Yolanda Wilson-Harris

African Americans and the Deferred Dream

From early civilization, people have sought personal and religious freedom.  The Pilgrims came to America seeking religious freedom.  They were willing to forge peaceful relationships with Native Americans to survive and thrive in their new home. The concept of freedom grew with our founding fathers, who were not as concerned about religious freedom, but wanted financial freedom – ‘taxation with no representation’ was the driving force in our violent departure from England.

While our Founding Fathers grappled and thus framed our principles through the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, their concept of freedom did not include African-Americans. Their overriding desire for freedom was limited to those they defined as capable of understanding and exercising it and disparaged the actual freedom of others. Throughout our nation’s history, Americans have ‘taken’ whatever they wanted to pursue their dream – land from Native Americans, land from foreign countries, and later the freedom of others. Caucasians enslaved others to pursue their dreams, which was primarily linked to the ownership of things and people.

As our nation grew, the notion of capitalism, a governing philosophy of the country, was born. Despite the elusive nature of the American Dream, it has been well defined - a bigger house, car, 2.5 children, and wonderful vacations.     Unfortunately, when the tapestry was originally sown, African-Americans were not a part of our nation’s construct. There was no imprint for African-Americans through the Constitution - no road map or even the rights to pursue any form of the American Dream.  Even with the development of our nation, African-Americans have still been running behind the metaphorical bus, trying to catch up with other races and cultures. Slavery is one of America’s biggest black eyes in regards to democracy.   Despite the many end roads, Civil Rights, Voting Rights, and Affirmative Action, African-Americans in many regards have not recovered from the devastation of slavery.   Emancipation did not cure the lack of education, financial knowledge, actual wealth, cultural recognition or stature.

This 400 year curse, has impacted the mannerism or conceptualization of the American Dream. Slavery turned the American-American Dream into a nightmare for Africans-Americans, who did not possess any financial wealth, power, or stature in society. While Caucasian Americans, poor or wealthy, are born and naturally pursue the American Dream, African Americans have a dream, similar in nature, but often diverse in its pursuit.  African-Americans still have to, unfortunately, overcome that ideal that ‘all men are created equal’.

The concept of the American Dream has been narrated by many American writers, both Caucasian and non-Caucasian. We see the dream through prose and poetry, theatre and literature. Through literature, we see that all ethnic groups struggle with the nature of the Dream  and obtaining the American Dream. However, African-Americans traditionally have additional challenges added to the proverbial acquisition of the pie. 

Many African-American writers have espoused not only what the American Dream actually means, but what happens to those waiting on the American Dream. Many theories have emerged through historical documents, but literature has attempted to capture the voice of the forgotten. Sometimes the voice is outraged, saddened, patient, anxious, but always sprinkled with tinges of hope.

     Writers such as Equiano, Morrison, Hughes, Hansberry, Ellison, Wright, and contemporary writers, such as Sachs or Yates – to name a few, have expressed what freedom meant and the disparity felt about achieving some form of the American Dream. While these writers, whether it be in prose or poetry, have not expressed their point with the same voice, all agree that the African-American’s pursuit of the American Dream is in some manner similar to the Caucasian version, but on many levels diverges. Different genres and voices have collectively portrayed the challenges that African-Americans face with trying to have access to the American Dream. Many stories have been told, through the eyes of men, women, families, people with varying educations, and people of varying regional locations.

Historically, the slave narratives and autobiographical narratives were the first bodies of literature presented to establish the ‘evils’ of slavery. The slave narratives did not present a political or an economical position, but a humanistic appeal. The common approach in slave narratives required a dual appeal, considering the readers were white Americans. Writers like Equiano, Douglass, Jacobs, and Truth were fully aware of the prejudices and values of their audience.

The historians presented the horrors of slavery and the first edition of the American Dream  was formulated. At this point, the American Dream was only focused on life, liberty, and education. These literature pieces placed the emphasis on the humanistic view, and appealed to the human and often spiritual side of the white population, mainly expressing the abolitionist viewpoints. 

