The Violence of Duality in Adrienne Kennedy’s Funnyhouse of a Negro

Adrienne Kennedy’s psychodrama Funnyhouse of a Negro personifies in her protagonist, Sarah, the internalised racism and mental deterioration that a binary paradigm foments. Kennedy also develops the schizoid consciousness of Sarah to accentuate Sarah’s hybridised and traumatised identity as an Af...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Quan Manh Ha, Conor Hogan
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Institute of English Studies 2018-10-01
Series:Anglica. An International Journal of English Studies
Online Access:http://www.anglica.ia.uw.edu.pl/images/pdf/27-1-articles/Anglica-27-1-9-Ha-Hogan.pdf
Description
Summary:Adrienne Kennedy’s psychodrama Funnyhouse of a Negro personifies in her protagonist, Sarah, the internalised racism and mental deterioration that a binary paradigm foments. Kennedy also develops the schizoid consciousness of Sarah to accentuate Sarah’s hybridised and traumatised identity as an African American woman. Kennedy’s play was controversial during the Black Arts Movement, as she refrained from endorsing black nationalist groups like Black Power, constructing instead a nightmare world in which race is the singular element in defining self-worth. In her dramatized indictment of both white supremacy and identity politics, American culture’s pathologized fascination with pigmentation drives the protagonist to solipsistic isolation, and ultimately, to suicide. Kennedy, through the disturbed cast of Sarah’s mind, portrays a world in which race obsession triumphs over any sense of basic humanity. The play urges the audience to accept the absurdity of a dichotomized vision of the world, to recognise the spectral nature of reality, and to transcend the devastation imposed by polarising rhetoric.
ISSN:0860-5734
0860-5734