Comparing The American Dream In Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin In The Sun

Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun was one of the first plays that focused on African-American life to debut on Broadway in 1959. The play follows the Youngers, a family living in a Chicago apartment, as they chase the American Dream during the 1950s. With the death of Big Walter, the patriarch of the family, the Youngers have the opportunity to finally achieve their own American Dream by moving into a new home due to Big Walter’s insurance money. However, Walter Lee decides to invest the insurance money in a business in order for his family to achieve the economic success that he always dreamed of. In A Raisin in the Sun, race is one of the most prominent factors that determine whether or not people are able to successfully achieve the American Dream. While the American Dream promises that with hard

Even with Big Walter and Mama’s joint efforts, they are not able to save their children from a life similar to their own. Here the concept of the American Dream is rejected because even with hard work, the Youngers aren’t able to reach economic prosperity due to the low status jobs limited to African-Americans. Big Walter and Mama’s dreams only become possible after the death of Big Walter; the insurance money that the Younger’s receive has the power to change their lives. But what does this say about the American Dream? In the play, Asagai states, “Then isn’t there something wrong in a house-- in a world--where all dreams, good or bad, must depend on the death” (Hansberry 135; Act 3, Sc. 1). Even now, the American Dream is still largely determined by race, and while the Youngers have the determination to fight and to prosper economically, they aren’t able to do so because of the strict limitations that are set in the form of racism and discrimination in order to keep African-Americans in a lower socioeconomic