Gender Roles In A Raisin In The Sun

In society, fender equality means providing equal opportunities to both men and women in political, economic, education and health aspects, but it also means to be equal in the house. The book A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry is a book about a black family of 5 who don’t live a luxurious life getting an insurance check for $10,000, which was quite a sum of money back when this was written. The family consists of Mama, who has two kids, Walter and Beneatha, Ruth and her and Walter’s son, Travis. The book takes place over a few days where we come to learn about the characters and their beliefs. One of the differing beliefs in the house is gender roles and what each gender should be doing in the house and in society. Beneatha has very

Walter is the ”man of the house” and the main man in the book, and with this he shows us the most toxic masculinity and what the roles of a man are viewed as. He has a certain view on women, even his wife, and does not truly respect them. He still believes he has a right to the money just because he is the only man in the house and is the only one who can make a good decision with the money. While talking to his son about a business deal he was going to make and how it was going to change their lives, he said, “...secretaries getting things wrong the way they do…” ( Hansberry 108). Secretaries were almost always women during this time as they did not really get high up or important jobs. So him saying that the secretaries are getting things wrong like they always do, he’s showing how little faith he has in women and what they can do. This mentality was very common back then and was also used to determine what’s “girly” and what was meant for boys. He had very strong opinions on what men and women should do and what they should look like. A man named George goes to college with Beneatha, and college had its own style. Walter did not take a liking to George’s shoes, he saw them too “feminine” for a man. While speaking with George, Walter said, “Why all you college boys wear them Faggoty looking white shoes?” (hansberry 83). George’s white shoes weren’t seen as masculine through

We see this the most with Walter’s character development and the way his view on women changed. In contrast to what he first thought of his sister becoming a doctor, at the end he expressed how proud he was of her. This is showing his growth in letting his toxic masculinity mindset go and opening up to less rigid gender roles. While stepping up to stand up for his family, Walter said, “And that’s my sister over there and she’s going to be a doctor- and we are very proud-” (Hansberry 148). This was a huge moment in the book because Walter’s view on his sister being a doctor was not good in the first half of the book. He thought she should’ve either become a nurse like all the other women or got married and taken care of her husband then. This is a huge change in thought and shows him not supporting strict gender roles as much anymore. The old gender roles were that the men were to be in charge of most of the money and running the household. While Amama’s husband used to be head of the house, after he died it transferred over to mama. While mama didn’t necessarily want to be head of the house, she still ran the house like her husband used to. When the man who was in charge of the neighborhood they were buying a house in was trying to get the papers signed, he asked Mama, “ Well- with whom do I negotiate? You, Mrs.Younger, or your son here?” ( Hansberry 146). While Walter is the only man in the house,