Eng2603 Assignment 02

ENG2603 ASSIGNMENT
02; UNIQUE NUMBER: ANDILE NDANDA
818817
STUDENT NUMBER: 64773663
ENG2603 818817 64773663
TABLE OF CONTENTS
A RAISIN IN THE SUN ESSAY page 2
BIBLIOGRAPHY page 4
DECLARATION REGARDING
PLAGIARISM page 5
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ENG2603 818817 64773663
A RAISIN IN THE SUN

This essay will set forth at length how race relations and the arrival of the insurance
money impact unity among the Younger family. This will be done by looking at each
individual member of the family and what factors of race relations and insurance money
impact upon his or her decision to function in unity with, and as part of the family.
Walter Lee Younger believed that colored (black) women generally accepted mediocrity,
had very little dreams and therefore offer no support to their men, children or siblings
when they want to rise above it. He had a dream of being wealthy and making it big by
running a successful liquor business. He saw that black people, inasmuch as they were
emancipated from slavery, were still in slavery. This is because, according to his view,
they occupied the bottom rung of the ladder of success in the land while their white
counterparts were still at the top. This is the reason he was tired of his job as a
chauffeur for a wealthy white man called Mr. Arnold. Seeing that his dream of being a
successful business man was well within reach, with the advent of insurance money, he
grew very tired of his job. He even compared himself to a volcano that was about to
explode.
This is where the family unity was tested! Walter Lee Younger was angry with his wife
for not supporting his dream of opening a liquor business. The reason for his anger
towards his wife was that, in his mind, his wife refused to convince his mother to give
him the insurance money to start the liquor business. Ruth Younger, his wife, had a very
close relationship with his mother Lena, so he was convinced that his mother would
agree. Walter was also angry at his mother for supporting his sister’s dream of being a
doctor – something he thought was no profession for a woman. He resented the fact
that a big chunk of that money was going to pay tuition for medical school which he
deemed very unnecessary. In his mind, the only place for women was in marriage.
Walter Lee never asked his mother about the money. He assumed that she did not want
him to have it. He did not know that she was not opposed to him having the money but
was opposed to selling liquor. Because of his deep frustration of this insurance issue,
Walter was not paying any attention to his wife and their marriage was falling apart. He
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ENG2603 818817 64773663
did not even care about her pregnancy and drowned his sorrows and frustrations by
drinking liquor. When Mama Lena saw that Ruth was contemplating aborting the baby,
she intervened but Walter would have none of it. At this point, to her it seemed that the
family was falling apart – all because of this insurance money. When the money arrived
she put a down payment on a house and to diffuse the tension in her household she
entrusted the remaining amount to Walter with the instructions that he put away some
for Beneatha’s medical school and take care of the family with the rest.
As we later learned in the story, Walter gave all the money to Willy who ran away with it
together with Bobo’s life savings. On the day of their moving to the new house Bobo
brought this news to Walter and Beneatha heard that her share of the insurance money,
meant for her medical school bill was also lost, she became furious with Walter. The
situation was very tense. In his distress, Walter remembered that a Mr. Karl Lindner,
who was the representative of the neighborhood committee where their new house was
situated, offered to buy the house from them so that the whites in that neighborhood do
not mix with black people. As the whole family, they rejected his offer because it was
insulting to the family. Now, because of the loss of the insurance money through theft,
he was seriously considering the offer and therefore selling out on the whole family and
abandoning his pride as a black man.
He called Mr. Lindner to come. Mama Lena brought Travis to the meeting so that he
can hear and see and learn for himself if his father was going sell out his black pride to
the white man. Before this, and because of the loss of the insurance money, Mama
Lena had decided to cancel the sale of the house in favor of fixing their current
apartment. But seeing Mr. Lindner and her son about to sell out on the family, she
renewed her resolve to move to the house in defiance against racism. Walter Lee
Younger’s stand against his decision to receive the offer – his stand against racism
united the family and restored harmony. His sister, wife, mother and child were proud of
him as a man.
It is then clearly evident that race relations and the arrival of insurance money,
inasmuch as they initially had a negative impact on the unity of the family, they
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ENG2603 818817 64773663
ultimately became the glue that united the family and caused it to be stronger than it
was at the beginning.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Cliffsnotes.com. 2020. Walter Lee Younger ("Brother"). [online] Available at:

<https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/r/a-raisin-in-the-sun/character-analysis/walter-
lee-younger-brother> [Accessed 9 September 2020].
Dambe, D., Janari, M., Maithufi, D., Masemola, P., Murray, P., Musvoto, D., Raditlhalo,
P. and Vambe, P., 2013. COLONIAL AND POSTCOLONIAL AFRICAN LITERATURE
ENG2603. Pretoria: University of South Africa.
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ENG2603 818817 64773663
DECLARATION REGARDING PLAGIARISM
NAME: ANDILE NDANDA
STUDENT NUMBER: 64773663
ASSIGNMENT TOPIC: A RAISIN IN THE SUN
ASSIGNMENT No. 02 UNIQUE ASSIGNMENT NO. 818817
I declare that this assignment is my own original work. Where secondary material has
been used (either from a printed source or from the Internet), this has been carefully
acknowledged and referenced in accordance with departmental requirements. I
understand what plagiarism is and am aware of the department’s policy in this regard. I
have not allowed anyone else to borrow or copy my work
Signature :
Date: 09 September 2020

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ENG2603 ASSIGNMENT

02; UNIQUE NUMBER: ANDILE NDANDA

A RAISIN IN THE SUN

Cliffsnotes.com. 2020. Walter Lee Younger ("Brother"). [online] Available at:

DECLARATION REGARDING PLAGIARISM

NAME: ANDILE NDANDA

STUDENT NUMBER: 64773663

ASSIGNMENT TOPIC: A RAISIN IN THE SUN

ASSIGNMENT No. 02 UNIQUE ASSIGNMENT NO. 818817

Date: 09 September 2020

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