Beloved - Appropriate for High School Students
Beloved is a novel which digs deeply into the lives of four, post-Civil War, African American people. The novel has many things which could be deemed unacceptable but it is necessary to read as high school students in order to expand our views on life as we know it. The novel may have some idiosyncratic issues but they are unfortunately things that occur in our modern day world.
The story is based upon Sethe, Denver, Beloved, and Paul D all of whom have their own personal problems. It is easy to see how critics can say that Beloved is unacceptable for the high school English level but it all depends on the maturity of the students and the discretion of the teacher. Many people thought it to be very amusing when Morrison wrote about how the arrival of Sethe affected the men at Sweet Home. "They were young and so sick with the absence of women they had taken to calves." (Chapter 1, Pg. 10) This statement is lewd and should not be viewed by an immature audience but the Honors English class has a higher maturity level and although there may have been some comments about the incident, it definitely wasn't overly talked about.
Beloved had many obscenities, such as, murder, raw language, sexual harassment, and other unwanted sexual advances but they are what made the novel what it is. The murder that Sethe commits is gruesome but a very huge part of the story. The following quote from the novel is the depiction of the murder scene in which Sethe performs a grotesque murder on her own daughter and injures her two boys in order to keep them from a life in slavery. "Inside, two boys bled in the sawdust and dirt at the feet of a nigger woman holding a blood-soaked child to her chest with one hand and an infant by the heels in the other. She did not look at them; she simply swung the baby toward the wall planks, missed and tried to connect a second time, when out of nowhere- in the ticking time the men spent staring at what there was to stare at- the old nigger boy, still mewing, ran through the door behind them and snatched the baby from the arch of its mother's swing.
Throughout the story, Beloved goes into a brief period of explanation of the line between hell and the living; Beloved had yearned for Sethe and her appreciation towards her, all she wanted was her mother’s affection. Beloved had ruined the relationships between Sethe and everyone she grew close to, to try to get her to focus all her attention on Beloved. With Denver, Beloved had tried to assert her dominance over her younger sister by leaving her in the dark shed to ponder about the whereabouts of her sister. The actions that Beloved performs causes the reader to see how cruel Beloved was; she wanted her sister to believe that she could not live without her (PDF 70). Beloved also gets in between Denver and her mother’s relationship with one another by replacing her and making Sethe try to buy everything that she wanted; as the author states, “the two of them cut Denver out of the games. The cooking games, the sewing games, the hair and dressing-up games.” (PDF 135), signifying how both Sethe and Beloved cut Denver out of everything. With Paul D, Beloved seduced him and tried to steal him away from Sethe by sleeping with him. Beloved tells Paul D, "I want you to touch me on the inside part and call me my name” (PDF 68), even though she knows of Paul D’s love for Sethe. At the beginning of the novel as well, her monstrous attitude can be exhibited through directly choking Sethe, making her believe that someone else had done so, and coming to her aid
Beloved is a movie full of pain, love, and triumph. This film is constructed and created from the works of Toni Morrison’s novel. Beloved can be considered a ghost tale based on how the main character Beloved magically appears and disappears with no warning signs. The movie takes place in the summer of 1865 in Ohio at 124 Bluestone Road in a little white house on a plate of land.
One could simply analyze the theme of Toni Morrison's "Beloved" to be about slavery, but the reader is introduced to its many complexities through the social struggles of very different characters. Once Paul D finally grasped his overpriced sliver of freedom, he had to figure out if there was anything worthwhile he could do with it. Throughout "Beloved", Paul D struggles between his natural instincts to settle down, procreate, and rely on the people that were part of a life he wants to put behind him, or to stay on the move in constant search of something better to call his own. Although many of Paul's decisions seem to be irrationally made based on the poor coping skills he developed in a dysfunctional and constantly changing environment, he somehow manages to emerge strong and hopeful at the end of the story, representing the success an entire race that has struggled to rise from oppression with the simple tool of persistence.
Harrison, Robert Pogue. “The Civil Rights Movement” . Chicago: U of Chicago, 2014. 98-111. Print.
From the beginning, Beloved focuses on the import of memory and history. Sethe struggles daily with the haunting legacy of slavery, in the form of her threatening memories and also in the form of her daughter’s aggressive ghost. For Sethe, the present is mostly a struggle to beat back the past, because the memories of her daughter’s death and the experiences at Sweet Home are too painful for her to recall consciously. But Sethe’s repression is problematic, because the absence of history and memory inhibits the construction of a stable identity. Even Sethe’s hard-won freedom is threatened by her inability to confront her prior life. Paul D’s arrival gives Sethe the opportunity and the impetus to finally come to terms with her painful life history.
