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The life of zora neale hurston
The life of zora neale hurston
The life of zora neale hurston
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Use of the Southern Black Vernacular in Their Eyes Were Watching God "The monstropolous beast had left his bed. The two hundred miles an hour wind had loosed his chains. He seized hold of his dikes and ran forward until he met the quarters; uprooted them like grass and rushed on after his supposed-to-be conquerors, rolling the dikes, rolling the houses, rolling the people in the houses along with other timbers. The sea was walking the earth with a heavy heel. ‘De’ lake is comin’!’ Tea Cake gasped."J This excerpt from Zora Neale Hurston’s book, Their Eyes Were watching God, is an example of her amazing writing. She makes us feel as if we are actually in her book, through her use of the Southern Black vernacular and admirable description. Her characters are realistic and she places special, well thought out sentences to keep us interested. Zora Neale Hurston’s art enables her to write this engaging story about a Southern black woman’s life. Mrs. Hurston uses Southern Black dialect through out the book. This is appropriate because all of the dialog is between Blacks who grew up in the deep South. Some authors that write in a dialect totally confuse their readers. However, Mrs. Hurston’s writing does not confuse us at all. One particular example of this is on page 102. Tea Cake starts off saying, "‘Hello, Mis’ Janie, Ah hope Ah woke you up.’ ‘Yo sho did, Tea Cake. Come in and rest yo’ hat. Whut you doin’ out so soon dis mornin’?’" Janie replied. This dialog is easily to understand. The reader really gets the feeling of the speech because reading it is just like listening to it. Mrs. Neale also knows where to stop writing in dialect. All of the narration and description in the book are in plain English: she does not confuse us by putting narration in dialect, only the speech of characters is in dialect. This part of Zora Neale Hurston’s art adds to the story without confusing the reader. Mrs. Hurston not only uses the vernacular of the Deep South she also uses Southern traditional legends. One example of this is how the book refers to death. Death is called the, "Square-toed one," that comes from the West. Even if the reader is not familiar with referring to death as the, "Square-toed one," the use of traditional legends helps to make us feel like we are where the book took place.
Zora Neale was an early 20th century American novelist, short story writer, folklorist, and anthropologist. In her best known novel Their eyes were watching God, Hurston integrated her own first-hand knowledge of African American oral culture into her characters dialogue and the novels descriptive passages. By combing folklore, folk language and traditional literary techniques; Hurston created a truly unique literary voice and viewpoint. Zora Neale Hurston's underlying theme of self-expression and search for one’s independence was truly revolutionary for its time. She explored marginal issues ahead of her time using the oral tradition to explore contentious debates. In this essay I will explore Hurston narrative in her depiction of biblical imagery, oppression of African women and her use of colloquial dialect.
It’s no wonder that “[t]he hurricane scene in Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, is a famous one and [that] other writers have used it in an effort to signify on Hurston” (Mills, “Hurston”). The final, climactic portion of this scene acts as the central metaphor of the novel and illustrates the pivotal interactions that Janie, the protagonist, has with her Nanny and each of her three husbands. In each relationship, Janie tries to “’go tuh God, and…find out about livin’ fuh [herself]’” (192). She does this by approaching each surrogate parental figure as one would go to God, the Father; she offers her faith and obedience to them and receives their definitions of love and protection in return. When they threaten to annihilate and hush her with these definitions, however, she uses her voice and fights to save her dream and her life. Hurston shows how Janie’s parental figures transform into metaphorical hurricanes, how a literal hurricane transforms into a metaphorical representation of Janie’s parental figures, and how Janie survives all five hurricanes.
When I think of the south, I think of southern hospitality. I picture people always talking to each other, whether it?s just small talk or gossip, which is the case in The Petrified Man. The dialogue itself appears to be pretty accurate (from what I can imagine anyway, since I?ve never been down south). The south definitely has a certain way of talking and Eudora Welty does a great job showing us, not just telling us, this dialect. From the very first sentence of the story, you know where you are, and the type of people involved in the story. ?Reach in my purse and git me a cigarette without no powder in it if you kin, Mrs. Fletcher, honey ? I don?t like no perfumed cigarettes.?
She does this by writing out the words the way the characters pronounce them, not necessarily how they are spelled. An example of this style is a line spoken by a minor character: “Yep. Hot or col’, rain or shine, ies ‘ez reg’lar ez de weeks roll roun’ Delia carries ‘em an’ fetches ‘em on Sat’day.” Hurston exemplifies the traditional southern speech, used specifically by African Americans, by removing letters and replacing them with an apostrophe, eliminating the sound to match the omission of syllables by the speaker. When the reader reads this line, they not only understand the message, but the way that it would be spoken. This allows for a deeper connection to each character, and for the regional and cultural influences on their language to be showcased naturally. The physical representation of language influences our perception of the character, and in most other books written in “proper” English, this connection is somewhat lost. This phonetic language represents the culture of the area perfectly, and contributes the development of characters and their
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston is about a young woman that is lost in her own world. She longs to be a part of something and to have “a great journey to the horizons in search of people” (85). Janie Crawford’s journey to the horizon is told as a story to her best friend Phoebe. She experiences three marriages and three communities that “represent increasingly wide circles of experience and opportunities for expression of personal choice” (Crabtree). Their Eyes Were Watching God is an important fiction piece that explores relations throughout black communities and families. It also examines different issues such as, gender and class and these issues bring forth the theme of voice. In Janie’s attempt to find herself, she grows into a stronger woman through three marriages.
