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...
Main Authors: | , |
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Format: | Article |
Language: | English |
Published: |
Institute of English Studies
2018-10-01
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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 |
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. |
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ISSN: | 0860-5734 0860-5734 |