Olaudah Equiano purchased his freedom in 1766, and became a leading abolitionist and respected figure in the Anti-Slavery Movement. He believed in the resettlement of blacks in Sierra Leone. The Interesting Narrative made a significant contribution to the abolitionist debate. Through his autobiography, he was able to share the intensity of his beliefs regarding religion, politics, and economics.

     Equiano recognized that slavery ‘violates that first natural right of mankind, equality, and independency, any gives on man a dominion over his fellows which God could never intend!’ (pg. 111). Equiano’s direct appeal to white America was  connected to the American Dream in its purest form – simple freedom. He appealed to the Christian sensibilities, ‘when you make men slaves, you deprive them of half their virtue,…’ (pg. 111).     Equiano’s narrative reflects the common goal that any dream by an African-American has to be initiated by freedom and education.  His narrative is often termed the African version of Benjamin Franklin’s American Dream success story. His narrative displayed the hope that most African-American’s dreams consist of – moral character, religious faith, hard work, and determination. His definition of the American Dream continued throughout other pieces of literature.

Frederick Douglass’ narrative seemed to receive more acclaim. His story seemed to be a more direct example of the American Dream, the tradition of education leading to success. He was an entrepreneur, filling many jobs – salesman, wharfs man, and orator - ultimately using capitalism to his advantage. Despite the differences between Equiano, Douglass’ vision of the American Dream for the African-American was tied solely to his freedom and the ability for him to become educated. Douglass himself recognized the empowerment of education. Both men were undoubtedly laying the groundwork for the African-American to have the opportunity to live the American Dream.

While the slave narratives did not blame its audience for the plight of the African-American, other genres were not so compelled to follow suit. ‘While something of an anachronism in the 1990s, the African-American protest novel of the 1940s and 1950s maintained a symbiotic relationship with the mythic American Dream: It drecried a history of American racism which made achieving the Dream a chimera for blacks.’ (Clark)

The writers tended not to attack the nature of the Dream, but the pretense that the Dream was not difficult for African-Americans and that racism continued to exist. What the literature continued to expose was the fervent belief that African-Americans believed and wanted to achieve the American Dream. In the1940s and 1950s, African-American writers demonstrated the difficulties that existed for men, women, and families to experience the American Dream, despite hard work and belief in the system. The literature world exposed us to protagonists with varying situations - with education and without education continuing to struggle.

Unfortunately, the American Dream for African-Americans ‘has been marked by two major ironies which would preclude any widespread, long term endorsements'. (Yarborough) The nation founded upon the principles of freedom and equality supported a brutal chattel system for over two hundred years. The African-American’s status in this great nation was not elevated to provide avenues to pursue the American Dream. The ‘same racist distortions’ that were used to enslave were continuing to be used to thwart the participation in the national drive ‘toward prosperity and apparent fulfillment’ (Yarborough)

     ‘Afro-American novelists have had to perform a peculiar kind of thematic gymnastics in order to reflect in their works both the realistic awareness that racist oppression has persisted after slavery and the idealistic faith in America as the land of opportunity for all’. (Yarborough) One striking example of this delicate balancing act is Frank J. Webb’s portrayal of free blacks in the mid-nineteenth century Philadelphia, The Garies and Their Friends (1857). This novel is thematically torn by two ultimately irreconcilable concerns.  The first is Webb’s endorsement of capitalist individualism and the ‘apparent validation of the mainstream American belief that anyone can rise to prosperity.’ (Yarborough)

        In the twentieth century, writers began to display the tension between hope and despair, producing the synthesis between the African-American’s grasp of the American Dream and the resilient racism that persisted. Richard Wright’s Native Son (1940) was the first novel to embody this despair, pain and rage felt by the African-American community. Chester Himes, Ann Petry, and Ralph Ellison were influenced by Wright and wrote narratives that predominantly defined the ‘reactions evoked by the failure; the cynical acceptance of defeat; explosive rage and then despair, and finally the desperate hope that something of the American Dream can be salvaged.’⁴

There were various narratives that even considered regionalism in regards to obtaining the American Dream. Most Americans, Caucasians and non-Caucasians, have always been willing to leave their home in search of better conditions.

