The American Dream In Ralph Ellison's Battle Royal

The American Dream is the promise which many even outside of the United States hold close to their hearts, while the perception of the American Dream is visible to all, not many can obtain it. Few rise above the masses and become the champions of the American Dream. These men were, for the time, all white and intended to keep their small circle to themselves; they excluded non-whites and women from joining their club. As immigrants and rural citizens migrated to the urban areas and found jobs in factories, the white men cemented their power and position, for it was virtually impossible to escape factory work because of the low wages and similar conditions across the board. In Ralph Ellison’s “Battle Royal”, the white men restrict the socio-economic

mobility of the poor, non-whites, and/or women; while the story doesn’t represent the conditions laid out in large urban areas, the small scale version in the semi-rural area reflects the mentality of superiority that the rich men possess. The occurrences in the hotel ballroom reveal that superiority and dominance when they use people as forms of entertainment.
The naked dancer captivated the crowd and the men in the ring feed their blood lust; the Invisible Man was given the opportunity to deliver a speech to the wealthiest men in town. The tones of dominance and subservience are displayed in the animalist nature of the events that take place in the ballroom. The men are confident in themselves and their power that they promote select African Americans with scholarships to all black colleges; they are confident because “some day he’ll[the Invisible Man] lead his people in the proper paths” (235), the proper paths being in the service of white people. The rich men require the oppression of African Americans to retain their power because without that power they have no means to stop the progression of another group of people through education and career-climbing. By guiding the processes and who can obtain the means, the affluent Caucasian men can continue to guard the door to the American Dream. They view the Invisible Man as the catalyst to “shape the destiny of [his] people” (236) because of his fear, politeness, and submissiveness towards the older males; he is their perfect model. The men provide false hope of actual achievement towards the American Dream with the “scholarship to the state college for negroes” (236) because while education provides a step up, the world the white men have created does not allow for social advancement or much economic advancement.