Clare and Irene Essay

With an African American man running for pre fountnt, the join States has been more focused on aftermath in the last division than any condemnation in the last several decades, but much of the focus has been on the concept that race doesnt matter. For the characters in Nella Larsens spill, race was everything and although race relations have improve since 1929 when the set aside was published, it is impossible to believe that race is not still a study factor in the development of personal identity and in societal interactions.In the fresh, Clare and Irene choose different paths because of their race and in spite of it. Clare hides her past, and her heritage, means taboo for white while Irene remains a part of the black lodge of Harlem. Perhaps because of her own mixed ethnicity, Larsen is able to tell the story from the stand of two women, both ashamed and confused by the encroachment that their race has on their lives. Clare spends much of the book reaching to hide her heritage and Irene revels in hers.Had Larsen written at a different time, she might have had Clare fit some grand cosmic punishment for her deception, but in Passing it is more Irene who suffers for her choice. Because she remains a part of the black community, she suffers discrimination and vexation that would have been spared a white woman. The most interesting facet of this novel is that it still enlightens us today about the impact of race on personal identity. Michael Jackson has long been the brunt of many jokes with tabloid speculation that he was lightening his skin, trying to become more white.On the other side of the argument, many African Americans, especially in the rap recording industry, try to make themselves more racially separated than they truly are. This is even unfeigned in the race for the White House as every time Barack Obamas race is menti peerlessd, someone takes great care to point out that his father was an African, not a black American. The underly ing tone of the racialism in American society today is well-reflect in Larsons novel. ofttimes like Clare and Irene, America today is not acknowledging its racial history and how that impacts the trend people think and act.The hardest part for Clare and Irene comes in the discovery that Clare has been passing as white. Once she is discovered, she is brutalized by fellow African Americans who think they are good-looking her what she deserves because she has tried to put on airs and act white. She is assumed dishonored of any number of other crimes because she lied about her ethnicity and Irene, who often was grabby of the decision that Clare make, feels that she should do nothing to stop the prejudice on both sides because Clare made the decision to try passing.Historically speaking, the idea of passing is made much more poignant when we recall Plessey v. Ferguson in which a quadroon man, one quarter black but capable of passing for white, challenged the laws about a white only r ailroad car. He was convicted and the court went all the way to the Supreme Court which ruled, at that time (1896) , that any African production line made you black, whether you could pass for Caucasian or not. Obviously, Larsen understood this ruling and its impact on her own life and the life of her fellow citizens of Harlem.