A STUDY ON RACISM IN LOUANNE JOHNSON’S DANGEROUS MINDS USING RICARD DELGADO’S AND JEAN STEFANCIC’S CRITICAL RACE THEORY

Abstract

Dangerous Minds is a novel written by LouAnne Johnson published in 1992. The novel is inspired from true story of the writer. This research is focused on racism issues in the novel that is influenced by social condition in 20th century of American society as represented in her novel. A white woman teacher with students of different races makes the racial tension run high in the novel. There are two problems to discuss in this research. The first is the racist attitude in LouAnne Johnson’s Dangerous Minds. The second problem is racism socially constructed in 20th century of American society as represented in LouAnne Johnson Dangerous Minds. The type of research in this research is qualitative. Furthermore, there are two kinds of data used in this research. There are primary and secondary data. The primary data in this research are all information dealing with racism taken from the novel in form of sentences, clauses, phrases, and words stating about racism. The secondary data are all information dealing with racism issues of the U.S.A in 20th century taken from internet sources such as journal articles and books such as Critical Race Theory, Critical Race Theory Today, Sociology of Literature, and anything may help and support the analysis. In collecting data, this research takes data from library, books, and internet sources. This research use Allan Swingwood’s sociology of literature as approach to analyse the social conditions in 20th century of the U.S.A and the social condition in the novel. Furthermore, I use Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic’s Critical Race Theory to analyse racism issues in the novel The result finds that Dangerous Minds is the representation of social condition that happens in 20th century of the U.S.A when the novel is created. Racism still happen in the U.S.A and it is difficult to cure. Social conditions at that time have influenced her in writing the novel. Poverty, class conflict and broken home in the novel are representation of the social condition at that time. These social conditions have influence racist activities run high in the novel. Although Johnson is a white writer, she does not care about race. She bridges between the white and the coloured and the black. Johnson as a white writer represents the social conditions of the U.S.A in her surrounding relates to racism issues and informs the readers that racism is stiil going on in 20th century of the U.S.A. However, Johnson as a white writer is still biased in writing the novel. Johnson as the writer and also as the main character of the novel always becomes a hero in the novel. Her students who hate her at the first time finally love her at the end of the story. In the novel the white is represented as a good one. The voice of the writer is not objective because there is not the voice of the black and the coloured. Although Johnson can inform racism issues surrounding her, she still biased in writing the novel because in the ending, the good one is still the white.