Text to Text

Teaching ideas based on New York Times content.

Updated: April 4

With the much-anticipated April 3 opening of a new Broadway revival starring Denzel Washington, “A Raisin in the Sun” is again in the spotlight — though for teachers the groundbreaking play has been a classroom staple for decades. First performed on Broadway in 1959, “Raisin” last appeared there 10 years ago, then starring Phylicia Rashad, Sean Combs, Audra McDonald and Sanaa Lathan, a production that was later adapted for television.

The play remains a potent touchstone, still speaking to viewers about race, gender roles, family, hope and desperation, capitalism, the American dream and so much more.

This edition of our Text to Text series was written by Audrey Fisch, a professor of English and elementary and secondary education at New Jersey City University, and Susan Chenelle, who teaches English and journalism at University Academy Charter High School in Jersey City, N.J.

Together, they are writing a book series on using informational text to teach literature — a series that has much in common with what we do on The Learning Network in all our Language Arts lesson plans, but especially via our Text to Text series. The first volume of their series, “Using Informational Text to Teach ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,'” will be published in April; the second will focus on “Raisin.”

Below, the authors match a famous scene from the play with a 2013 Times article on the persistence of the problem of housing discrimination, a central theme in “Raisin” and an issue about which students are likely to have little background knowledge.

Text to Text | ‘A Raisin in the Sun’ and ‘Discrimination in Housing Against Nonwhites Persists Quietly’

By Susan Chenelle and Audrey Fisch

Background:

An introduction to the play by the Westport Country Playhouse, which staged a production directed by Phylicia Rashad in 2012.

One of the underlying sources for “A Raisin in the Sun” is Lorraine Hansberry’s personal experience with housing discrimination. In the 1930s, her father, Carl Hansberry, bought a house in the South Park neighborhood of Chicago.

The house was “protected” by a racially restrictive covenant, which legally prevented ownership or occupancy of property by blacks. The covenant was enforced, the Hansberry family was evicted and Carl Hansberry sued. The case made it to the United States Supreme Court; Hansberry v. Lee (1940), however, did not overturn the constitutionality of racially restrictive covenants. It wasn’t until 1948, in Shelley v. Kraemer, that the court would find such covenants discriminatory.

In “Raisin,” the Younger family does not face a racially restrictive covenant when they buy a house in the white neighborhood of Clybourne Park. But they face two different threats.

From the opening scene of the play, we are made aware of the violence — “Set off another bomb yesterday” — menacing the Youngers and their dreams. The Youngers also face the coercion of the Clybourne Park Neighborhood Association. Unable to keep the Youngers out of the neighborhood through legal restrictions, Karl Lindner, a representative of the neighborhood association, has been sent to buy the Youngers out. Especially disturbing in the scene below is his attempt to justify his behavior, explaining that racial segregation is in everyone’s best interest.

We match this scene from “Raisin” with a 2013 article on the present state and persistence of housing discrimination in the United States.

Shaila Dewan, reporting several studies based on undercover investigations, finds that the United States has yet to achieve real equity in housing. Black couples and white couples seeking properties to rent or buy continue to receive unequal treatment.

According to Shaun Donovan, secretary of the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, “Although we’ve come a long way from the days of blatant, in-your-face housing injustice, discrimination still persists.”

Key Question: Do we all have the right to buy a home of our own, wherever we want?

Activity Sheets: As students read and discuss, they might take notes using one or more of the three graphic organizers (PDFs) we have created for our Text to Text feature:

Text 1: Excerpt from ‘A Raisin in the Sun,’ by Lorraine Hansberry, Act 2, Scene 3

Note: We have excerpted only a small portion of the scene below. Please use the full text of Lindner’s visit to the Youngers’ home in Act 2, Scene 3.

LINDNER: Yes — that’s the way we feel out in Clybourne Park. And that’s why I was elected to come here this afternoon and talk to you people. Friendly like, you know, the way people should talk to each other and see if we couldn’t find some way to work this thing out. As I say, the whole business is a matter of caring about the other fellow. Anybody can see that you are a nice family of folks, hard working and honest I’m sure. (BENEATHA frowns slightly, quizzically, her head tilted regarding him) Today everybody knows what it means to be on the outside of something. And of course, there is always somebody who is out to take advantage of people who don’t always understand.

WALTER: What do you mean?

LINDNER: Well — you see our community is made up of people who’ve worked hard as the dickens for years to build up that little community. They’re not rich and fancy people; just hard-working, honest people who don’t really have much but those little homes and a dream of the kind of community they want to raise their children in. Now, I don’t say we are perfect and there is a lot wrong in some of the things they want. But you’ve got to admit that a man, right or wrong, has the right to want to have the neighborhood he lives in a certain kind of way. And at the moment the overwhelming majority of our people out there feel that people get along better, take more of a common interest in the life of the community, when they share a common background. I want you to believe me when I tell you that race prejudice simply doesn’t enter into it. It is a matter of the people of Clybourne Park believing, rightly or wrongly, as I say, that for the happiness of all concerned that our Negro families are happier when they live in their own communities.

