfit by her husband as she suffers from a sort of depression, and is generally looked down on for other reasons.
Mrs. Turpin in Flannery O’Connor’s short story Revelation, is a prejudice and judgmental woman who spends most of her life prying in the lives of everyone around her. She looks at people not for who they are, but for their race or social standing. In fact, Mrs. Turpin is concerned with race and status so much that it seems to take over her life. Although she seems to disapprove of people of different race or social class, Mrs. Turpin seems to be content and appreciative with her own life. It is not until Mrs. Turpin’s Revelation that she discovers that her ways of life are no better then those she looks down upon and they will not assure her a place in Heaven.
I think this play is a lot about what does race mean, and to what extent do we perform race either onstage or in life:
As women's studies programs have proliferated throughout American universities, feminist "re-readings" of certain classic authors have provided us with the most nonsensical interpretations of these authors' texts. A case in point is that of Kathleen Margaret Lant's interpretation of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire in her essay entitled "A Streetcar Named Misogyny." Throughout the essay, she continually misreads Williams' intention, which of course causes her to misunderstand the play itself. Claiming that the play "has proved vexing to audiences, directors, actors, readers, and critics" (Lant 227), she fails to see that it is she herself who finds the play vexing, because it does not fit nicely into the warped feminist structure she would try to impose upon it.
Margaret is an intelligent, articulate, and ambitious woman who desires to rise up in social status by marrying a man of higher social rank. She attends to those above her, in hopes of elevating her status as she becomes closer to the upper-class. As a minor character, she plays a small yet crucial role in advancing Don John’s plot to slander Hero and spoil her wedding. As a lower-class character, Margaret serves as a foil to the rich girls, particularly Hero, who embodies every attitude and mindset Margaret does not. But she also offers an alternative perspective on the upper-class characters in the play. Because Margaret is victimized because of her social ambitions, punished for wanting to rise above her ...
Born into slavery, Patsey places less hope in acquiring her freedom than enslaved freeman Solomon. She instead focuses on making the best out of her tragic situation. As a slave, Patsey is of the lowest order in southern society. She lives a destitute existence, finding solace in furnishing dolls out of straw and in visiting the neighboring plantation owners slave mistress. Patsey labours tirelessly in the cotton fields of Edwin Epps’s plantation in the hopes that her efforts will grant some leniency from her sadistic master. Her efforts however go largely unrewarded. Patsey’s exceptional skills in the cotton fields act only to attract her master vile fancy. She becomes the victim of unprovoked beatings and rape by Epps, making an already miserable existence almost entirely unbearable for her (The Internet Movie Script Database). Throughout the film, Patsey challenges negative stereotypes regarding gender and race. Her ability to collect hundreds of pounds more cotton than the average slave contradicts the notion of field work being a primarily male dominated endeavor, a common stereotype still held today. The stereotype most critically challenged by the portal of Patsey is that of the “Jezebelle” image. Traditionally the “Jezebelle” caricature was one of “a light-skinned, slender Mulatto girl with long straight hair and small features”, who “more closely resembled the European ideal for beauty than any pre-existing images… Jezebelle served to absolve white males of responsibility in the sexual abuse and rape of African-American women” (Green, 1998). Patsey does not possess any of the characteristics of the traditional “Jezebelle” caricature; she has an exceedingly dark skin pigmentation and short afro-textured hair. The film’s depiction of Patsey acted to debunk the stereotypical “Jezebelle” image, without neglecting to include the sexually abusive relationship between slave owners
Racism is everywhere; it is all around us and at most times it resides within us. Racism basically refers to the characterization of people (ethnicity based) with certain distinct traits. It is a tool with which people use to distinguish themselves between each other, where some use it to purposely inflict verbal, physical or mental attacks on others while some use it to simply distinguish or differentiate from one another. It all depends on the context in which it is used. The play Fences by August Wilson, takes place during the late 1950’s through to 1965, a period of time when the fights against segregation are barely blossoming results. The main protagonist, Troy Maxson is an African American who works in the sanitation department; he is also a responsible man whose thwarted dreams make him prone to believing in self-created illusions. Wilson's most apparent intention in the play ‘Fences’, is to show how racial segregation creates social and economic gaps between African Americans and whites. Racism play a very influential role in Troy’s but more importantly it has been the force behind his actions that has seen him make biased and judgmental decisions for himself and his family. Lessons from the play intend to shed light on how racism can affect the mental and physical lives of Troy Maxson and his family.
When Northup arrived at his new Master’s plantation, Master Epps, he received a cruel welcoming of what a slave really went through. When Northup arrived, he was introduced to Patsey, who was played by Lupita Nyong’o, who has been a slave her whole life. She was the “queen of the fields” and befriends Northup. In one scene, Patsey tells Master Epps that she had gone to Mistress Shaw’s house fore a bar a soap because Mistress Epps would not give her soap to bathe with. Due to the envy and jealousy that Mistress Epps had for Patsey, she ordered her husband to whip her; however, he did not want to. Therefore, he ordered Platt to whip Patsey. It is prevalent from the moment that he began to whip her that he was heartbroken to do so. Afterward, Master Epps had taken the whip from Platt and nearly whipped Patsey to death. Before being whipped, Patsey disclosed to Platt that she rather have him whip her then Master Epps because she knew he would not be as rough as Epps was. He had lost himself and his