The struggles with masculinity by male characters in following August Wilson’s plays; Jitney, Fences

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The struggles with masculinity by male characters in following August Wilson’s plays; Jitney, Fences, Joe Turner Come and Gone This paper will examine the male characters in the following August Wilson’s plays; Jitney, Fences, Joe Turner Come and Gone and their struggles with masculinity. There’s is a silent scream among the male characters to prove their masculinity. The male characters in each of these plays are fighting to prove their worth while trying to escape from someone or something. Each male character cry out for their sense of dignity and will fight to death to get it.

August Wilson’s plays; Jitney, Fences and Joe Turner Come and Gone represent characters struggling with masculinity. Most of the male characters in these plays are attempting all means to prove their masculinity. They try to prove their worth either through avoidance of the expected responsibilities, or by running away from other people or things. This paper shows how male characters struggle with masculinity in August Wilson’s plays namely: Jitney, Fences and Joe Turner Come and Gone Wilson shows the African-America’s struggle at different times since the abolition of slavery in America. Whereas male characters in Joe Turner Come and Go fight for identity and authority as per the African believes, Troy in Fences is fighting a losing war by trying to protect his family against what he believes to be injustice. The place of women in the society also causes confusion as most women aren’t ready to be subjected to patriarchal slavery experienced during their days as slaves. Men on the other hand are struggling to be the main providers and family protectors, despite the hardships in securing well-paying jobs or other opportunities. It their attempt to show their masculinity, most of the male characters fail terribly.

How have African American men defined their masculinity? Assimilation to or separation from hegemonic masculinity is the first question that appears to attract August

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Wilson’s attention mainly. Although these three plays present different sociological, cultural and historical factors conducive to this definition of masculinity, many of Wilson’s male characters adhere, at significant cost, to hegemonic masculinity. Most of Wilson’s male characters are aware of an existing perception of masculinity in society. This perception is indicated through the white characters in the plays. Wilson uses only three white male characters. According to Henry Louis Gates, one of Wilson’s most significant accomplishments is to register the ambitious presence of white men in a world of segregated Africans. The whites are seen nowhere but felt everywhere. Although Wilson majorly focuses on the black male residents of the Hill district, the presence of a hegemonic society is evident. The white men govern the lives of the blacks even when they aren’t physically present.

Wilson ties the destiny and success of African-Americans to self-identity and appreciation of the suffering and culture of the forefathers. The use of Africa terms such as juba and dancing style that ironically makes Herald Loomis to ‘speak in tongues’ in Joe Turner Come and Gone is example enough of the cultural and religious confusion that affected the black Americans in their struggle with masculinity. Jitney shows the life of black American during the post-Vietnam war in America. They are united for a purpose; to prove the worth of the black people. Their hunger for identity and superiority contributes to their success and failures.

Through Jitney, one gets a clear picture of the modern racism and its effects on the black community. The play also shows how despair can lead to crime, lies and failure in people’s lives.

It shows the blacks’’ resilience and ability to ‘hustle’ despite all unfavorable odds.

The black male crisis is brought about by hegemonic masculinity and their unawareness of their masculine performance. A concern with the valiant efforts of the black men to situate themselves into a fiction of archetypical masculinity is the main cause of restlessness and

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indulgence in retrogressive activities. Their attempts to exert their superiority and sense of entitlement are often derailed by a virulently hostile hegemonic culture. Activities associated with the fictitious archetypical masculinity are evidenced through glorification of violence, oppression of women, te struggle for dominance and the embodiment of a capitalist agenda that measure success through material wealth and accumulation of money. However, Wilson also brings in another characteristic of hegemonic masculinity as evidenced by herald Loomis in Joe Turner Come and Gone. When he goes into a trance, he strips naked and exposes his manhood, signifying the use of sexual prowess as a sign of greatness among the blacks. This proves the stereotypes associated with blacks’ in terms of crime, drugs and sex.

Wilson values a masculinity that demands from his characters a deep sense of recognition and an appreciation of their rich heritage. This involves accepting that they are indeed responsible for their neighbors and that they play a vital role in their community. He indicates that man’s liberation from hegemonic masculinity comes through spiritual and cultural connection with his community and through the recognition of his ancestry.