BENEATHA: (with a grand and bitter gesture) This, friends, is the Welcoming Committee!

Continue this scene through Lindner’s speech that ends, “People can get awful worked up when they feel that their whole way of life and everything they’ve ever worked for is threatened.”

Text 2: Excerpt from ‘Discrimination in Housing Against Nonwhites Persists Quietly, U.S. Study Finds,’ by Shaila Dewan (The New York Times, June 11, 2013)

Discrimination against blacks, Hispanics and Asians looking for housing persists in subtle forms, according to a new national study commissioned by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development. Though less likely to face overt obstacles, like being refused an appointment to see a home, minority customers were shown fewer available units than whites with similar qualifications, the study found.

They were also asked more questions about their finances, according to the study, and given fewer offers of help financing a loan.

“Although we’ve come a long way from the days of blatant, in-your-face housing injustice, discrimination still persists,” Shaun Donovan, the department’s secretary, said in a telephone conference on Tuesday unveiling the findings. “And just because it has taken on a hidden form doesn’t make it any less harmful.”

In each of the study’s 8,000 tests, one white and one minority tester of the same gender and age, posing as equally well-qualified renters or buyers, visited the same housing provider or agent. In more than half the test cases, both testers were shown the same number of apartments or homes. But in cases where one tester was shown more homes or apartments, the white tester was usually favored, leading to a higher number of units shown to whites overall.

In one test, a white customer looking for a two-bedroom apartment was shown a two-bedroom and a one-bedroom and given applications for both, while a Hispanic customer who arrived two hours later was told that nothing was available. In another, a real estate agent refused to meet with a black tester who was not prequalified for a loan, while a white tester was given an appointment without being asked if she had prequalified.

The study was the fourth of its kind since 1977, when the results showed a starker form of discrimination known as door-slamming. In 17 percent of the cases in that study, whites were offered a unit when blacks were told that none were available. In 2012, when the new study was conducted, the vast majority of testers of all races were able to at least make an appointment to see a recently advertised house or apartment.

But once they arrived, they were given fewer options. Over all, black prospective renters were presented 11 percent fewer rentals than whites, Hispanics about 12 percent fewer rentals and Asians about 10 percent fewer rentals. As prospective buyers, blacks were presented 17 percent fewer homes and Asians 15 percent fewer homes, but Hispanics were given the opportunity to see roughly the same number of homes as whites.

White testers also were more frequently offered lower rents, told that deposits and other move-in costs were negotiable, or were quoted a lower price. Taking into account fees, deposits and rents, apartments were more likely to cost whites slightly less in the first year of rental than blacks might pay. …

Even subtle discrimination like steering minorities to certain neighborhoods or failing to offer them the homes most likely to increase in value would result in substantially weaker accumulation of wealth, said John Taylor, the president and chief executive of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, which seeks to improve housing in underserved communities.

Polling shows that many Americans think financially stable customers have the same opportunities to obtain good housing regardless of race, he added.

“A study like this,” he said, “helps you understand that there really is very different treatment occurring when it comes to things like housing and lending.”

For Writing or Discussion:

What strategy does Lindner use in order to persuade the Youngers to accept the association’s proposal? What is appealing about his argument? What is offensive about his suggestion? How does Walter respond to his efforts? Why do you think Walter responds as he does?
What forms of housing discrimination persist today, according to a recent study discussed in the article? How has housing discrimination changed since 1977? What justifications do you think people use to defend and continue such practices? How would you compare a real estate agent today who doesn’t show an African-American family a house for sale in a white neighborhood with Lindner and the neighborhood association in “Raisin”? How have things changed? How have they remained the same?
How does the social and racial context in which housing discrimination occurs today compare with the circumstances in which the Youngers experience it? Why, for example, do the Youngers want to get out of their apartment and move to a house in Clybourne Park? What specifically about the house and the neighborhood of Clybourne Park is attractive to the Youngers? What does the play suggest are the reasons that they buy a house outside of “their own community”? Do you think people today are still drawn to homes outside of “their own community” for similar reasons?
Walter Younger’s life insurance policy represents a substantial financial windfall for the Youngers. Mama’s decision to use some of that money to buy a home in Clybourne Park represents the classic realization of the American dream. Use the article on housing discrimination to consider how achieving the American dream by purchasing a home can be complicated by race. Why, according to the article, is it more difficult for some to achieve this dream? And what kinds of long-term economic effects does housing discrimination have, according to the article?
As the article explains, housing discrimination has been the subject of several studies over the years by the federal government through the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Why do you think the federal government would study housing discrimination? What do you think is significant about the results of the research? What, if anything, do you think the government should do based on the results?
Why do you think housing discrimination existed in the American past? Why do you think housing discrimination continues today? What do you think the existence of housing discrimination says about contemporary American society? Do you think we all should have the right to buy a home of our own, wherever we want? What do you think should be done to ensure that right?

