In Search Of Our Mother's Garden Analysis

Scholars engaging in Womanist biblical hermeneutics transform certain strands of biblical interpretation by drawing from literary, biblical, and other extra-biblical sources as a means to illuminate the hegemonic, patriarchal and kyriarchal powers that render Black women exploited, marginalized and oppressed. Philosopher, Clarice Martin and biblical scholar Nyasha Junior’s scholarship highlights American Womanist religious studies scholar’s appropriation of Alice Walker’s definition and concept of womanism as employed in her text In Search of Our Mother’s Garden to reflect their distinctive focus on African American women in their scholarship. Additionally, Junior charts the development of the term “womanist” throughout the expansion of womanist

biblical interpretation and religious discourse placing emphasis on the development of African and Africana womanism in order to underscore the difference between American and African womanisms as well as womanists of women living in other diasporic locations. Martin notes how the subject of womanist biblical interpretation came to the fore in conjunction with the growing body of literature on “womanist theology.” Her observation reflects the ongoing academic work of womanist scholars in a variety of disciplines as contributors to womanist biblical hermeneutical theories, methodologies, and discourse. Biblical scholar Mitzi Smith’s scholarship also highlights womanist biblical interpreter’s appropriation of Alice Walker’s womanism as she provides in the first part of her anthology, Alice Walker’s definitions of Womanist as well as articles on Womanist interpretative theory.
Theologian Delores Williams specifically analyzes Alice Walker’s use of feminist issues to structure The Color Purple, as a means of highlighting Walker’s talk about Black motherhood in African American literature as a means to portray how some postbellum women writers provide images of black motherhood that are radically different than what their white male counterparts projected within their works.

Williams also evaluates the story of Hagar in order to compare Hagar’s life with the lives of contemporary black women so to underscore their shared histories under oppressive forces. Ethicists Katie Canon understands Black Feminist Consciousness as more accurately identified as Black Womanist Consciousness according to Alice Walker’s concept and definition. Canon’s failure to describe the two as distinct personal identifiers suggests that she understands Black female consciousness as womanist thereby imposing an identity on women who might not claim womanist subjectivity. This point is further made through Junior’s scholarship as it reflects that African American women do not universally accept the “womanist” definition or identifying title. In addition, while Junior notes bell hook’s concerns about how the term womanism connotes a negativity that pits Black women with white women, none of the scholars raise questions about or discuss whether the identity markers of “feminist” or “womanist” inhibit collaboration and solidarity among Black

women.