Ava Morgan – Intro to African American Literature

February 29, 2024February 29, 2024

Analyzing Spike Lee

One February 14th, 2024, at 12:30, I attended a lecture run by a SUNY Cortland associate professor of communication and media studies, Christopher Ortega. The lecture was titled “Analyzing Spike Lee”. Before going to this lecture, I had never actually heard of Spike Lee, but film has always been something I was interested in so I thought it would be a good opportunity to go and learn about African American film culture. What I learned was that Spike Lee wasn’t someone who became famous for his directing or creations of a great storyline, but based on the ideas he created and the thoughts he left the viewers with. Ortega spent most of the lecture talking about one of Lee’s films “Do the Right Thing”. In this film, there is a dispute over a wall of fame in a pizzeria. One character believes the wall should feature African American artists since the shop is in an African American neighborhood. The owner declines this idea, keeping the wall with only Italian artists. Now what I find so interesting is that Lee’s films didn’t just deal with issues of racism against African Americans. Even in this movie, the main character, who is African American, makes some racial insults about Italians. Insults are also thrown at Koreans and Puerto Ricans. I really enjoyed seeing this in his movies. Racism against African Americans has always been terrible and taken the front view, but I think it is also important to realize and recognize that this is happening to other races as well. One night, the character who got into an argument with the pizzeria owner goes back to the shop and another dispute starts. This one leads to violence. When the cops show up, one of the African Americans is strangling the shop owner. As the cops attempt to restrain Raheem, the African American, one officer begins to choke him. This ultimately ends with Raheem being killed and the police putting his body in the back of the police car and driving away, trying to save face. But there were many onlookers at this point so their actions were clearly seen. A riot breaks out the following day because of the death and that is where the film is left.

I took a lot away from this lecture and this film. One thing is the title. The film is called “Do The Right Thing”, but what the right thing is is never specifically said. Were the boys right for wanting black artists on the wall? Or was the owner right in wanting to show appreciation to his own culture? There are many decisions made in this movie that could be picked apart and discussed about if they were the right decision. But I think the movie as a whole speaks to the separation that the idea of race has put us in and what it can make seemingly kind and good people do. The one other thing that really stuck out to me that Ortega pointed out was that in a later film by Lee, the same two cops, played by the same actors are seen on duty, in uniform. I don’t believe they had any big part in this other film, but just showing that these two cops, who murdered and covered up the murder of an African American, are still working and didn’t have any repercussions is something in itself. Lee did this on purpose. He did this to show how corrupt cops are not penalized and don’t receive consequences for their terrible actions. They are just allowed to keep patrolling our streets with nothing stopping them from doing it again.

February 19, 2024

Analysis of Mama in “A Raisin in the Sun” Act II

A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry focuses much on family relationships during a time of struggle and uncertainty. The character Mama is portrayed as head of the family, although there seems to be a power struggle for this with her son, Walter. Hansberry writes, “You the head of this family. You run our lives like you want to. It was your money and you did what you wanted with it” (94-95). This quote demonstrates Walter’s frustration in not being the head of the family and how he is unable to control the new sum of money they are getting to try and do what he believes is best for his family. He and Mama doesn’t agree on what is best for the family and that has created this tension that explodes when the decision about the check needs to be made.

Mama’s character seems to have many qualities that make her a questionable head of the family. We see her, in act 1, trying to parent Travis in front of Ruth, she says “I ain’t meddling… Put a lot of nice butter on it… He likes lots of butter”(41). Ruth feels like Mama thinks she doesn’t know her child and can’t parent him. Throughout this scene we see Ruth continually telling Mama that she can handle her child. Then, later in act 2 we see Mrs. Johnson talking to Mama about her kids, she says to Mama “Oh– I ain’t criticizing her none. It’s just– you know how some of our young people gets when they get a little education”(102). Although Mama never says anything about this to Mrs. Johnson, we see how annoyed Mama gets when Mrs. Johnson is talking badly about her children based on the way Hansberry writes the character Mama and has her act. She is annoyed at one person for criticizing her children, which a parent will take very personally and think themselves to be criticized as well. But then she is doing the same thing to Ruth throughout the play. This hypocritical quality of Mama is not only seen here, though. We hear Mama criticize Ruth’s parenting once again, but it also shows another hypocritical aspect of Mama when she says, “Why don’t you never let the child explain hisself.” (90) I find this quite funny because the issue her children seem to have with the way Mama runs the household is that no one else gets a voice and they don’t feel like they are being heard. Mama is a very head strong character, and we see many times in which she doesn’t really listen to the other members of the family. Walter says, “You just don’t understand, Mama, you just don’t understand.” (74), indicating that his mother won’t take the time to listen and fully understand what he is saying and where he is coming from. But in the previous quote we see her defending Travis and trying to get Ruth to listen to his explanation and give him a chance to explain himself.

In this second act, we see Mama decide what to do with the check that she has received. She decides to buy a new home for herself and her family, but the way she announces it gains mixed reaction. Mama says to Travis, “She went out and she bought you a house!” (91). Both Ruth and Travis are clearly excited about this new house that they are going to be moving into. Walter, on the other hand, seems very upset. Hansberry depicts him as, “Bitterly” (93), obviously meaning to display him as upset and angry at Mama’s choice. I found it interesting that Mama says she bought the house for Travis. I think this is initially what upset Walter. He has always felt that his mother doesn’t support his dreams and ambitions. When he sees how she is treating Travis and what she is doing for him, I think he sees all he feels he should have gotten. Walter says, “So you butchered up a dream of mine–you– who always talking ‘bout your children’s dreams…” (95). After finding out about Mama buying the house, Walter sees his dream of opening a liquor store vanish, as he wanted to use the money for that. He ridicules Mama, saying she says she supports her children’s dreams. But then she does this, which takes her child’s hope of his dream away from him.

Discussion Questions:

We see that the scene with Mrs. Johnson was taken out of some performances of the play. What importance do you think this scene brings to Hansberry’s message and what was lost when it was taken out?
We know that this was meant to be performed as a play but reading it we get the stage directions and the exact ways that Hansberry meant for the characters to act. How might the ideas and interactions between the characters be seen differently when just watching the play?

Work Cited:

Hansberry, Lorraine. A Raisin in the Sun. Random House, 1986.

January 24, 2024

Introduction

Hi! My name is Ava and I’m a freshman in my second semester of college. I just transferred from UAlbany, and I am an English major and a Professional Writing minor. The study of literature has always been a big passion of mine so I’m excited for this class. I love sports, mostly basketball, and I like to read and write in my free time.