Racism In Mark Twain's Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn
Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn depicts the racial hierarchy and embedded racist attitudes towards African-Americans in the antebellum South. When exploring the issue of Whiteness in Huckleberry Finn, the reader need only look towards Twain's representation of the character Jim, a runaway slave who is portrayed as the stereotype of the ignorant Southern “negro.” Racism cannot accurately be examined in this novel without considering the way Whiteness becomes personified through Huckleberry Finn, because he occupies the greatest space white privilege. Although it may appear that the two runaways are willingly each other’s accomplice, in actuality, Huck exploits Jim’s otherness to free himself from his undesirable situation. His treatment
of Jim should be considered negative, not only because his behavior is insensitive in the way he continuously insults and plays jokes on Jim, but also because it asserts the binaries of race in novel. Although Huck’s actions reflect the prejudice of the South towards Blacks, I argue that Huck’s racist attitudes have been embedded by his upbringing, which makes him completely unaware that his attitude towards Jim is demeaning and wrong. Furthermore after spending so much time in the presence of Jim, Huck seems to struggle to perpetuate his oppressive practices, becoming what will later be defined as his “crisis in Whiteness.” He changes Examining the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’s socially constructed make-up of Whiteness requires an examination of the power dynamic in a sense of who becomes oppressed and who benefits by the construction. Certainly, given the racist attitudes of the South, Huck is obliged to act within the guidelines of the master/slave relationship, which inadvertently allows his Whiteness to unfold. In her monograph, Playing in the Dark, Toni Morrison refers to this dynamic as an “Africanist” presence, in that Jim serves as “[a] strongly urged, thoroughly serviceable, companionably ego-reinforcing, and pervasive” other who becomes essential to allowing Huck to form his inadvertent practice of white supremacy (8). The most revealing evidence of Huck’s inadvertent Whiteness occurs when both he and Jim are nearing Cairo, a spot where the Ohio River merges with the Mississippi. From there the two will be able to board steamboat upriver and journey into the “free” states, where Jim can become a free man.
of Jim should be considered negative, not only because his behavior is insensitive in the way he continuously insults and plays jokes on Jim, but also because it asserts the binaries of race in novel. Although Huck’s actions reflect the prejudice of the South towards Blacks, I argue that Huck’s racist attitudes have been embedded by his upbringing, which makes him completely unaware that his attitude towards Jim is demeaning and wrong. Furthermore after spending so much time in the presence of Jim, Huck seems to struggle to perpetuate his oppressive practices, becoming what will later be defined as his “crisis in Whiteness.” He changes Examining the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’s socially constructed make-up of Whiteness requires an examination of the power dynamic in a sense of who becomes oppressed and who benefits by the construction. Certainly, given the racist attitudes of the South, Huck is obliged to act within the guidelines of the master/slave relationship, which inadvertently allows his Whiteness to unfold. In her monograph, Playing in the Dark, Toni Morrison refers to this dynamic as an “Africanist” presence, in that Jim serves as “[a] strongly urged, thoroughly serviceable, companionably ego-reinforcing, and pervasive” other who becomes essential to allowing Huck to form his inadvertent practice of white supremacy (8). The most revealing evidence of Huck’s inadvertent Whiteness occurs when both he and Jim are nearing Cairo, a spot where the Ohio River merges with the Mississippi. From there the two will be able to board steamboat upriver and journey into the “free” states, where Jim can become a free man.