‘Go West, young man.’ Horace Greeley 

‘Swing log, chariot, come down easy,

Taxi to the Terminal Lane…’ Chuck Berry, ‘The Promised Land’

Oscar Micheaux’s autobiographical novel, The Conquest (1913), eluded to the opinion of many, that the answer to the dream was west. In addition, Chester Himes’ If He Hollers Let Him Go, is also an examination of searching for the dream in Southern California.

     Another component that continues to spur African-Americans to pursue the American Dream, is hard work and that America is the land of opportunity. The African-American still contends with the overwhelming  belief that the economic system is colorless and that hard work leads to success. Ann Petry in her novel, The Street, demonstrates that an industrious, intelligent, sensitive, and idealistic young black woman is still unable to achieve the American Dream. In this novel, the protagonist compares herself to Ben Franklin, her goals are grounded in the view of economic possibilities. Despite Petry’s character following all the rules, she still fails.

Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man also resonates with common themes to the black experience – migration and using Caucasian mythical heroes, like Horatio Alger. Ellison noted during a mid-50’s interview that ‘the major flaw in the hero’s character is his unquestioning willingness to do what is required of him by others as a way to success.” (MELUS page 47) Ellison’s protagonist migrates to the North, which has always been a mythical attraction in the early part of the century. The publication of poems, like “Bound for the Promised Land”, ‘Northward Bound”, and “The Land of Hope”, voiced that sentiment. However, from the beginning, Sojourner Truth’s narrative offered a rare glimpse of her life as a slave in rural New York.  In addition, many commentators stated that the North was hardly “The Land of Hope”. Despite Ellison’s hero’s failure to obtain the American Dream, Ellison suggests growth and new awareness. Ellison, like most African-Americans, continue to fervently want to believe in the American Dream, the promises of America are ‘explicitly reaffirming’. Ellison wants his protagonist, like African-Americans, to believe that he will not achieve the American Dream until he takes responsibility for shaping his own life.

Americans have always held on to the belief that the person who uses the freedom to define himself will achieve success. ‘However, Afro-Americans have had to define themselves in a far more self-conscious manner than any other group in the country.’ (pg. 53 MELUS) As seen in Himes, Petry, and Ellison’s narratives, the failure of African-Americans stems from the refusal to allow blacks fair and equal access. It is complicated by not the African-American’s self-image, but the stereotypes that society holds about African-Americans. ‘The racial wall which blocks the path of Afro-Americans consists of a refusal to recognize their basic humanity.  Thus, the crisis of the American Dream for the black is essentially a crisis of identity,’ (page. 54). Thus leading to Ellison’s ‘invisible’ protagonist. However, Ellison does not deny the impact of racial prejudices in America, but he does reaffirm the relevance and the accessibility by separating the basic ‘principle’ from its worst manifestations. The American Dream is put on trial in novels written by Himes, Petry, Eillison.

Writers such as Langston Hughes and Lorraine Hansberry, did not only identify the obstacles that African-Americans faced in obtaining the American dream, they placed the effects of the deferred dream front and center. Langston Hughes, an iconic figure in the Harlem Renaissance period.   He was a critic of DuBois, Fauset, and Locke, who he felt were overly accommodating in the perspective of racial equality, focusing more on assimilation.

Hughes was a tireless advocate for civil rights. He wrote poetry and narratives that demonstrated his focus on race relations in America. He wanted society to consider what happens when a group of people who are being denied their rights and abilities to achieve their dreams. He wanted society to view the degrading process that happens to a human being who suffers from not obtaining his dreams. He compares dreams to very concrete things in our everyday lives. He did not want African-Americans to consider dreams an abstract concept. Some of his poetry boldly identified the negative results of dreams deferred, ‘Montage of a Dream Deferred’,’ Dreams’, and’ A Dream Deferred’. 

