Hanna vs Joe contrasting roles in Agelsin America
In Tony Kushners to part play, Angels in America, readers are introduced to a closeted gay man, Joe Pitt and are exposed to his relationship with his Mormon mother, Hannah. An underlying conflict occurs when Hannah finds out her son is a homosexual; a problem which forces her to question her love and acceptance towards her son and her strong Mormon anti gay sentiments and beliefs. This conflict between mother and son helps Kushner illustrate the complexity of sexuality and the changing views of homosexuality.
The conflict between Joe and Hannah initially arises when Joe tells is mom for the first time that he is gay. Joe's mother is Mormon and Joe himself is born and raised Mormon. The religious prohibits homosexuality and this, Hannah is in shock when Joe tells her what is going on. It is even more shocking due to the fact that Joe is presumably happily married to Harper, also a Mormon. During This discussion with his mother, Joe tries to point the finger at his father who Joe claims didn't love him enough and might have "caused" his homosexuality. Hannah can not seem to deal with the situation and delves into extreme denial. She hangs up the phone thinking the conversation came from Joe just being drunk.
Hannah's Mormon background embedded in her strict beliefs about traditional love and marriages and the idea that being gay is unnatural and devilish. This background doesn't allow her to accept Joe's sexuality. It is in this upheaval that Hannah moves from Salt Lake City to New York in hopes to save her son and his dying marriage. Her arrival, However only makes the situation worse. She carries out responsibility as a mother-in-law and takes care of the abandonment and valium-dependant Harper and manages at the same time to dive Joe completely out of the picture.
By the second part of the play, Hannah is working at a Mormons visitor center in New York and simultaneously taking care of Harper. Joe meanwhile is beginning his first relationship with a man, Louis. Both Joe and Hannah are opening up; Joe living out his homosexual tendencies and Hannah being exposed to absurd circumstances such as the meeting of prior. Prior in many ways becomes Hannah's first real recognition of homosexuality. Prior, who is surviving with A. I. D. S visits the Mormon center, where he falls severely ill and ends up being saved by Hannah.
Taste, which is, after all, the insecurity of the middle class, became the homosexual's licentiate to challenge the rule of nature,” (Rodriguez 124). This stereotype communicates to the general public that homosexuality or the ones that fall in the boxes of LGBTQ (and more) are the individuals that have taste in fashion, makeup, food, home decor, etc., also even by claiming to be something out of heterosexuality disrupted the laws of nature which is smart for Rodriguez to input in Late Victorians. In addition, the use of symbolism in Rodriguez’s essay regarding homosexuality is portrayed as a home. The Victorian houses that were built for middle-class individuals, which were being claimed by homosexual men to live in, marry, or start a family in, in San Francisco. The portrayal of home as a place of comfort, safety, and family were things that homosexual men (or women), and anything in between craved for in mortality like heterosexual beings. Apart from the symbolism, I noticed that Rodriguez liked metaphors, anaphora, hyperbole, and repetition in his
What I’ve noticed in the film is that the two main characters fit two standard archetypes of gay men. One who welcomes their sexuallity and one suppresses it. Ennis Del Mar is a man who before the story started was engaged to a woman named Alma. When Ennis and Jack begin their sexual relationship and Ennis tells Jack that he wasn’t queer,
The lecture hall filled with the audience members’ conversations in the gymnasium-sized room, which the microphone on the podium in center stage amplified. Through the double door entrance to the hall walked a conference attendee named Adam Moore, who found his seat in the last of many perfectly aligned rows of folding chairs. He began reading the brochure handed to him as he arrived and “homosexuality” being on the list of discussion topics intrigued him because he is an openly homosexual member of the Episcopal Church. After all the discussions had concluded and the ministers and clergy answered every question, Moore approached Father McAllister and asked him to explain some of the Catholic Church’s teachings to him. Father McAllister happily agreed and they both returned to the lecture hall to have their conversation. Father McAllister sat next to Moore, who reclaimed his conference seat. Moore explained that although there were many topics he did not fully understand in Catholic Church teaching, there was only one he wanted to discuss with him. He sought to understand what the Catholic Church taught on the topic of homosexuality and what the Church’s opposition was to homosexual relationship...
...e social changes brought about this period. He cites the growing sensationalism of sex covered in the media as a prime driver behind the sexual orthodoxy in American culture (Chauncey 1994, 359). During this witch hunt, he draws a silver lining. Using the scholarship of others such as John D’Emilio, he cites that this period brought a greater bond to the gay community by forging brotherhood of adversity which would then come back into play in the 1960’s as an experiential touchstone for the Civil Rights era (Chauncey 1994, 360). Chauncey nestles his own narrative of the gay community in New York within the larger narrative of gay life in America filling in the gaps of secondary sources through his own primary work.
... homosexual being felt in the world around the 1970’s and 1980’s. The time period in which this play was written was one of great dissonance to the LGBT movement. For Harvey Fierstein to be so bold and public with his own lifestyle was truly admirable and brave. Fierstein shows us that ignorance can destroy a life because of what is unknown.
