Gender Stereotypes In The Color Purple By Alice Walker

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Introduction
The movie I have chosen for this assignment is “The Color Purple.” In this film, we follow the story of a young black woman, Celie, as she endures racial profiling and gender expectations during the early nineteen hundreds. This is a film, based off a novel written by Alice Walker, that portrays not only the oppression of one group, but also three (women, blacks, and black women). I have seen the workings of status, gender stereotypes, body image, and sexuality within this film as I watched this woman mature in mind as well as spirit.
Movie Summary
Raised in an abusive household with her mother and stepfather, Celie gives birth to two children fathered by her stepfather and each is taken away from her soon after their births.
If women behaved like men did sexually, instead of a possessing charm or beauty, they were trashy and classless. By Shug being a jazz singer, deeply entwined in the world of blues and booze, she lost the respect of her father who was the local preacher that took care of her illegitimate children. Although Celie is married to her husband, Mister, for what seems like a few days, she is still viewed as a child who needs to be trained with punishments (regardless of how absurd his request may be). When asked to silence his daughter as she combed her hair, she tells him that she can’t, only to be slapped for “talking back” to him.
Body Image
Celie is a skinny, dark-skinned black woman with a wide smile. Her clothes fit her frame like a child, largely proportioned to hide any womanly features (waistline, hips, or breast). Another means of keeping her easier to dominate is by keeping her childish and treating her like one of the children.
When we see Shug enter Harpo’s jut-joint, she is dressed in a bright red, sequined dress that shimmy’s as she shimmy’s. Every move she makes as she sings is strong, sexual, and accentuating the curves of the body as she gyrates.
Sophia is a larger woman who is comfortable with how she looks and thinks that she has nothing to be ashamed of as a full figured

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