          ‘A Dream Deferred’ by Langston Hughes

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up

Like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore—

And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over—

Like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags

Like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

‘Dreams’ by Langston Hughes

Hold fast to dreams

For if dreams die

Life is a broken-winged bird

That cannot fly.

Hold fast to dreams

For when dreams go

Life is a barren field

Frozen with snow.

               (www. poem hunter)

His poems not only spoke about the power of pursuing dreams, but also the state of civil rights in America. Hughes’ main concern was the uplifting of people, who proudly demonstrated strength, resiliency, and courage. He also wanted to record their experiences as part of the American experience. His poems also spoke to the fact that African-Americans’ dreams have been deferred. Slavery and the continued lack of civil rights prohibited and caused many goals not be thought of or achieved. He felt that deferred dreams would lead to social unrest. His poetry evoked an emotion from the reader – to feel the urgency of dreams.

     Lorraine Hansberry wrote ‘A Raisin In The Sun’. Her achievement itself, ironically represented a dream deferred, being the first Black woman to be produced on Broadway in 1959. The narrative boldly displayed the explosive nature of dreams deferred. Ms. Hansberry purposely quoted Mr. Hughes’ poem ‘A Dream Deferred’ at the beginning of her narrative. The setting of the story includes a family that cannot afford decent living spaces, an elderly matriarch still working, and adults possessing menial domestic jobs. The story overtly displays the lack of dreams and coldness of despair that settle in the fabric of the lives of people living below the poverty line and not experiencing any of the wealth that a simple dream provides – not having a bathroom inside your roach-infested apartment or home; having to share a bathroom with another family on the floor; sleeping in the living room; the wife secretly thinking of getting an abortion. Her narrative looks at the devastating effect and how explosive the anger can be, acting out what Hughes stated early in his poem, ‘A Dream Deferred’. Her  narrative looks at how an African-American family can manage the anger and what is at risk – continued life and liberty. ‘The mood is forty-nine parts anger and forty-nine parts control, with a very narrow escape hatch for the steam these abrasive contraries build up.’ (Wilkerson)  While literature often mirrors the societal issues, three years before opening the play, the Supreme Court had declared racial segregation in public schools illegal, marking a climax to decades of advocacy and legal challenges.

A famous contemporary playwright, August Wilson, also expands on the same idea in the play Fences. ‘Wilson became involved in the civil rights movement during the 1960’s and 1970’s and began to describe himself as a black nationalist.  Fences presents a slice of life in a black tenement in Pittsburgh in the 1950’s.’ (Jacobus) Fences focuses on an outstanding athlete who is denied his dream of playing major league baseball because of the color of his skin. ‘Troy Mason, now a 53-years old garbage collector has collected his share of dreams deferred and hopes deflected.’ (Roudane) Similarly to Walter in Hansberry play, Troy experiences anger and oppression, leaving the reader to wonder if his anger has ‘dried up in the sun’, like the raisin. In both plays, the protagonist’s anger smoldered over their lifetime. They get menial jobs that do not allow them to adequately take care of their family, which adds to the anger and sense of depression.

African-American women poets were themselves a group whose dreams were being deferred. In the 1970s, these poets raised critical issues about the nature of sexism and ‘their work ‘embodies the realization that the politics of sex as well as politics of race and class are interlocking factors’ (Gloria Hull, et al, ed…1982). Poets like Nikki Giovanni have touched the lives of black people and have attempted to make Dr. King’s dream a reality.   

Outside of the world of literature, historians like DuBois also addressed the racial climate and disparity of African-Americans, who had not been able to fulfill their dreams. ‘He was a sociologist, historian, and civil right activists, who wanted African-Americans to use politics and ‘classical’ education- not vocational education as a means of success. He was the author of several books. In ‘Souls of Black Folk’, he expressed his sadness, rage, and frustration with the hardships that black people encountered’. (www.history.com pages)

‘The fact is the American Dream has by and large remained a mirage. African-American thinkers and artists like, W.E. DuBois and Zora Neale Hurston wanted blacks in American to recognize the true meaning of their lives, the aesthetic richness of their folk culture and ancestral traditions, and the industry and potential of their communities, so they would not be ashamed.’ (Femi Ojo-Ade)