They mention the transition of “the closet,” as being a place in which people could not see you, to becoming a metaphor over the last two decades of the twentieth century used for queers who face a lack of sexual identity. Shneer and Aviv bring together two conflicting ideas of the American view of queerness: the ideas of the past, and the present. They state as queerness became more visible, people finally had the choice of living multiple lives, or integrating one’s lives and spaces (Shneer and Aviv 2006: 245). They highlight another change in the past twenty years as the clash between being queer and studying queerness (Shneer and Aviv 2006: 246-7). They argue that the active and visible contests over power among American queers show that queers now occupy an important place in our culture. They expand on the fact that queerness, real, and performed, is everywhere (Shneer and Aviv 2006: 248). This source shows the transformation in American culture of the acceptance of queerness. It makes an extremely critical resource by providing evidence of the changes in culture throughout the last two decades. Having the information that queerness is becoming more accepted in culture links to a higher percentage of LGBTQ youths becoming comfortable with their sexual identity. However, compared to the other sources, this
To begin with, ‘Down Low’ is a phrase that was coined by members of the African American urban culture during late 1980’s which defines gay men who appear to be straight (Hamilton, 2009). Many characteristics of men living on the down low include individuals (who appear as though they are straight) who are sometimes married with children, members of the clergy, elected officials, ex-convicts, and most notable in a number of low-budget and often overlooked films – straight acting thugs (Hamilton, 2009). It is almost virtually impossible to be appreciative of the drama “Angels in America” without having an understanding about the history of the AIDS crisis as well as a more extensive story of lesbians and gays in the United States of America. While men and women have engaged in homosexual conduct in all times and various cultures, it was only in the twentieth centu...
The difficulty of determining what gay and lesbian text is poses a challenge in finding material applicable to queer theory. However, being subtitled as a Gay Fantasia on National Themes by its openly homosexual author, Tony Kushner’s Angels in America is most appropriately viewed through this lens, as the play’s content directly illustrates the purpose of queer theory. Entangling the personal with the political, Kushner seeks to deconstruct the heteronormative agenda by illustrating the relationship between Reagan, AIDS, religion, and homosexuality through their impact on his characters. All struggling with some aspect of homosexuality, each perspective told in the play expresses the depth at which societal norms damage the freedom of American citizens. With sexual identity at the f...
That same night, I walked by Hannah’s cell and I saw her staring down at a newspaper clip out of a young teenager shaking hands with another man. I recognized that the boy was the man who visited today. Could he be Hannah’s son? If he is, then why hadn’t he visit her all this time? Hannah brushed her fingers across the books on her shelf, and took out a sheet of paper and started writing in it. This time, her eyes turned grey and they were empty, but free.
Throughout Huck's living in the novel, he reveals through his interactions with Widow Douglass and Silas Phelps the hypocrisy of those characters. For example, in chapter one, Widow Douglass takes snuff, but would not allow Huck to smoke since smoking “wasn't clean, and... not do it anymore” (2). While Widow Douglass preaches virtues into Huck and tells him of all the unclean practices in the world, she is below that knowledge since the same drugs are in snuff as in cigarettes and reveals her dark side; she is an oppressor who wants everyone to agree with her practices and bends the rules slightly to fit her lifestyle. In another example, Huck reveals the hypocrisy of the prejudice society when he visits the Phelps. While Silas Phelps and Aunt Sally state Jim’s content in the small shed, they reveal Jim is no more than a piece property in their minds. As Jim pronounces when Huck and Tom visit the shack where Jim is held captive until Miss Watson comes to get her slave, Silas prays with Jim every day. The action reveals Slias’s hypocrisy in the act of Silas not praying with Jim on the account Sil...
Gay begins her article by first mentioning how her parents took her on an unexpected trip which educated her for the future. Since Gay was a child when she witnessed all the poverty and uncleanliness of the
...re original and inspiring in placing these readings in a historical understanding of the receival of homosexuality in society and the way in which Rice both simultaneously defies and reasserts these opinions.
In the beginning of the story, Janie is stifled and does not truly reveal her identity. When caught kissing Johnny Taylor, a local boy, her nanny marries her off to Logan Killicks. While with Killicks, the reader never learns who the real Janie is. Janie does not make any decisions for herself and displays no personality. Janie takes a brave leap by leaving Killicks for Jody Starks. Starks is a smooth talking power hungry man who never allows Janie express her real self. The Eatonville community views Janie as the typical woman who tends to her husband and their house. Janie does not want to be accepted into the society as the average wife. Before Jody dies, Janie is able to let her suppressed anger out.
Janie’s first attempt at love does not turn out quite like she hopes. Her grandmother forces her into marrying Logan Killicks. As the year passes, Janie grows unhappy and miserable. By pure fate, Janie meets Joe Starks and immediately lusts after him. With the knowledge of being wrong and expecting to be ridiculed, she leaves Logan and runs off with Joe to start a new marriage. This is the first time that Janie does what she wants in her search of happiness: “Even if Joe was not waiting for her, the change was bound to do her good…From now on until death she was going to have flower dust and springtime sprinkled over everything” (32). Janie’s new outlook on life, although somewhat shadowed by blind love, will keep her satisfied momentarily, but soon she will return to the loneliness she is running from.
While facing certain struggles as both Alison and her father try to embrace their sexuality, Alison is able to “come out” to her family at the age of 19 unlike her father who’s homosexuality remains a secret for most of Alison’s life. When Alison tells her mother that she is gay she is able to do so with a sense of a mostly a supportive community. Therefore, it is Alison’s own “coming out” that provokes her mother to reveal her father’s hidden