ipl-logo

Censorship In Alice Walker's The Color Purple

629 Words3 Pages

Children are always being told what not to do. They are told: "do not touch that!" "Do not eat too much candy!" "Do not stay up too late!" So many things are off limits to them; however, being told not to read a book should not be one of them. Books should not be censored for children and young adults because in reality, life is not censored. One specific book that should not be censored, or challenged, is The Color Purple by Alice Walker. It is challenged for exposing the gruesome truth of racism and abuse along with the use of profane language. Although these elements these elements are not positive topics, they are necessary to depict the reality of life in the early 1900s. The Color Purple teaches the reality about the mistreatment of African-Americans …show more content…

However, is it very difficult for the protagonist Celie to enjoy the small, positive signs she sees. About halfway through the novel, Shug Avery is introduced and transforms Celie's world. Shug is a spontaneous, careless, and independent woman who teaches Celie that she does not have to do everything everybody tells her to do, nor does she have to fulfill everybody's expectations. By focusing on herself, she is able to enjoy life more than before and be grateful of the little things she sees. Shug teaches Celie this one day by pointing out a purple flower. She states that beautiful things in nature are meant to be appreciated and taken notice of. She also adds that little things are put on earth by God intended for people to enjoy and as a result, be happy. This realization completely changes Celie's view on everyday things. In addition to Celie, this message is important for all people. Many people in today's world look at the negative side of every situation. It is very important to appreciate small, cheerful things because those are the things that improve rough days and brighten bad moods. In conclusion, The Color Purple teaches many lessons involving both the past and present. By banning this book, readers would miss out on a novel that illustrates the reality of life for African-Americans in the twentieth century and the significance of appreciating small gifts in life. Although

Show More
Related
599 Words | 3 Pages

Imagine coming home to a family that has to use a dictionary in order to speak. A family so worried, that they quit their jobs, in order to lessen the chance o accidentally slipping and saying a censored letter. Mark Dunn wrote a novel to explore how people would react when being censored, and the results caused a considerable amount of consternation in people. Censorship on language caused people to have lipograms forced on to their tongues, these rules brought out the worst of people, and even the government wasn't able to conform to these silly rules. Censorship causes unusual dialect in people.

Read More
631 Words | 3 Pages

“Having the freedom to read and the freedom to choose is one of the best gifts my parents ever gave me,” Judy Blume. The issue is there are both pros and cons upon banning and challenging books. Some people may be all for it and believe their children should not be exposed to realism that comes from books ‘trying to protect them.’ What ever happened to the freedom of speech? Books are constantly challenged or even banned.

Read More
692 Words | 3 Pages

Should the word “nigger” be used in high school literature? That is the tough decision that many high school teachers face when try to decide whether or not to teach The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. Huck Finn uses the n word throughout the book to refer to a friend who is a slave. Even though that word can be very offensive, it is a big part of our history that high school students should be mature enough to learn about. Many students do not continue on to college after high school; therefore, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn should be allowed to be taught in high school.

Read More
1225 Words | 5 Pages

Her faith is weakened at a certain point but then she starts to develop a new perception of God, she begins to see God as a universal being with no gender and race who is present everywhere and in everything that we love or do. She is now able to see God through people, nature, sex, and in the color purple. Alice Walker also gave importance to the value of female bonds and relationships or sisterhood as a means of coping and social support against the alienation experienced by Celie and other black female characters in the novel. Celie’s friends, mainly Shug and Sofia helped her to find her voice and stand up for herself. As the novel progresses, Celie develops strength and eventually gains her freedom towards the end.

Read More
500 Words | 2 Pages

Censorship: The Child of Fear and the Father of Ignorance A man by the name of Wesley Scroggins, the writer of Springfield News; “Filthy books demeaning to Republic education, once said,“How can Christian men and women expose children to such immortality”. The comment made by this man was directed at books like Speak, Slaughterhouse Five, and Twenty Boy Summer. Books, as such listed, are under fire among many school boards for their use of “soft pornography” as he describes it.