“W.E. DuBois: The Man and His Vision of Africa for Africans” presents another site upon which African Americans affirm their identification with Africa, that is, on the landscape of race. Denied a sense of wholeness in America, the African-American “has no choice but to fight for it through an establishment of his African heritage and humanity.’ ‘America’s failure to make possible the fulfillment of its promise eventually sends Dubois to Ghana in 1961, where he declares his citizenship; like those flying Africans who returned home. (Femi Ojo-Ade, Indiana University Press)

Dr. King was the most powerful spokesman for the deferred dream. His life encapsulated the totality of the plight of the African-American. Dr. King wrote numerous books and made several speeches that addressed equality. His entire life was devoted to gaining equality for African-Americans. He recognized that in order for African-Americans to gain equality, they would not only need laws to be changed, but the hearts and mind of Caucasian-Americans would also have be converted. His personal and professional life personified the struggles of the African-American experienced - that despite education, hard work, religious fervor, or professional commitment, African-Americans were still discriminated against. When he made the ‘I Have a Dream’ speech, he brought to the forefront the overwhelming nature of the transformation and the commitment that existed in the African-American community. His speech addressed how the historical and political successes of the past had not solved the inequalities, ‘One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination.(King )

He went on to say that ‘America has defaulted on this promissory note’… and

the ‘bad check has come back marked “insufficient funds”.’ (King) He compelled the nation through spiritual overtones and historical references to rise to the expectations. All of Dr. King’s speeches were powerful; however, this speech was unforgettable. He commanded even the most racist state, Mississippi, to be ‘transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.’ (King)

     Dr. King and others were committed to the transformation of our nation.  The American Dream is the shiny, bright star, which illuminates the hope that contains all the wonders that America has to offer. 

               ‘If you can keep your head when all about you

               Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

               If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,                           But make allowance for their doubting you:

               If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

               Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,                

                  Or being hated don’t give way to hating.

               And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise’( Kipling)

This poem epitomizes the spirit of the African-Americans. They have been kidnapped. transported, auctioned, flogged, shackled, separated, emancipated, lynched, Jim Crowed, bombed, hosed , jailed, undereducated, cheated, and migrated, but yet they endure. They continue to hold the promissory note that this country owes them and believe in the principles established by the Founding Fathers.  Literature has not only communicated, inspired, and questioned the emotional investment that remains constant in the African-American community. It has also provided the vehicle to demonstrate the urgency and loyalty that persists because African-Americans have never questioned the essence of the American Dream.  Their desire for the American Dream is like a controlled wild fire, fervent and true.

WORKS CITED

Equiano, Olaudah. “The Interesting Narrative and Other Writings”. Penquin Books. New York. 1995

Clark, Keith. “A Distaff Dream Deferred? Ann Petry and the Art of Subversion”. African American Review, Vol. 26. No. 3, Fiction Issue (Autumn, 1992): Pp. 494-505. Print.

Ojo-Ade, Femi. ”Of Dreams Deferred, Dead or Alive: African-Perspectives on African-American Writers”. The International Journal of African Historical Studies.  Vol. 31. No.3 (1998) :pp. 686-687. Print

Yarborough, Richard. “The Quest for the American Dream in Three Afro-American Novels: If he Hollers Let Him Go, The Street, and Invisible Man”. The Society for the Study of the Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States. Vol 8, No. 4. The Ethnic American Dream (Winter, 1981), pp. 33.59. Print

Jacobus, Lee A. The Compact Bedford Introduction  to Drama. University of

 Connecticut: Bedford, Boston, 2009. 876-877

Roudane, Matthew. Dram Since 1960: A Critical Essay. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1996.

Wilkerson, Margaret. “A Raisin in the Sun: Anniversary of an American Classic”. The John Hopkins University Press. Vol. 38, No. 4, Theatre of Color (Dec. 1986), pp. 441-452. Print.

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