According to Wilson, rather than criticizing their male systems of identification that propose power only in return for accepting a limited version of “real” masculinity, the AfricanAmerican male prefer to transfer their own identity struggle with “normative” masculinity onto others, i.e. women, children or friends.

Wilson’s characters expose the grief and pain that they carry as a direct result of their blackness and the unawareness of their masculine performances. Many of them have been imprisoned by hegemonic masculinity. Since their identity crisis is observed in the form of masculinity crisis, there appears to be no possible way out for them to solve the problem

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August Wilson’s develops his characters in such a way to reflect the plight of African American people directly. One substantial aspect that is evident is the struggle of black males.

These men strive to get a power that seems out of reach to them because other people are in control. Though most of Wilson's plays show the theme of struggling for power, two characters that stand out are Troy from Fences and Herald Loomis from Turner Come and Go. Though these men live their lives in different decades, they have very similar situations. Both are oppressed by white culture and simultaneously oppressed by their heritage of bondage. They gain freedom but continue searching for a fresh beginning which sadly seems evasive. While one deserts his family to seek a new beginning, the other one explores a new beginning by cheating on his faithful wife. Both Troy and Loomis struggle against their oppressive pasts and their present surroundings, and when they try to regain power in their lives, they fail and end up bringing others down with them.

The Fences Troy emerges from a battered past and as someone who once dreamed of swinging for the fences — playing professional baseball — but is consigned to being a garbage man. Troy’s perception of his existence and worth is inadequate, mostly because he cannot realize the American Dream economically and socially as he is an “emasculated” man. By embodying and performing standards of hegemonic masculinity, Troy sentences himself to a lifetime of disappointment. Due to the dominance perpetuated by hegemonic masculinity and his inability to “head” his family, Troy experiences failure with his masculinity and, in turn, oppresses his wife and sons. In other words, the metaphorical emasculation is presented by Wilson as a motif, which delineates the status of African American males in the United States.

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In the ‘Fences,' Troy’s past dictates the kind of man he is today. His father has had a major impact on Troy. Troy says that he knows that his father never loved him, but his father stayed with the family because it was his duty to take care of his children. After an incident with his father where he was beaten unconscious, Troy knew he needed to leave. The idea of deserting his father's home and going away from the harsh environment is expected to bring Troy a feeling of freedom. However, troy ironically feels the opposite. Because of his tumultuous relationship with his father, Troy tries to control his own son’s life. He also tries to control his son’s future because he sees that Cory is heading down the same road he had been before being rejected.

Although Cory has a great chance of going to college on a football scholarship, his father ruins his chances by refusing to sign the form that allows his son to join the college football team.

Since his father did nothing to help him, Troy is doing what he thinks is his responsibility as a father for his son. He intends to save Cory from the same athletic rejection Troy experienced when he was his age. Sadly, his actions ruin Corry's possibility of having a better life away from Troy. He ruined his son’s chances of getting out of this life, fulfilling a dream of playing football, and obtaining a college education.

Troy also suffered another injustice of losing a great opportunity due to the color of his skin. He was a great baseball player when he was a man. According to the play, Troy, as well as other characters assume that he would have succeeded to play in significant baseball leagues had he been given a chance. This unfortunate experience creates a feeling of inadequacy in him and shapes his future struggle for masculinity. He feels that his skin color is a significant impediment to his success. This makes him bitter and affected his adult life. He thinks that Corry should concentrate on his job at A&P instead of wasting time chasing football dreams. Troy believes that Corry will undergo the same fate that befell him and is therefore ready to protect his son by

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all means. When his wife Rose informs him about the possibility of Corry getting recruited in the football team, he says;

“The white man ain’t gonna let him get nowhere with that football noway. You go on and get your book-learning so you can work yourself up in that A&P or learn how to fix cars or build houses or something, get you a trade. That way you have something can’t nobody take away from you. You go on and learn how to put your hands to some good use besides hauling garbage” (Fences 35).

Troy is upset with the injustice that he experienced in his life with athletics. He prevents Cory back from obtaining successes that Troy could only dream about achieving. He has a low expectation of what African-American men can make in life due to his experience.