Williams, Juan. Eye on the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Years, 1954-1965. New York: Viking Penguin Inc., 1987.
...her father’s intense racism and discrimination so she hid the relationship at all costs. Connie realized that she could never marry an African American man because of her father’s racial intolerance. If she were to have a mixed child, that child would be greatly discriminated against because of hypodecent. One day, Connie’s dad heard rumors about her relationship so he drove her car to the middle of nowhere, and tore it apart. Then, he took his shotgun and went to look for Connie and her boyfriend. Connie was warned before her father found her, and she was forced to leave town for over six months. Connie’s father burned her clothes, so she had to leave town with no car, no clothes and no money at sixteen years old. Connie had lived in poverty her entire life, but when she got kicked out she learned to live with no shelter and sometimes no food at all.
One aspect in the novel Beloved is the presence of a supernatural theme. The novel is haunted. The characters are haunted by the past, the choices made, by tree branches growing on backs, by infanticide, by slavery. Sethe, Denver and Paul D are haunted by the past that stretches and grasps them in 124 in its extended digits. A haunt, Beloved, encompasses another supernatural realm, that of a vampire. She sucks the soul, heart and mind of her mother while draining the relationships that exists between Denver and Sethe and Sethe and Paul D.
In Beloved, Toni Morrison portrays the barbarity and cruelty of slavery. She emphasizes the African American’s desire for a new life as they try to escape their past while claiming their freedom and creating a sense of community. In Beloved, "Much of the characters’ pain occurs as they reconstruct themselves, their families, and their communities after the devastation of slavery" (Kubitschek 115). Throughout the novel, Morrison uses color to symbolically represent a life complete with happiness, freedom, and safety, as well as involvement in community and family. In many scenes, Morrison uses color to convey a character's desire for such a life; while, in other instances, Morrison utilizes color to illustrate the satisfaction and fulfillment, which the characters experience once they achieve this life.
The impact of diversity in the workplace is contingent upon several factors. Across companies diversified workforces are becoming increasingly common. To successfully manage a diverse workforce, organizations are ensuring that employees understand how their values and stereotypes influence their behavior toward others of different gender, ethnic, racial, or religious backgrounds; are gaining an appreciation of cultural differences among themselves; and behaviors that isolate or intimidate minorities are being improved (Noe et al., 2010, pg. 302).
In Toni Morrison’s novel, Beloved, Morrison uses universal themes and characters that anyone can relate to today. Set in the 1800s, Beloved is about the destructive effects of American slavery. Most destructive in the novel, however, is the impact of slavery on the human soul. Morrison’s Beloved highlights how slavery contributes to the destruction of one’s identity by examining the importance of community solidarity, as well as the powers and limits of language during the 1860s.
In Beloved, Toni Morrison paints a picture of the cruelty of slavery. She emphasizes the African American’s desire for a new life as they try to move beyond their past to achieve their freedom. In Beloved, "Much of the characters’ pain occurs as they reconstruct themselves, and their families after the devastation of slavery" (Kubitschek 115). Through the novel, Morrison uses color to represent a life complete with joy, freedom, and protection, as well as things like community and family. In many sections, Morrison uses color to portray a character's desire for this life while, in other instances, Morrison utilizes color to illustrate the pleasure and realization which the characters experience once they obtain this life.
Toni Morrison and bell hooks are both known to be critical theorists. They believe that the dominant views in society are not the only views to perceive. "The Nobel Lecture," a speech Toni Morrison given Stockholm, and "Sorrowful Black Death is Not a Hot Ticket," by bell hooks, are two different pieces by these powerful women, that have their own views about issues in the world. Toni Morrison tells a story about a wise, old, blind woman, that is teaching two young people a lesson in life how language effects the actions that others take. Some of the actions are violent and some are not. bell hooks reviews the movie "Crooklyn", relating it to racism. She also ties in racism that is shown in movies today. There is a connection between Toni Morrison and bell hooks because they both are very clear on the choice of life and discrimination and that it is in our hands.
Barak, M. E. (2005). Managing diversity: toward a globally inclusive workplace. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publications.
BBC, in a rare move, picked up the series and turned it into a smash