The American Dream Still Deferred Many Years Later

The American Dream: Still deferred, many years later Langston Hughes poem Harlem presents a series of images in which dreams are deferred, destroyed, or otherwise rendered unattainable for African-Americans. The applicability of the images to the African-American experience is subtly rather than explicitly reinforced. The name of the poem is the most potent reference to the authors concern about the treatment of his people. But when he asks: Does it dry up/ like a raisin in the sun? it is hard not to think of the skin of slaves, drying up in the sun in the antebellum south. Hughes does not need to explicitly mention slavery. The words Or fester like a sore / And then run? also refers to how slaves tried to run and escape their masters. Maybe it just sags/ like a heavy load reinforces the image that African-Americans have been treated as beasts of burden in the past. The poem ends with an image of explosion, implying that sustained injustice results in anger and resistance, even violence. Injustice cannot be weathered indefinitely. But although the images of the Hughes poem are African-American in character, the metaphors used to describe the plight of injustice have universal applicability. The children of illegal immigrants who have grown up in this country, have known no other nation other than America yet cannot move forward and secure and education or a legitimate job because of their illegal status also find themselves with deferred dreams, like theShow MoreRelated A Raisin in the Sun Essay: Importance of Deferred Dreams734 Words   |  3 PagesImportance of Deferred Dreams in A Raisin in the Sun      Ã‚   A dream is a hope, a wish, and an aspiration. Young people have dreams about what they want to be when they grow up. Parents have dreams for their childrens future. 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