It is evident that Troy wants his son to have a better life than his own, but he doesn’t consider Cory’s dreams and that times have changed enough since he was young that these dreams do have the possibility of becoming realities. Troy’s focus on being a good father to his son, though it may seem misguided, stems from the fact that his own father did not warn him of the world’s injustices. Troy had to learn on his own, and Troy is trying to protect his son of the evil injustices that this life has, but he ends up pushing his son away because he cannot look past his own problems. History repeats itself when through his actions, he pushes his son away, just the same way his father pushed him away. His attempts to help backfire and instead destroy his family.

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After running away from his father's dictatorial rule, Troy founds out that there are no jobs and houses for black people. He becomes a petty thief to get his daily food and for survival.

He found a woman and made her pregnant with his firstborn son. This adds the responsibility on his jobless shoulders. He has to provide for two mouths. Due to lack of employment, he continued with his criminal behavior until one day when the robbery goes wrong. He killed a man in self-defense, and as a result, he was thrown in jail for fifteen years. Lyon's mother got married to another man during Troy's stay in prison. This shows the delicate balance that was there between love and survival. The confusion caused by the oppression of blacks and life as slaves deprived them of human instincts. It's this oppression that led Troy to jail and separated him from Lyon's mother.

Troy later got a suitable job as a garbage collector. He, however, isn't satisfied with the job and still feels oppressed because of his skin color. The archetypical masculinity in him forces him to approach both the workers union and the employer to request for promotion of employment status. He understands that the work of truck drivers is a preserve of the white employees, but he is determined to prove his self-worth. The employer yields to this demands and promotes him to be a truck driver, his lack of truck driving license notwithstanding.

His feeling of entitlement, however, denies him the happiness he thought he would have after being separated from his black workmates. He isn't content with the situation, but can't accept self-defeat. The issue of getting employed without proper qualification raises many questions. Although he has proved to himself and those around him, including the whites of his worth, Troy still feels inadequate. It's evident that the main reason for seeking promotion was to gain some power he thought he had lost in life.

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Though this promotion was a dream he was able to obtain; he finds that this job is lonely. He does not work with his friends, and he has no one to company. This is one dream he can achieve that has not affected those around him, just himself.

Concerning his role as a man and his relationship with his wife, Troy tries to regain his power, but he falls short. As a man, he is to provide for his family. He is unable to do this alone, and he must use the catastrophic injuries of his brother to provide for his family.

His brother Gabriel was wounded in the war and was compensated with money. Troy, however, uses the compensation funds to pay for his house. He feels guilty about using his brother's compensation as a way of supporting his life. Troy feels that his brothers suffering is the only way him and his family. He sadly says;

“If my brother didn’t have that metal plate in his head…I wouldn’t have a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of. And I’m fifty-three years old” (Fences 28).

He ends up having his brother committed to a hospital. His ego doesn't allow him to admit that he signed the papers to admit Gabriel to the hospital for good. He insists that the hospital tricked him into signing the documents; However, life goes on smoothly as he is no longer reminded of his constant shortcomings and taking advantage of his brother's unfortunate situation.

Despite having a great loving relationship with his wife Rose, Troy cheats on her with another woman in his quest of becoming a different man. He is afraid of the constant reminder of

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his failures and thinks that by straying out of his marital bed, he will find solace in the arms of another woman. He fears the fact that his wife knows his shortcomings and therefore he has no authority over her. Although Rose is a responsible and loving wife, Troy breaks her heart by impregnating another woman and defiantly accepting responsibility. The patriarchal society of the time forces Rose to take Troy back, but all emotional connection is gone. Although Rose didn't agree with all of Troy's decisions, she was a faithful woman who had stood with Troy, loved him and respected him as the man of the house.

Troy didn't keep his part of the bargain. He escaped responsibilities and went to be with another woman with whom he could feel in control. Rose accepts the responsibility of raising Troy's child, but the relationship between the two is ruined. This action makes Troy lose his power, and he finds himself emasculated more than ever.

Harry J. Elam says, “The traditional nature of their marriage allowed Troy to dominate, while Rise suppressed her will and desires” (180).

Troy's struggle of proving his worth to others blinded him and made him lose control over his family. While working hard to prove his worth to others, he ends up showing to his wife that he is unworthy. His relentless search for power over his life ends up ruining his happiness and makes him desolate and powerless.

