The taboo of the white woman plays a major role in the literary as well as political history of the United States. Ralph Ellison illustrates this by including several notable characters in Invisible Man that fulfill different stereotypes regarding the relationships between white women and young black men. An example of one of these stereotypes would be the innocent white woman who is 'accused' of being raped by the virile, primitive, sexually eminent black man. …showed first 75 words of 1527 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1527 total…th the intention of discovering the truth behind the stereotypes of black male sexuality. Lisa Locascio, a literary critic, stated that Ellison's approach to portraying women was misogynistic. This is inferring that Ellison is trying to reveal something about the role women played in general during the 1930s in Harlem, and that the symbol of a white woman is representative of an antagonizing force against the black race, which is portrayed by the Invisible Man.