Their Eyes Were Watching God Clothing Analysis

Karl Lagerfeld stated, “Fashion is a language that creates itself in clothes to interpret reality.” In Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie wears several different types of clothing which signify the important moments in her life. Each article of clothing outlined in the book suggests Janie’s inner self and the feelings she has at those particular moments of her life. For Janie, when told to wear certain articles of clothing, whether a head rag, an apron, or white clothing six-months after Tea Cup dies, Janie’s confidence and inner self struggle because these are particular pieces of clothing she would rather not wear. All of Janie's clothes represent her search for love and describe each relationship. Janie

feels free and more openly willing to express herself when wearing clothes of her choosing. Clothing is an integral part of a person’s identity and expressions, when dictated by others one can lose their inner self.
Throughout Janie’s childhood she wears hand-me-downs from Mrs.Washburn .

Mis’ Washburn uster dress me up in all de clothes her gran’ chillum had. And then she uster put hair ribbon on mah head fuh me tuh wear” (Hurston 9). Janie feels poor and rejected by the other white children. Janie did not get to choose her own clothes, rather they were chosen for her. Janie realizes that she does not fit in and hopes for a different life. However, the arranged marriage to Logan Killicks and the apron she wears represented a housewife tied to someone. In the quote, when she flings off her apron, she is symbolically freeing herself from the bonds of her marriage to Logan and her “homemaker” lifestyle. “The morning road air was like a new dress. That made her feel the apron tied around her waist. She untied it and flung it on a low bush beside the road and walked on, picking flowers and making a bouquet” (Hurston 31). Janie realizes the confinement of this type of life and rids herself of the apron for freedom from the marriage.

Janie still manages unhappiness when marrying Jody. At first, “Jody told her to dress up and stand in the store all evening. Everybody was coming sort of fixed up, and he didn’t mean for nobody else’s wife to rank with her. She must look on herself as the bell-cow, the other women were the gang. So she put on one of her bought dresses and went up the new cut road all dressed in wine-colored red. Her silken ruffles rustled and muttered about her. The other

women had on percale and calico with here and there a head-rag among the older ones” (Hurston 38).
Janie realizes Jody wants her to look nice for everyone else, but quickly get jealous when she gets attention. Jody tells Janie to hide her hair in a head rag. Although this is the first life Janie chooses on her own, she is still being told how to dress.
Janie is not sad about Jody’s death, but more upset about the fact that she has to wear certain widower clothes for six months. “Jody ain’t never in his life picked out no color for me. De world picked out black and white for mournin’, Joe didn’t. So Ah wasn’t wearin’ it for him. Ah was wearin’ it for de rest of y’all” (Hurston 107). She only dresses in grieving clothes, because society expects her to. Janie is still not in control of what she wears or how she lives her life, until the six months is up.
Janie breaks loose and starts wearing her hair in different styles and colored dresses.

She also meets Tea Cup and begins to wear overalls. She finally found the lifesytle she envisioned, a life down in the everglades with Tea Cake. In the quote, Janie imagines what her friends would say if they could see her in the overalls. “No expensive veils and robes for Janie this time. She went on in her overalls. She was too busy feeling grief to dress like grief” (Hurston 180). This quote shows the grief she felt when dressed by others. The overalls symbolize comfort and freeness in her new life. The masculinty of the overalls also represents the new

found
independence Janie found with Tea Cake. Tea Cake treated her like an equal.
All of Janie's clothes represent her search for true love and her relationships with those around her. We all wear our clothes a silent messengers, and Hurston used this tool clearly and well in her novel.