Troy tries to reclaim the power and the control in his life after going through injustices and oppression in his life as an athlete, a son, and as an employee

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Sandra Shannon In the essay “Developing Character: Fences,” says, “These feelings of being passed over change Troy into a man obsessed with extorting from life an equal measure of what was robbed from him” (95).

He tries to control everything in his life to cover up for his unfulfilled opportunities in his life and his cruel father. However, his efforts end up bringing other people around him down. His attempts to make up for the oppression in his life ends up making him an oppressor.

Troy also exhibits toxic masculinity that later tears his family apart. Toxic masculinity refers to stress violence, dictatorial tendencies and outward aggression demonstrated towards others. It is done by men who desire to align themselves with societal expectations of manhood and masculinity. This desire is worsened by the fear that one cannot be man enough. Toxic masculinity deprives one of the abilities to appreciate his weaknesses but instead does everything to overpower everyone.

In the play, Corry feels unloved by the father and even asks him why he doesn’t like him (Corry). Instead of answering him, Troy uses his responsibility to cover up for his inability to connect emotionally with his son. He is unable to love Corry. He was also unable to love and remain faithful to his wife, Rose. His inability to be emotionally connected to the people who are close to him is evidence of toxic masculinity.

According to Troy, his manhood depends on how e takes care of his family and his belief in hard work. This, however, negates the necessary compassion for taking care and loving his son and wife wholly. Troy’s anger about his past shouldn’t be a license for the violence he

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causes the Maxson household. The toxicity erects a tall fence that blocks Troy from loving those that belong to him.

Trying to live up to the hegemonic masculine ideal was not an easy task for black males.

By considering his masculinity within the standards of the masculine mystique, Troy creates pressures that can only be decreased by removing the inadequate benchmarks defining him.

Living in an “imperialist, white supremacist, capitalist patriarchy” where he must earn money to survive, however, makes this struggle arduous. If he wishes to break free of the masculine mystique, Troy’s double consciousness as a black man living in a white world requires fuller consideration. To have any chance for freedom both for himself and the Maxson family, Troy must take off the lens of the masculine mystique that obscures his view of himself and the world because he cannot regard himself to be inadequate and his burdens to be failures. As a result, Troy fails to see the successes of his family and his life.

Joe Turner Come and Gone The story of Joe Turner’s Come and Gone is quite straightforward. Herald Loomis, with his daughter Zonia, enters Seth and Bertha Holly’s boarding house in Pittsburgh in search of his wife, Martha, whom he has not seen for the past ten years because of her move from Memphis to Pittsburgh while he was serving a seven-year peonage. He wants to find her because he believes that seeing her face is the only thing that would help him to restart his life. Loomis, on conjureman Bynum Walker’s advice, hires Selig Rutherford, a peddler and “people finder,” to locate his wife. Selig 37 returns with Martha after seven days, Loomis delivers his daughter, Zonia to his wife and leaves the boarding house.

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Herald Loomis, the protagonist of the play, embraces this patriarchal ideal and transfers his problems with “normative” masculinity onto his wife and daughter. The question of masculine identity, which according to August Wilson, demands a spiritual and cultural connection with one’s family and a recognition of his ancestry, is not resolved in this play. By adopting a model of hegemonic masculinity — traditionally splitting of the white American hero from his family or any female presence — Loomis mimics and embodies the standard model set by white masters, thereby experiencing a failed masculinity.

Loomis, the protagonist of Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, is socialized by mainstream patriarchal society to believe that he should become a patriarch by protecting his wife; in other words, by becoming “benevolent patriarch” (hooks 1). Adopting the “plantation patriarchy,” Loomis takes as his standard the dominator model set by white masters. By making white patriarchal masculinity a crucial part of his identity, he not only distances himself from his African heritage but also oppresses himself, his family as well as other people in his community.

At the end of the play, his escape from a female presence and his rejection of his African heritage imply that he will face a masculinity crisis or using bell hooks’ term a “failed masculinity” (hooks 1).

Loomis attempts to rediscover, repossess and redefine his masculinity as a free black man. Throughout the play, the audience witnesses how Herald Loomis experiences a masculinity dilemma that involves assimilation into the hegemonic masculinity or returning to the African sensibilities that hooks and Wilson highlight.

