Student Question
In Native Son, how do Jan and Mary describe the Negro community's potential contribution to the communist party?
Quick answer:
Jan and Mary believe the Negro community could bring spirit and emotion to the Communist Party, aiding a revolutionary change. They view African Americans as needing white organization to "get going," revealing a patronizing attitude. Despite their intentions, their behavior towards Bigger is insensitive and reflects indirect racism, treating him as an experiment rather than a person. This underscores the irony in the Communist Party’s stance, which, despite opposing segregation, often uses African Americans as a means to an end.
Jan thinks that the black community will add spirit and emotion to the Communist cause, enabling a successful revolution that overturns the rigid racial hierarchy. As Bigger drives Jan and Mary around Washington Park, he hears Jan say,
I want to work among Negroes. That's where people are needed. It seems as though they've been pushed out of everything . . . When I see what they've done to those people, it makes me so mad . . . They have so much emotion! What a people! If we could ever get them going . . . We can't have a revolution without 'em . . . They've got to be organized. They've got spirit. They'll give the Party something it needs.
When Mary chimes in, she praises "their songs and spirituals" and begins singing.
Jan and Mary both engage in a type of indirect racism themselves; while they
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Jan and Mary both engage in a type of indirect racism themselves; while theyintend to help the black community, their behavior towards Bigger and their attitude toward the black community in general is deeply problematic, as it assumes that the black community needs the help and organization of white people in order to "get going." Jan talks about the black community as if they're children: "spirited" and "emotional." His pointing out that "they have so much emotion" is his way of saying that they don't have intellect and therefore need the "white savior" to come along and rescue them. This sort of paternalizing, thoughtless approach compounds the racism that people of color already endure, and indeed, we see Bigger's discomfort as he listens to Jan and Mary talk. When Mary gets into the front seat of the car, transgressing the racial rules that Bigger is used to, Bigger "[tightens] with hate." So, though well-intentioned, Jan and Mary's description of and hopes for the black community are part of the very system they think they're fighting against.
How do Jan and Mary view the Negro community's role in the Communist Party?
Though Jan and Mary are apparently well-meaning in their attitude toward the African American community, they also show an insensitivity and cluelessness to Bigger in the way they discuss the racial issue in front of him. Richard Wright experienced first-hand this sort of behavior from Communist Party members and wrote about it in other works as well, such as his later novel The Outsider. The thoughtless way Mary asks Jan, in front of Bigger, "Say, do you know any Negroes?" and then proceeds to describe (as her voice trails off wistfully) that black people live right here in this city (as if she's just finding this out for the first time) reveals at least an inadvertent insensitivity that comes from her sense of "privilege."
One cannot escape the suspicion that Jan and Mary see Bigger as the subject of an experiment rather than a real person. The irony is that at this time (1940) the Communists were one of the few groups in the U.S. who were openly opposed to segregation and discrimination against black people. Yet we get the impression, here and elsewhere in Wright's oeuvre, that the Party views African Americans more as a means to an end rather than as people they genuinely wish to help, out of real empathy or simply because it's the right thing to do. It's as if the destruction of the capitalist system is the only thing that really matters to the Communists.