An Invisible Post

For our Equality class, we split our unit into three subgroups- Race, Gender, and Class. We looked at each of these groups, as well as others, as examined the inequality in our society that these groups face. We read a book- Invisible Man, to get a more in depth glance at how someone's life can be affected by these inequalities and disadvantages. For our action project, we were assigned to discuss how this book related to one of the many theorists whose work we read, and compare how their theories were shown in the book. I’m proud of the discussions I was a part of in this unit because I feel like I went really in depth in explaining my opinions, while also listening and respecting other people’s beliefs.

AG . Invisible Image on Page 36 . 2016

The 1952 novel Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison was published during the Korean War and two years before the Civil Right Movement started. It was a time when people were fighting to end racial segregation and discrimination against African Americans. Ellison was born in 1914 and pursued a variety of different jobs throughout his life, from an artist to being a cook in WWII to being a writer. Invisible Man follows the life of an African American man living in the Jim Crow south during this time period, whose name we never discover and is simply identified as an invisible man. We see how racism and other obstacles affect him and how he deals with the alienation he feels throughout his whole life. The book begins with the narrator explaining why he calls himself an invisible man, and telling us he decided to live underground in order to write his story. He then narrates his life story, through college in the South, a move to New York, memory loss, joining the Brotherhood, a riot that led to his decision to live underground, and ending with an understanding of himself and the truth of invisible and structural American racism. W.E.B. Du Bois, an early twentieth century African American writer, sociologist, and critic, offers an interesting way of analyzing Ellison's novel. The first chapter from Du Bois’ 1903 book, The Souls of Black Folk, “Of Our Spiritual Strivings”, introduces one of his main concepts for understanding race and racism is: “double-consciousness”. Du Bois describes double-consciousness as the “sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity,” meaning always having to think about how other people are seeing you, and that affecting how you see yourself (Du Bois). Du Bois also pushed African Americans to do the most in life and to strive to get an education and do more than just the things expected of black people. These concepts are shown many times in Invisible Man. 

One of the many ways Invisible Man illustrates Du Bois’ beliefs and theories was by pursuing a greater education, despite society saying his race wasn’t good enough for that. In the scene early in the novel the narrator had been asked to show a benefactor of his college, Mr. Norton, around the campus. The two characters were making conversation, and Mr. Norton was talking about the college, and described it at “a great dream become reality”; he then stated “Slavery was just recently part. Your people did not know in what direction to turn and, I must confess, many of mine didn’t know in what direction they should turn either. But your great Founder did” (Ellison 38, 39). This brings to light Du Bois’ writings about how many people believed black people should only do hard labor and stick to what they know, but how he pushed them to do more and strive to get an education. Mr. Norton was a man who agreed with this point of view, and he believed that black people deserved to have an education as well. This also brought up the other perspective-- Norton had said that the invisible man’s people and his people both didn’t know what direction to turn, many people including black people, didn’t know how to act or what to do. While theorists like Du Bois were pushing them in one direction, many other people were pushing them back down in the other direction. This caused even more of an internal struggle, and caused many people to be lost and not know what to do and what they were expected to do. This is what I believe is a big factor in creating the feeling of double consciousness within African Americans. 

Another of double consciousness occurs also early in Ellison’s novel when the invisible man is asked to give a speech to the white leaders of his southern town, supposedly because they saw him as a great orator. The narrator realizes pretty quickly, however, that these men he has been taught to look up to, fear and respect aren’t paying attention to his words or intellect. In fact, the narrator spent time revising his speech in order to present a more appealing and respectable message to his audience. He reveals:

On my graduation day I delivered an oration in which I showed that humility was the secret, indeed, the very essence of progress (Not that I believed this--how could I, remembering my grandfather?--I only believed that it worked.) It was a great success. Everyone praised me and I was invited to give the speech at a gathering of the town’s leading white citizens. It was a triumph for our whole community (Ellison 17). 

This quote showed how he was treated as a black man in a society of white men. He was a successful student, and yet his mind wasn’t valued simply because he was black. It also showed how he was so conscious of what he said and how he acted for fear of how he would be perceived. He made sure to only say the things that the white men wanted to hear, because he knew if he didn’t say what they wanted to hear they would just refuse to listen. This is shown even more so in the battle royale scene, which occurs directly after the invisible man delivers his racial uplift speech to the disinterested white audience. Our narrator was told fight other black men simply for entertainment while the white men watched. Black men were seen by white people as animals simply there for their entertainment; they weren’t valued for anything else.

Finally, we see double consciousness is illustrated Invisible Man through the narrator’s struggle to unite his black identity to his American identity, which is exactly how Du Bois defines this concept, in terms ofthe inner conflict between being both black and American. The invisible man struggles to see himself in any other way than through other people’s eyes. This is a struggle not only he faces, but all black people in America. Ellison uses symbolism to show this when the narrator describes the statue of the Founder of his college holding the veil over the face of a slave. It is unclear whether he is pulling the veil up or pushing it down to keep it over the slave’s face. The narrator states: “I am standing puzzled, unable to decide whether the veil is really being lifted, or lowered more firmly in place; whether I am witnessing a revolution or a more efficient blinding” (Ellison 36). It shows a black man’s relationship with the world, how it blinds him from the truth, and how he is misperceived by it. It also represents how members who are higher up in the black community keep other black people down and below them, by making them believe in false notions and how they should interact with whites. They are told by others how they are supposed to act and what they are supposed to be, and it causes them to struggle with their identity and become lost in themselves, as the reader sees played out through the invisible man's often chaotic and confusing journey away from the school and into the North.

Ralph Ellison demonstrated Du Bois’ theories a number of times throughout his novel. He showed double consciousness and had his character go to school and do work that wasn’t just hard labor, just like Du Bois wrote about and encouraged. Invisible Man is a book filled with metaphors and so many of them relate to double consciousness and the struggles with identity for an African American male of this time period. I focused on some of these examples that took place in the beginning of the book but they are found throughout the entire novel. Du Bois’ theories were proven time and time again. These connections all show us the relationship between society and black people, specifically men. We see the way they are stereotyped and misperceived by society, and the way that makes them question themselves. They are forced to second guess all their actions in order to make white people happy while also not betraying their race and themselves.


Works Cited

• Bois, W.E.B. Du. "Chapter 1 Of Our Spiritual Strivings." The Souls Of Black Folk. Chicago: A. C. McClurg & Co., 1903. Print.
• Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man. New York: Random House, 1952. Print.