I have been thinking a lot lately about responsibility in Invisible Man. I am writing my response paper on this topic, and figured I would try to lay out my thoughts in a blog post first. I noticed that the phrases "social responsibility" and "personal responsibility" are both uttered by the narrator in the novel, and both times the concept is met with derision.
First, the narrator says it during his speech after the battle royal, and is made to repeat it often, until he accidentally says "social equality", and frightens everyone. The rich old white guys who are "listening" to the narrator all laugh at his idea of there people having a social responsibility. Later, after Todd Clifton's funeral, the narrator tells the Jack and other Brothers that he felt it was his personal responsibility to perform the funeral. He is once again scoffed at and must repeat the phrase. This no doubt influenced his departure from the Brotherhood, but it also shows how the Brotherhood views responsibility. The Brotherhood clearly thinks that personal responsibility is not a real thing, they feel responsible only to their own ideals and the people who share them.
I think that people's reactions to the idea of social or personal responsibility display that the few people feel a connection or a responsibility for society as a whole, or for people who do not share their ideals. They only care about the groups that they are a part of, and the specific ideals that they have chosen to hold. It seems to me that most people are blind to the ideals of others, and to the feelings or reality of groups other than their own. I would even go so far as to say that the groups--be they political, economic, or racial--are invisible.
I want to explore this invisibility and how it presents itself in Invisible Man. I think that it is safe to say the Ras's followers/ideals are failed to be seen by the Brotherhood, and Ras fails to understand the true ideals and workings of the Brotherhood. This is also evident during the eviction at which the narrator makes his debut as a Harlem leader. The people who are being evicted, and the crowd that forms around them, do not care about the forces that move the people who are evicting them. If both groups had been able to see the other, the outcome of the situation may have been much more positive.
Also, it is not in the book, but in the Documentary we watched, I think the narrator says something like it is his social responsibility to write the book, during the prologue-scene. I checked and I don't think he says that in the actual book, but I found it interesting that they added it in the movie.
I've never thought about it this way, but I think you frame responsibility correctly. We define "social" responsibility by the social group we align ourselves to, so if we exclude a certain race or gender from our idea of society, we do not feel the responsibility towards them. Ras includes the black members of the Brotherhood in his society, while the Brotherhood includes people of any race, but only the ones that follow their ideals, excluding Ras and any other "alternative" characters, such as Rinehart and the counterculture teenagers. This definitely relates to invisibility. When we separate ourselves from another category of people, we do not see them individually, and are therefore blinded in a way. It would be nice if we could include all people in our definition of society, although it is difficult with the size and diversity of the population.
ReplyDeleteI think it's really interesting how the narrator thinks it is his responsibility to give a funeral for Tod Clifton. Although Clifton was a good mentor for the narrator, he left the Brotherhood to sell racially offensive toys. Maybe the narrator is more forgiving than I am, but when someone leaves and organization that fights for equality to sell something that goes against everything they believe it just doesn't sit right with me.
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