Read More
199 Words | 1 Pages

Alice Walker is considered a Revolutionary for many people because of the struggles she fought through as an African American woman, novelist, and activist living in the mid to late 1900’s. Alice Walker shows how women have struggled in America with having similar and equal rights to white men. She also shows how African Americans struggle with the same problems when it comes to achieving similar or equal rights to a white male. In the novel, “The Color Purple”, written by Alice Walker, the main protagonist, Celie, learns to find her own voice and own self worth through a series of obstacles that she had to overcome throughout her journey; similar to the way Alice Walker also had struggles of being an African American woman during the mid to

Read More
1623 Words | 7 Pages

Today, there is an all-too-common problem surrounding the censorship of children’s literature. The American Library Association (ALA) states, “parents challenge books more than any other group” (Szymanski 2007).

Read More
361 Words | 2 Pages

“The Color Purple” by Alice Walker has been banned all across the United States. Readers and parents view this book as; “having inappropriate language, racial, sexual, and negative.” They believe the book should be completely removed from another reader’s choice selection when they are searching for a book to read at a library. If people want to read this book, they should be able to because all books teach some very valuable life lessons.

Read More
1682 Words | 7 Pages

Yet, the women still have each other for survival, which is such an important factor considering what they face. Celie’s realization of the overall bias of the female African leads her to venturing off with Shug and creating her own business. The breakthrough she makes with her own life reveals that Black women are empowering and are able to possess

Read More
537 Words | 3 Pages

In the book, The Color Purple, Sofia acts as a foil character to Celie; her strong and feisty personality helps Celie realize that she can choose different paths for her life to follow. Raised in a home constantly beaten, Celie learned at a young age her place as a women in pre-World War II society. To survive she complied with all commands shot towards her. When Sofia arrived however, Celie realizes there’s more options in life than just settling and becoming a scared and submissive house wife, there’s a way to finally see the color purple. Being brought up on the bible lead Celie to lead a very religious lifestyle.

Read More
1053 Words | 5 Pages

The book that I chose to read is by Harper Lee, ‘To Kill a Mockingbird.’ The novel’s setting features the Deep South and envelops an intense portrayal of prejudice and race narrated through a little girl’s eyes. Filled with impressive evocations of American life at the peak of the Great Depression that shook the nation in the 1930s, whilst also underpinned by caring and moral susceptibility, the novel proofs as both an excellent rendering of a particular place and time as well as an all-inclusive tale of how old and wicked perceptions can be triumphed by understanding. It was published by J.B Lippincott in New York in 1960 (Topham, 2018). ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ has received both positive and negative feedbacks from a wide audience of readers.

Read More
1222 Words | 5 Pages

It is based on Celie’s life which she went through varieties of issues along with childhood until grown up stage. For example,

Read More
587 Words | 3 Pages

The Color Purple is a novel written by African-American writer Alice Walker. It is one of the most remarkable novels in the literature of Black Americans. The novel is a mirror to the physical, societal, political and economical environment she grew up in. It focuses on various modes of inequalities of race, ethnicity, class, color and gender, especially the lives of the women. It further illustrates how the minority group (i.e. the colored people) discovered their way through these extreme times by looking towards religion which again was controlled by the whites to increase complete control over the shaded.

Read More
682 Words | 3 Pages

At the end of the book, Celie said that everyone is contented and that she felt younger than ever before; this shows that Celie had dropped her fear and kept her faith. Learning is inevitable. In The Color Purple by Alice Walker, Celie learned a lot of life lessons throughout the novel. She learned to be compassionate by getting the love that she deserved from the people around her, she also learned that forgiving others for their mistakes and dropping her fears will lead to peace and freedom of

Read More
1396 Words | 6 Pages

Celie finds her voice and personal identity over the years. As such, the work does function as a feminist novel. However, its deeper thematic elements offer an alternative approach to spirituality. Walker traces Celie’s journey from living in fear of a patriarchal God that is difficult to identify with to Celie’s eventual joy and acceptance of herself, others and the serenity to be found in daily life. Shug is the catalyst that allows Celie to embark on an active spiritual journey because Celie’s infatuation with and eventual love for Shug enables Celie to focus on a good aspect of her life.

Read More

More about Censorship In Alice Walker's The Color Purple

Related Topics

Open Document