Loomis’ role as husband and father is stolen from him the moment he is captured by Joe Turner, a character who based on the actual brother of Tennessee Governor Pete Turner. His

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world becomes completely shattered after on his return from captivity finds that the people who once depended on him are no longer there. As he explains in Act II Scene II: "My wife Martha gone from me after Joe Turner caught me. Got out from under Joe Turner on his birthday. Me and forty other men put in our seven years, and he let us go on his birthday. I made it back to Henry Thompson’s place where me and Martha were sharecropping, and Martha’s gone. She taken my little girl and left her with her mama and took off North. We 39 been looking for her ever since. That’s the only thing I know to do. I just wanna see her face so I can get me a starting place in the world. The world got to start somewhere. That’s what I been looking for. I have been wandering a long time in somebody else’s world. When I find my wife that be the making of my own." (69 Since Wilson favors returning to African heritage and rediscovering African characteristics of masculinity as opposed to hegemonic masculinity, with Herald Loomis, he exemplifies the dilemma that many black males have faced. To come in terms with his African masculine identity, Herald Loomis is supposed to undergo a spiritual quest, which will be guided

by Bynum, the conjure man. Bynum directs him to greater self-awareness, to rediscover his “song.” It is not an easy task for both of them because Loomis has been estranged from his African ancestry and has been taught to be a “benevolent patriarch” in his bondage.

Loomis associates his freedom, or, in other words, finding his “song,” or masculine identity with finding Martha. That is why, he oppresses not only himself, but also those around him. What he must do is come to terms with his African ancestry and discover “his father’s house” he has left in the past (Devries 29). The theme of returning to his father’s house in the odyssey of self-empowerment is part of Loomis’s recognition of his African heritage and a symbol of the rejection of the plantation patriarchy.

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Wilson uses Joe Turner as a symbolic representation of the mainstream American oppression of African Americans. In terms of masculinity, the excerpt also highlights bell hooks’ concept of the “plantation patriarchy.” Slaves, similar to Loomis were taught patriarchal masculinity, and they forgot about their African sensibilities with respect to their manhood. That is why, after their emancipation, when they freely reunited with their community, they experienced a masculinity dilemma. As opposed to individuality, which was perpetuated by hegemonic masculinity, Wilson emphasizes the importance of masculinity in relation to the African community. By claiming his African ancestry and remembering the slaves from the Middle Passage, Loomis is expected to discover his “song,” to have a kinship with those Africans and become one of them.

Herald Loomis is plagued by his missing wife. Without his wife, he finds no continuity in his life. The tragedy here is that Loomis does not know how to stand on his own feet. Through another character and a journey to the City of Bones, he learns that it is his “song,” his identity, that has been stolen by Joe Turner and must be restored before he can fully stand on his own feet (Wilson, Joe Turner’s 68).

In his trance, he travels to the underwater graveyard for the masses of the blacks who died crossing the Atlantic on their bloody journey into slavery. He, however, can't stand up after his bones were swept to the banks of the ocean. This signifies his inability to move until he finds and accepts his African identity.

Since he was taught to be the “benevolent patriarch” in Joe Turner’s gang, losing his wife was a tremendous defeat for him. He thinks his male identity rests in his wife and it will be restored by her return. (Wilson, Joe Turner’s 68). As Wilson indicates in the play, Loomis’ identity will only be recuperated through a process of self-recognition and acceptance of his

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ancestry. By motivating Selig to find Martha, Bynum facilitates Loomis’s discovery that his identity is not linked to Martha, but rather to his African ancestry. In other words, Bynum stresses the difference between masculine status and human identity. Bynum asserts that even 'if a man forgets his “song,” and goes off in search of it, the song is usually with the man all the time (68)'. Loomis has his song with him all the time — the song of self-sufficiency or the song of non-dependence on white men or women —, even when he suppressed it so that Joe Turner cannot take it from him (68) Nonetheless, in Act II Scene V, Loomis accuses Bynum of binding him to the road, declaring that he is not going to be bound up anymore, and pulls out a knife. He slashes himself across the chest and exclaims, “I am standing now” as he walks away (86). This symbolic break from Martha is connected to bell hooks’ argument on the plantation patriarchy. Martha, in the eyes of Loomis, is a feminine force that does not enable Loomis to perform his hegemonic masculinity. Thus, Loomis frees himself from the struggles caused by Joe Turner’s imprisonment only by freeing himself from his wife and daughter. Like the typical American man, Loomis departs triumphantly alone leaving his daughter and wife behind. He is out to rediscover his identity and become a new whole.

