The Broken Dream : The Failure of the American Dream in The Grapes of Wrath from a Caste and Class perspective

Abstract:

The paper aims to investigate the failure of the American Dream in the novel The Grapes of Wrath and the factors that affect it. Thus, the thesis of the paper is that it is the classes and castes of Californian that prevent the Joad family from fulfilling the American Dream.

The thesis will be discussed from four focal points of the American Dream: Freedom, Equality, Individualism and Family and Ideal Home. The novel takes place during the Great Depression, a time when many Americans were homeless and unemployed. An attempt will be made to define the American Dream and give a background to it. Furthermore, the binary pair of “self” and “other” will be used as an instrument of analysis.