In the novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God”, by Zora Neale Hurston there were many contrasting places that were used to represent opposed forces or ideas that are central to the meaning of this work.
Postmodernism movement which began in the 1950’s and still prevails today, is the successor of Modernism. Postmodernism, in contrast to Modernism, seeks to challenge authority as a whole, refutes any belief in absolute truths, regards hierarchal power as distrustful and seeks to establish an approach in
“What she doin’ coming back here in dem over-halls? Can’t she find no dresses to put on?” Hurston's writing is full of conversations using colloquial diction. He uses a regional dialect to create the picture in your head of what the people speaking may look like by how they talk. In this excerpt, it describes a group of men and some women sitting on a porch watching another local women walk to her home. They are judging every move she makes. “What dat ole forty year ole ‘oman doin’ wild her hair swingin’ down her back lak some young gal?” The way he portrays their accents makes me picture them as somewhat idiotic.
Haralambos & Holbron (2004:84) determined that postmodern societies distinguish themselves through four key figures: culturalism, fragmentation, autonomization and resignifcation. Postmodernism theorizes that class is dead due to our consumer culture that allows infinite freedom of choice, taste, lifestyle and fashion; therefore, everyone has the ability to shape themselves and create their own identity. Globalization and media influence has spread the idea of individualism is the key that divides society subsequently provoking no definite class exclusivity—People no longer identify themselves through their social class, occupation or their background, rather they do so through their leisure (realsociology, n.d). Postmodernism encourages the idea that if perceptions are acted upon they can be achieved through a person’s willingness to pursue their personal development and desires (Pakulski & Waters,1996:121:120). Literary critic Frederic Jameson argued from a Marxist perspective that society is divided because despite having a superstructure that is constantly changing (culture and society), there is still an economical base (the relation of productions and exchange) which is what ultimately shapes society (Clark, 2008);
Through her use of southern black language Zora Neale Hurston illustrates how to live and learn from life’s experiences. Janie, the main character in Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, is a woman who defies what people expect of her and lives her life searching to become a better person. Not easily satisfied with material gain, Janie quickly jumps into a search to find true happiness and love in life. She finally achieves what she has searched for with her third marriage.
Postmodernism movement started in the 1960’s, carrying on until present. James Morley defined the postmodernism movement as “a rejection of the sovereign autonomous individual with an emphasis upon anarchic collective anonymous experience.” In other words, postmodernism rejects what has been established and makes emphasis on combined revolutionary experiences. Postmodernism can be said it is the "derivate" of modernism; it follows most of the same ideas than modernism but resist the very idea of boundaries. According to our lecture notes “Dominant culture uses perception against others to maintain authority.”
According to the National Institute of Mental Health, about one in four American adults suffer from a mental disorder. This means that 57.7 out of 217.8 million people over the age of 18 are ill; never mind that mental illnesses are the leading cause of disability in Canada and the United States. Holden Caulfield, the controversial main character of J.D Salinger’s novel Catcher in the Rye, spends much of the book wandering through the streets of New York City. Kicked out of boarding school for the umpteenth time, he does many odd things: he calls a prostitute, tries to befriend a taxi driver, drinks with middle aged women, and sneaks into his own house in the middle of the night. While many of these things seem outré, some may even go as far as to say that he is mentally disturbed. From a psychiatric standpoint, main character Holden Caulfield exhibits the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, bipolar disorder (manic depression), and psychosis throughout the infamous novel Catcher in the Rye.
In southern place of Rural Georgia there were racial issues. Walker discuss stereotypes that Celie went through as the daughter of a successful store owner, which ran by a white man Celie did not have no right to. The black characters and community were stereotyped through their lives to have human rights (Walker 88-89). Walker engages the struggle between blacks and whites social class, blacks were poor and the whites were rich. This captures the deep roots of the south discrimination against blacks. African-American women went through misery, and pain of racism to be discriminated by the color of their skin. Another major racist issue Hurston represent in “The Color Purple” is when Sofia tells the mayors wife saying “hell no” about her children working for her, Sofia was beaten for striking back to a white man (Walker 87). Racism and discrimination in the black culture did not have basic rights as the whites instead they suffered from being mistreated to losing moral
Steptoe says how she knows every scene in the movie because she loves it and used to watch it countless times, but she would never admit it to anyone. Steptoe states "You see, I 'm a black chick from Houston, born and bred in the shadow of pine trees and petrochemical plants…I understood that it was not cool for black girls to listen to country music or even enter a honky tonk…"(Steptoe, 422). Steptoe receded herself down to the racial stereotyping and hid herself from the world. Hurston would condemn Steptoe for her actions and argue that Steptoe should not let her race define her but rather she should forget about her race and just live her life the way she wants to. Hurston states "At certain times I have no race. I am me" (Hurston, 419). Hurston says it loud and clear. Steptoe should not be defining herself by her color but by just being herself. Now although that sounds like a great idea, Steptoe would backfire by saying that the reasons for previously tuning out country music was because of she was"…steeped in racial politics" (Steptoe, 423). Steptoe after many years knows that she is wrong for associating country music with "cowboy hats and pointed-toe boots, with a particular type of white person, the kind that painted Confederate
But the closing/opening distinction prevalent in Gibson's Neuromancer is also evident in Idoru, although in a more mythopoetical sense. Lyotard's model of subdialectic Marxism suggests that the significance of the poet is significant form.