Jeremy, a young man, considered to be a free spirit tries to fight with his destiny. He doesn’t accept defeat in the hands of the White supremacy. When asked to give the white men part of his meager earnings, he refuses and as a result, gets arrested. He doesn’t fear to lose his job and refuses to give out money even when faced with possible unemployment and lack of housing. In his quest to find his power, he uses and dumps women without reason. He is determined to prove his worth at all costs and doesn’t care about the unavailability of

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opportunities. To him, the road is broad, and not even the white men can stop him from achieving his goals.

Jitney Set in 1977 when black men were returning from Vietnam full of hope, Jitney looks at the changing face of the emerging African-American community in the post-civil rights era. In urban areas such as Pittsburg Hill district; however, segregation was still a genuine factor for African Americans. Hiding behind the dubious legality of the government-constructed empowerment zones, gentrification had begun to rear its ugly head, and for the lack of men in America, jobs and life chances were limited. For a group of African-American men working in a small jitney cab station, life chances and manhood became continually tested while all around the cab, authorities closed small black businesses because of impending redevelopment. Jitney presents some of Wilson's most understanding of black manhood.

Jitney is a real example of the current black male struggle for masculinity. Today, the crisis in black masculinity is more commonly considered and questioned in detail, a fact whose basis lies in the emasculation and social death of black men under colonialism, slavery and hegemonic masculinity. This crisis is mapped onto the black matrilineal family structures in which the matriarchal kinship patterns replace the absence of the father and affects the bonding between the black men, June Jordan in her “Don’t You Talk About My Mama,” refutes the arguments of the scholars, such as Marriot, who blame the black mother for the “crisis” in black masculinity (262). As she elucidates, according to some experts, “the source of the problem is ‘femaleheadedness’ [of African American family]. It must be more white — more patriarchal, less ‘female-headed,’ more employed more steadily at better-paying jobs” (262). On the contrary, she

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states that the problem does not originate with black women but the media distortions and the systematic oppression of American hegemonic masculinity (264).

Indeed, many scholars point out that the social construction of the masculinities of nonwhite men is more troublesome and confining than that of white 12 men in general.

In jitney, much of the African-American population is still living in traditionally segregated neighborhoods that haven’t completely lost their interdependence sense of community despite the failure of public transportation. In the minds of socio-political maneuvering, a group of hardworking men struggles to hold together a jitney company as an alternative means of survival. The men posted names on the chalkboard in a manner that suggested a hidden transcript at work in the play.

Becker is an example of black masculinity that encourages the audience to delve deeper and understand the history of black progress. He also inspires exemplary leadership and encourages people to work hard to create opportunities for children to succeed.

Turnbo’s behavior indicates that dealing with duplicity may be one of the greatest challenges of African-Americans. He raises the question of whether black men have been forced to play the Janus role-one side brute, one side coon. Although his name figuratively suggests turncoat or turnabout, he is harmless despite having two sides Fielding struggles with alcoholism as he seeks solace from loneliness and hurt. He doesn't accept defeat despite his condition and strives to put his name on the list of honor.

Wilson doesn't explain why Fielding separated from his wife, but it can be assumed that his alcoholism is as a result of the separation. The struggle by men to exert authority despite their inability to provide for their families could be the leading cause for the family breakdowns.

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Wilson indicates that Fielding is loyal and earns his honor of putting his name on the chalkboard despite his fight against alcoholism Doub personifies grateful reason. “ it ain't all the time what you want,” he says, “sometimes its what you need” (67). DFuplicatinhg the ancestors’ voices, his story reframes the history of many African-American veterans who never had their stories told. Doub meditates and works hard to make an impact on his community. Like Becker he wont give up on fielding, and in the end, signifies perseverance.

Shealy is the shield of underground illegal employment strategy that, at one time operated out of the African-American community by African-Americans for African -Americans. He is recognized as a good guy who provides alternative modes of production and sources of capital.

Youngblood represents the young blood of the community, and his relationship with Rena provides the impetus for hope. If Rena doesn’t grow hard from her choice of loving him and if youngblood v\can only stick to the code – put family first, go back to school as Doub suggests, and curb spontaneity of youthfulness- his story may be as successful as Becker's with his second wife., Lucille. As Becker admonishes; It ain't going to flow together all the time …. when you look around you'll see that all you got is each other,, there isn't much more (78). Wilson uses this chance to share the primary truth rather than paradox: black men need black women just as black women need black men.

Not just the names on the chalkboard but the art of checking in reveals a hidden transcript making that act a ritual that undoes a time when all black man could do was make his mark anonymous labor in a world that didn’t value a black man.

At jitney, checkers is more than a way of showing masculinity. At jitney station, checkers reflect the political and economic position of many black men in their negotiations in and around

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identity and as a way of demanding to be treated with dignity and respect. The story of incarceration is significant in the jitney — Doub and Booster speak of detention and real-time as two different times in the lives of black men.. Such talk reveals the traditional stereotypes of the black man being forced to give up – to lose time. The repeated reference of the 20 years spent by Boosters in prison indicates incarceration as a harmful end product consistent with fighting the African-American masculinity.

Jitney also shows the use of the gun culture and its association with the black male brute.

When Turnbo argues with Youngblood over a cup of coffee he pulls out agun and threatens to shoot him, it reflects the testosterone-induced male games familiar with people of all races.

However, in Jitney, it shows a drastic change from the African way of settling things through fists. Again this is a struggle for the blacks to emancipate themselves from the quest for male superiority.

The failure of men to achieve success and dominance through athletics ushers in a new wave of male superiority. The accessibility, neutrality band potential fatality of the gun world seems an ideal way of leveling out with the whites. Wilson makes the audience recognize the effects of the gun world and how it replaces reason. Turbo points a pistol at Youngman and says ‘ Come on you young punk, come on!... hit me again... jump at me, and I will blow you as to kingdom come. (44) The gun culture shutters Youngman’s belief that he is unbeatable, just like Mohamed Ali. The male characters try their best to prove to the world that they are capable of being themselves.

There still exists some cultural confusion more than 100 years after the abolition of slavery. Men in Jitney are linked together by their skin color and belief that they are from one ancestry, which is different from the whites.

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Another indication of men’s struggle with masculinity is shown by fielding who in contradictions with the black man's fame for prowess, can't manage to remain sober. The fear of alienation and loneliness drives him to drugs which also indicates a direct sociocultural response to the limited life chances for black Americans. Shealy’s struggle with masculinity forces him to run as a way of earning money that is necessary for upward mobility and which will enable him to lead a dignified life just like the whites. He tries to prove his worth while escaping from the real poverty and joblessness of African Americans.

As Sandra Shannon points out, “August Wilson has chosen to focus on an African American man’s oppression in this country to symbolize the collective struggles of all African American males” (“The Good” 127). In that sense, Wilson values masculinity that demands from his male characters a deep desire for their rich African heritage to be recognized and appreciated, and the acceptance that they are indeed responsible for their family and play a vital role in their community. As he suggests, to understand who African American males are, they “have to understand their immediate ancestors. They got to make this connection with their recent past to understand the present and then to plot the future” (Boyd 237). According to Brian 48 Crow, the power of African sensibilities, which is also a way of being and “which can be mysteriously elicited from the ancestral past at crucial moments by certain specially empowered characters is enough to bring connection and the restoration of the integrated self even where there has been a long history of oppression and alienation” (58). In Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, it is Bynum who possesses this power, through his acquisition of the “biding song” from his visionary experience on the road with the “shinny man” and his father. Through Bynum, as J. Herrington asserts, Wilson hoped to show “the continuing role of African mysticism in the lives of his characters and the potential of what Wilson terms ‘African retentions,’ which, in his view, can

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serve as both a source of strength and a kind of psychic balm for the 20th century African American men” (81). Bynum seems to be suggesting that black males will never find their true identity, their “song,” unless they visit their fathers’ house once they have left since the destinies of African Americans are inextricably linked to their ancestors.

As August Wilson reveals in an interview with Bonnie Lyons, America proposes a strong belief by the black males that says; “if you leave all that African stuff over there and adopt the values of the dominant culture, you can participate.” For the most part, black males have rejected that sort of con job.