Going Further:

Imagining a 1963 Conversation: In 1963, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy met with several prominent African-Americans (PFD), including Lorraine Hansberry, the author James Baldwin, and the actress-singer Lena Horne, to discuss segregation in schools and other sources of racial tension building in the North. The article notes that the meeting was “secret” and that Kennedy chose to meet with these artists as opposed to civil rights activists.

What conclusions can you draw about the state of race relations in the United States at the time? What do you think about Mr. Kennedy’s strategy? Based on your reading of “A Raisin in the Sun,” imagine the conversation between Lorraine Hansberry and Robert F. Kennedy. What suggestions might the playwright have had for the attorney general? How do you think Mr. Kennedy might have reacted to Ms. Hansberry and her ideas?

Hurricane Sandy and Housing Discrimination: In a 2013 editorial, the Times editorial board reports on charges that “black and Hispanic citizens” who lost their homes in Hurricane Sandy faced discrimination. What does this editorial suggest about the continuing legacy of housing discrimination that is featured in “A Raisin in the Sun”? Imagine you are a civil rights lawyer working for the Fair Share Housing Center. How might you tie the issue of Sandy recovery aid to the larger history of housing discrimination in this country?

School Segregation, Then and Now: Broaden your understanding of racial segregation in the United States. Use The New York Times or the Internet to research school segregation in the 1950s and 1960s. Compare your findings with articles like this one or this one from the 2012 Times series “A System Divided” and the opinions expressed in the Room for Debate post “Is Segregation Back in U.S. Public Schools?,” which was published just after the 58th anniversary of the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education U.S. Supreme Court decision that declared segregation in schools unconstitutional.

Why does segregation in schools persist to the extent that it does so many years after it was declared unconstitutional? How are students affected by attending schools that are largely segregated? What do you think the relationship is between school segregation and housing discrimination?

‘Raisin': ‘A Landmark Lesson in Being Black’? In this 1999 article, “A Landmark Lesson in Being Black,” Michael Anderson describes the effect of the 1959 Broadway debut of “A Raisin in the Sun”:

But until that evening, Broadway had never seen a play written by a black woman, nor a play with a black director, nor a commercially produced drama about black life, rather than musicals or comedy. The Broadway premiere of “A Raisin in the Sun” was as much a milestone in the nation’s social history as it was in American theater. “Never before,” commented James Baldwin, “had so much of the truth of black people’s lives been seen onstage.”

Mr. Anderson also details how Lorraine Hansberry came to write the play, and the long struggle involved in raising the funds to produce it on Broadway. Do you think the play still carries such importance? Is it still a “landmark lesson” in the “truth of black people’s lives”? Why or why not?

From Sidney Poitier to Sean Combs:

Two years after its Broadway premiere, “A Raisin in the Sun” appeared in movie theaters, starring Sidney Poitier and Ruby Dee. In the trailer for the 1961 film, the producer David Susskind provides a lengthy introduction that describes the awards the play received and the importance of its story before any scenes from the movie are shown.

Compare this to the introduction Sean Combs provides before the trailer, embedded above, for his 2008 made-for-TV version. What is similar and what is different about each of these introductions? Why do you think Mr. Susskind and Mr. Combs created them? What purposes do they serve?

“The Raisin Cycle”: Lorraine Hansberry’s play has inspired a number of reimaginings. Bruce Norris’s 2011 Pulitzer Prize-winning “Clybourne Park” is both a prequel and sequel to “Raisin.” The first act centers on the white family and their decision to sell their house in the all-white neighborhood of Clybourne Park to the Youngers. The second act centers on a white family buying the same house in what has become an all-black neighborhood, and shows the response they encounter from a black community worried about gentrification. Kwame Kwei-Armah’s work, “Beneatha’s Place,” focuses on Beneatha’s life in Africa in the first act, and then, about 50 years later, on her life at a California university. As Artistic Director of CenterStage in Baltimore, Mr. Kwei-Armah staged the three plays together in what he called “The Raisin Cycle.”

If you could reimagine a moment in connection with “Raisin,” what moment would you choose? Would you want to think about Big Walter and his life before the play begins? Would you be interested in drawing out the life that Travis Younger might have faced coming of age during the height of the Civil Rights Era? Write a “missing scene” in which you add your voice and vision to the Raisin Cycle somehow. Then, write a brief explanation of your creative choices. What inspired your decisions? How did you draw on your understanding of “Raisin” in what you wrote?

Update: April 4: A New Broadway Revival

Ben Brantley begins his review of this show by writing, “The spark of rebellion, the kind that makes a man stand up and fight, has almost been extinguished in Walter Lee Younger.” In fact, he writes, “this production of “Raisin” makes clearer than any I’ve seen before [that] Walter inhabits a world that ages men like him fast.”

How, according to this critic, does the production make audiences feel it is “happening in the present tense, in our own world of recessionary anxieties”? If you were to create a Text to Text pairing of your own that matched some scene, moment or line from the play with something in the news today, what would you choose? Why?

More Resources: