Use of the Fences Metaphor in Describing Racial Injustice

Use of the Fences Metaphor in Describing Racial Injustice in Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, the Song "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot", and August Wilson's Fences

In today's world it is difficult for young people to get a good handle on the past. This is especially the case when talking about the history of African-Americans in the United States and the "consequences of racial injustice" which they faced. Toni Morrison shares her thoughts on this topic in her novel The Bluest Eye through the use of the metaphor, " the hem of life." This idea of marginalizing African-Americans was used well to describe the hardships of most African-Americans throughout history. A more effective metaphor was utilized in August Wilson's play Fences, where the same hardships discussed by Morrison were related back to the title of the play. The idea of the separation that the fence metaphor presents seemed to apply to African-Americans in the sixties, when his book was set, the characters in The Bluest Eye, as well as slaves. When reading the narrative by Frederick Douglass or even "Swing Low, Sweet Chariots," the fences metaphor stood out and was clearly very effective in describing racial injustice.

The very idea of slavery is based upon separation. Frederick Douglass discusses just how slavery acts as a fence in human separation. Just as African-Americans were separated from their homes, they were also taken from their homes, they were also taken from their families. Douglass writes, "[m]y mother and I were separated when I was but an infant" (366). Slavery built a fence between Douglass and his mother, keeping them from experiencing life with their family. Slaves were split apart from each purely becaus...

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...ital to society. In the spiritual it seemed as though the "hem of life" metaphor didn't not actually apply much at all because it did not discuss wanting to be in the middle of society as much as it talked about slaves wanting to cross the fences of restraint into a free way of life. Obviously Fences showed the importance of how the racial discrimination that Troy faced in his past caused the destruction of his family and Troy's isolation from the world. When it came to Toni Morrison's novel it wasn't that her metaphor wasn't effectively used in her entire novel, it was the fact that it didn't exemplify the "consequences of racial injustice" throughout, but also worked to describe discrimination in a more general way. The "fences" metaphor captured the key points of racial prejudice in a more specific manner, creating a more powerful overall effect on the reader.