In Her Own Words
On Integration
Hansberry believed that integration was the removal of all barriers to the construction of
solidarity among the children of the American working class. A push for integration was
not a sign of African Americans wishing to be absorbed into the house but rather that negro
people would like to see the house rebuilt. The success of integration and the conquering of
racism would enable the tackling of other problems such as poverty, militarism, inequality, and
education (Hansberry, The Village Voice, July 1964).
On Brown v. Board and Cultural Preservation of Racism
From the time he is born, the negro child is surrounded by a society organized to convince him
that he belongs to a people whose past is so worthless and shameful that it amounts to no past at
all awaiting our youth in every area of American life is a barrage of propaganda which distorts
and disparages their identity in a land where the Grace Kelly-Marilyn Monroe monotype ideal is
imposed on the national culture, racist logic insists that anything directly opposite no matter how
lovely is naturally ugly. (Hansberry, Freedom, March 1955).
On Racial Prejudice
Popular idiom deals best with race prejudice: who needs it? It too is a killer. Negroes, for
instance, simply do no live as long as white people in America. I think we must begin to
remember facts like that and chatter less about the sensibilities of our bigots. We have been
pathetically overgenerous with their malignant whimsy for three centuries. I hope in the next
ten years we will begin to recognize the void that racism has left in the character of white
Americans. The sorry absence of courage on the race question presents terrifying implications
for our culture. I also hope that a new spirit will charge the ranks of negro leadership. The
current plantation-paced dance of gratitude for crumbs shames the heart. (Lorraine Hansberry,
1960)
On Feminism
"I think it is about time that equipped women began to take on some of the ethical questions
that a male-dominated culture has produced and dissect and analyze them quite to pieces in a
serious fashion. It is time that 'half the human race' had something to say about the nature of its
existence. Otherwise -- without revised basic thinking -- the woman intellectual is likely to find
herself trying to draw conclusions -- moral conclusions -- based on acceptance of a social moral
superstructure that has never admitted to the equality of women and is therefore immoral itself."
(Hansberry, The Ladder, 1957)
Hansberry believed that integration was the removal of all barriers to the construction of
solidarity among the children of the American working class. A push for integration was
not a sign of African Americans wishing to be absorbed into the house but rather that negro
people would like to see the house rebuilt. The success of integration and the conquering of
racism would enable the tackling of other problems such as poverty, militarism, inequality, and
education (Hansberry, The Village Voice, July 1964).
On Brown v. Board and Cultural Preservation of Racism
From the time he is born, the negro child is surrounded by a society organized to convince him
that he belongs to a people whose past is so worthless and shameful that it amounts to no past at
all awaiting our youth in every area of American life is a barrage of propaganda which distorts
and disparages their identity in a land where the Grace Kelly-Marilyn Monroe monotype ideal is
imposed on the national culture, racist logic insists that anything directly opposite no matter how
lovely is naturally ugly. (Hansberry, Freedom, March 1955).
On Racial Prejudice
Popular idiom deals best with race prejudice: who needs it? It too is a killer. Negroes, for
instance, simply do no live as long as white people in America. I think we must begin to
remember facts like that and chatter less about the sensibilities of our bigots. We have been
pathetically overgenerous with their malignant whimsy for three centuries. I hope in the next
ten years we will begin to recognize the void that racism has left in the character of white
Americans. The sorry absence of courage on the race question presents terrifying implications
for our culture. I also hope that a new spirit will charge the ranks of negro leadership. The
current plantation-paced dance of gratitude for crumbs shames the heart. (Lorraine Hansberry,
1960)
On Feminism
"I think it is about time that equipped women began to take on some of the ethical questions
that a male-dominated culture has produced and dissect and analyze them quite to pieces in a
serious fashion. It is time that 'half the human race' had something to say about the nature of its
existence. Otherwise -- without revised basic thinking -- the woman intellectual is likely to find
herself trying to draw conclusions -- moral conclusions -- based on acceptance of a social moral
superstructure that has never admitted to the equality of women and is therefore immoral itself."
(Hansberry, The Ladder, 1957)