Langston Hughes first published “Why, you reckon



Langston Hughes first published “Why, you reckon?” in the New Yorker Magazine 1934.

Think of the title: What do you figure “reckon” means? Well, you guessed it…

• Imagine

• Think

• Figure

• Reason

are all good synonyms of reckon. The title of the story is asking the reader to address the question, “Why?”

Prediction 1: Read the first two paragraphs of the story. Then, in a few sentences, write down your version of what you think will happen next in the story, and why. Share your ideas with your classmates and your teacher.

‘Setting’ is a function of time and location.

Where: 133rd Street & Lenox Avenue (Harlem, NYC)

When: At the beginning of the Great Depression (1929-1939)

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The Great Stock Market Crash of 1929

What triggered the Great Depression? It was the stock market crash of 1929. We do not wish to study in depth here the series of events that led up to and caused the stock market crash. You should study that in your Global History and Business classes.

Here, we are more concerned with the immediate causes of the crash, since our purpose is to provide some background for Langston Hughes’ short story.

Contained within the phrase ‘stock market’ is the word market. What do you think goes on in a market? If you said that people come to market to buy and sell things, you’d be right. It’s the same for the stock market: people come to buy and sell commodities and ownership in companies. If a company is doing well, meaning that it is making money, everybody wants to own some of it. As a result, its stock value increases and investors make money.

But what happens when a company is not doing well? Investors will sell off their shares. If that happens, the company’s stock value decreases and investors lose money. So, the company may not be able to make its debt payments. As a result, the company may need to lay off workers. In 1929, hundreds, if not thousands, of companies were forced to lay off millions of workers. Without a job, workers had no income with which to feed their families. Consequently, tens of millions of people in the United States were destitute and hungry.

‘Hongry’ is a term used in Gullah, spoken in parts of Florida, South Carolina, and Georgia. From the narrator’s use of the term ‘hongry,’ we can infer that he arrived in Harlem from the south. He may have migrated to New York as a boy during the Great Migration, or arrived more recently. Nevertheless, he is a Black male who is being asked to make a serious decision in a matter of minutes. Moreover, he is unemployed, destitute, hungry and tired, with no prospects.

The Narrator’s Dilemma: Should he take the chance of making some quick, easy money (‘jack’) by committing a crime, or abide by the law and starve?

Question 1: Did the narrator make the right decision according to you? Why or why not?

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Important Dates:

World War I: 1914-1918

Great Migration: 1915-1917

Harlem Renaissance: 1919-1929

Prohibition: 1920-1933

Great Depression: 1929-1939

World War II: 1939-1945

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