Communities : Label Makers

A community is a world of its own.  It may have different opinions than those surrounding it or it may have similar beliefs but either way it is held together in a union of beliefs that are passed on to newcomers and imprinted into childrens malleable brains.  In society different communities have different cultures that establish language, opinions, and stereotypes that everyone is assumed to follow.  Some community’s work to dissipate the idea of stereotypes.  For example in the New Haven community they have a workshop for children to raise awareness of what stereotypes are and how to get rid of them.  According to an article in The New Haven Register, “The workshop will focus on how negative stereotypes of black people are hurting the children, how and why stereotypes were invented, and what parents and other caregivers can do to destroy those stereotypes and help heal the wounds they inflict.” In other instances communities hold on to the stereotypes given to race or gender and pass them on to their children, only to continue the vicious cycle.

Within Light in August community plays a significant role in shaping the thoughts of its persons.  In the town Jefferson, the two stereotypes passed down throughout the community are Racism and Gender relations.  In Light in August what I find interesting is the demonstration of how if one believes differently than the community how they are exiled.  Hightower believes and acts contrary to how the community believes and acts.  Hightower is said to have relationships with his black servants and has a unsuccessful relationship with his wife.  Both of these make an impression on the community and they respond by trying to make him leave.  Why does he stay?? Hightower is threatened, attacked, and shunned, yet he stays in Jefferson.  I think that his place in society has become his identity.  

Hightower takes on the identity of the outsider of the town, just as other identities are given to the different members.  When Lena arrives the community deems her the bad woman, just as when Christmas’s true racial confusion is addressed he is deemed as the violent black man. Both Lena and Christmas were judged upon only their physical appearance, Lena arriving with a pregnant stomach and no man, and Christmas with a slightly darker skin tone.  In Lena’s case her identity was less desirable whereas Christmas was struggling to accept an identity being racially mixed.  I think that Hightower, even though chosen to be an outsider, was comfortable in Jefferson because he was given an identity which is something that people strive to gain.  Within a community one might be searching for their identity however, once it is given sometimes it is less desirable.  Communities are organizations that label people with identities and stereotypes, it is hard to deviate from the path that a community has chosen for you if you remain there.