Many blacks in the ghettos say, “if I got to give up who I am, if I can’t be like me, then I don’t want it.” The ones who accept go on become part of the growing black middle class and in some areas even acquire some power and participation in society, but when they finally arrive where they arrive, they are no longer the same people. They are clothed in different manners and ways of life, different thoughts and ideas. They’ve acculturated and adopted white values. ( Lyons 3-4) Conclusion To conclude, in The Pittsburgh Cycle, August Wilson presents the problematic and problematized nature of black masculinity in acts of responsibility to one’s self and the surrounding community. In each of his plays, his black characters either experience a masculinity crisis or come to a new understanding of themselves in relationship to structures of power and systems of privilege. While actual confrontation with hegemonic masculinity works to produce a revisionist definition of black masculinity for some of his black male characters, the ones who reject confrontation with this reality are doomed to fail. In the end, his plays suggest that black manhood cannot be determined by external acquisition, but through internal pride, self-definition as well as self-determination. August Wilson demonstrates this dynamic of black

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male empowerment through various images of black men, of different ages and different historical circumstances. As Keith Clark argues, by depicting black men within a community of black men, “Wilson’s plays foreground multiple conceptions of gender that are often contradictory and conflicting” (102). Therefore, August Wilson’s portrait of black masculinity is not static. In his plays, devalued by society and marked by their performance crisis, black males negotiate with each other and with the hegemonic masculinity as they attempt to reclaim their masculinity.

Even a casual look at the black experience in today’s American culture and society reveals that the problem of African Americans continues to exist in various shapes. Even the plantation patriarchy, the relaxed pose, and the masculine mystique can still be observed in today’s black male’s performance of masculinity. They always do perform live up according to the expectations of social and ideological norms, which makes Wilson’s observations and interpretations all the more relevant and interesting because African American men still have to “perform,” i.e., act out to survive in a hostile social environment. In other words, the crisis exists and continues to determine the fate of African American males, and it seems as if August Wilson’s wisdom, i.e., going back to the African roots, rediscovering “African-ness” is adapted and will continue to exist.

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Works Cited Anderson, Douglas. “Saying Goodbye to the Past: Self-Empowerment and History in Joe Turner’s Come and Gone.” CLA Journal 40.4 (1997): 432-457. JSTOR. Web. October 16, 2012.

Bederman, Gail. Manliness & Civilization: A Cultural History of Gender and Race in the United States, 1880-1917. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995.

Bell, Christopher. A Century Lacking Progress: The Fractured Community in August Wilson’s The Pittsburgh Cycle. Ph.D. Thesis. Georgia: Georgia State University, 2009. Print Bigsby, Christopher. The Cambridge Companion to August Wilson. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007. Print Bly, Robert. Iron John: A Book about Men. London: Rider, 2000. Print. Bogumil, Mary L. “‘Tomorrow Never Comes’: Songs of Cultural Identity in August Wilson’s Joe Turner’s Come and Gone.” Theatre Journal 46.4 (1994): 463-476. JSTOR. Web. October 16, 2012.

Boyd, Herb. “Interview with August Wilson.” Conversations with August Wilson Jackson R. Bryer and Mary C. Hartig, eds. Jackson: UP of Mississippi, 2006. 235- 240. Print.

Crow, Brian and Chris Banfield, eds. An Introduction to Post-Colonial Theatre. Cambridge: University of Cambridge, 1996. Print.

Connell, R W. Masculinities. Berkeley: California UP, 2005. Print.

Devries, Hilary. “August Wilson: A New Voice for Black American Theater.” Christian Science Monitor (1984): 29-31. Web. December 23, 2013.

Elam, Harry. “August Wilson’s Women.” May All Your Fences Have Gates: Essays on the Drama of August Wilson. Ed. Alan Nadel. University of Iowa Press; 1st edition. November 1, 1993

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Lyons, Bonnie. “An Interview with August Wilson.” Contemporary Literature 40.1 (1999): 1-21.

JSTOR. December 12, 2013. Web. Shannon, Sandra D. “Developing Character: Fences.” The Dramatic Vision of August Wilson.

Washington, DC: Howard University Press, 1995.

Wilson, August. Fences. New York: Penguin, 1986.

--. Jitney. New York: Theatre Communications Group, 2007. Print Joe Turner’s Come and Gone. New York: Theatre Communications Group, 2007. Print