Sonny blues takes place in the 1950s. During the tough times of World War II and in the Harlem renaissance era. It plays an important role in segregation and the civil rights movements. The Important

Sonny blues takes place in the 1950s. During the tough times of World War II and in the Harlem renaissance era. It plays an important role in segregation and  the civil rights movements. The Important times of cultural injustice and political revolution. African-Americans faced follow in the world collisions. The U.S.Supreme Court ruled segregation was illegal in the case of the Brown vs. Board of education in 1954 when Rosa Parks refused to sit back in the purse being arrested that year after.

In the story’’ Sonny’s Blues’’ James Baldwin explores an impact on drugs In the black community  and segregation in Harlem. He depicts by telling continuous  stories and indirectly reflecting their racism. And drug abuse where they faced. In the lack of human rights that were given to people around. Due to their circumstances. Racism in America Is the Dark Undertone In Sonny’s Blues. In Sonny’s blue it has his own technique and style.That discusses the issue of black oppression in America. “ In Harlem given the largest concentration of Black people in the world, became a destination for African-Americans of all backgrounds from unskilled laborers to an uneducated middle-class they shared common experiences of slavery emancipation and racial oppression as well as a ditermination to forge a new identity as free people.” National  Museum Of African American History & Culture. Following World War II heroin use increased in height  throughout the country ,and much of drug distribution centers in New York, specifically Harlem. Drugs being put into Harlem what is the peak of racial discrimination in furthering deindustrialization in postwar Manhattan fostering the growth of heroin trade in the community. “ As Attendees at a Harlem neighborhood conference on narcotics addiction saw it ,” unemployment, poverty, poor housing , the oppressive strangulation of ghetto life and it’s construction of opportunities for creative expression.” The State Versus Harlem.

Baldwin’s stories use the life of a fictional character to show the hardships in the lives of Black Americans. Baldwin uses a technique to present a  subject of racial inequality. Presenting his message through characters and through the experiences they challenge. Sonny faces heroin addiction, lack of intelligence, and a lack of finding himself throughout the story to see what he wants to achieve in life. Not having a great foundation on what he wants to pursue. And enlisting into the military. After the fact of having. A hard relationship with his brother. The narrator and Sonny’s relationship together involves the environment in the community. The narrator has a difficult time expressing his ideas and emotions to Sonny.

After the post war Sonny wanted to move on from the tradition of music ,and expressed new notions for freedom and artistic liberty. Thousands of African-American soldiers were returning home from the war. Heading to different communities in Harlem on the northside finding new opportunities and equal rights. After fighting  overseas, Black soldiers faced violence and segregation coming home were forced to take menial jobs. New York Times” in hope of the G.I. Bill of Rights, a substantial piece of social legislation that President Franklin D Roosevelt signed into law in 1944 to avert mass unemployment among we’re trying to veterans and a postwar depression promoted as a racial neutral the G.I. Bill offered veterans unemployment insurance tuition assistance, job placements and guaranteed loans for home ,farms or businesses. On the face of it the bill was transformative during the war the NAACP in the civil rights groups encouraged Blacks to enlist in the military so they could receive G.I. benefits after the war however the bill failed to propel Black servicemen into the middle class in the numbers it did for white veterans discrimination toward African-Americans found its way through loopholes in the legislation just as it did in every day life.”

Sonny and his brother both served the war returning to find each radically living a different life from post war. Numerous African-Americans faced the following war  hopes of the G.I Bill. The civil rights movement which had begun in the south early which had quickly spread across the country as millions of African-Americans began to disquiet for equal rights . In the 1950s America was already more conservative and was in preparations  for  reforming political movements of the 1960s. Sonny’s blues” is a testament to both the exasperation of life in America and the eventful revolution into political movement.

Sonny faces heroin addiction in being a dealer. Facing incarceration due to drugs Still trying to find his passion in life. Baldwin uses Sunny as an example for how young black men in America can easily fall into depth on the wrong path. As a result of disadvantage and confusion and what they inherit when they’re born.  Baldwins uses “ the vivid killing streets of our childhoods —-’’ the streets ‘’ darken with dark people.’’ The narrator points out that nothing has really changed since their childhood.

Baldwin targets the visual of Sonny’s blues. Sonny hasn’t felt anything more so traumatic than his brother has, but so much ache. Sonny more so “moved…in a distant stillness” his brother would say. His mother encourage fearlly  his brother to watch over Sonny in due times. “You may not be able to stop nothing from happening. But you got to let him know you’s there.”

Though the narrator and the Sonny were both enlisted into the military, they both ended up back in Harlem still in darkness trying to find a new light. In the story the narrator especaped the darkness in his childhood  by starting a family and a good job. It didn’t change  the outlook on the older folks he had seen from his childhood. “The darkness outside is what the old folks have been talking about. It’s what they’ve come from. It’s what they endure. The child knows that they don’t talk anymore because if he knows too much about what happened to them, he’ll know too much too soon,about what’s going to happen to him