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Examples Of Figurative Language In Their Eyes Were Watching God

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Figurative language is a technique used commonly among authors in literature, yet still something readers have a difficult time figuring out due to the deeper meaning that is hidden in the piece of work. In Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, a minor yet significant character named Mrs. Turner is compared to a pious worshipper, portraying her as someone who is obsessed of one race over another, showing her want of power in society. This ultimately suggests the invisible power in a race and how the color of one’s skin can make differences. Mrs. Turner is an interesting character in this novel. Mrs. Turner is compared to “believers [who] had built an altar to the unattainable -- Caucasian characteristics for all” (Hurston
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Personification in Their Eyes Were Watching God By: Camryn McCracken Throughout the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, author Zora Neale Hurston uses personification to convey the complex emotions of each character as well as the beauty of the setting. Text often uses figurative language to explain what even careful readers may not understand, but Hurston’s use of figurative language is what makes this book a masterclass on literary art.

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297 Words | 2 Pages

ove is a strange emotion that we humans can’t explain.., in the novel Their eyes were watching God, by Zora neale Hurston, the author uses oxymoron to describe how the main character cherish what she has and how she wants it to remain the same for ever, but she has met tragedies in her lifetime and that caused her to not have the life she would have liked to have at the beginning of the chapter she was a young girl, Jannie the main character, who was leaving with her grandmother and her grandmother, once saw jannie kissed a young African American guy and her grandmother decided that she was old enough to be married and Jannie was forcibly married to a White Male who was really old compared to her, her grandmother forced to her get married

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841 Words | 4 Pages

The light in her hand was like a spark of sun.¨ (ch. 20 pg. 192) That quote is from Their Eyes Were Watching God. The novel was written in 1937 by famous African American writer Zora Neale Hurston. The novel goes through Janie (the main character) and her complicated relationships with Logan, Joe Starks, and Tea Cake (all the men she was married to) throughout her life.

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192 Words | 1 Pages

Everyone is growing and we still grow even when were older it is a mystery to all of us. Zora Neale Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God uses a array of rhetorical devices to show and explain what Janie from the novel went through her life growing up. At the outset of the novel the author uses metaphor comparing how and why it was like a flute song forgotten in another existence and remember again.

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595 Words | 3 Pages

“Separated by a Common Language:”1 Dialect in Their Eyes Were Watching God In the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, dialect is used in the dialogue. Hurston uses two very distinct writing styles in Their Eyes Were Watching God. One is in a style not so different than that of other American writers. The narrator begins Chapter 11 with, “Janie wanted to ask Hezekiah about Tea Cake, but she was afraid he might misunderstand her and think she was interested” (139).

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478 Words | 2 Pages

The tone from the author in this chapter was that he was angry, but was also sad. The author felt angry in this chapter because of when he was writing, he wrote about how the eve of Rosh Hashanah was the last day of that “cursed year”. Also, in the fourth paragraph of this chapter, he quoted “What are You, my God? I thought angrily.”

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733 Words | 3 Pages

Joelle Windmiller Their Eyes Were Watching God and Sexuality Their Eyes Were Watching God is in many ways a novel about the protagonist's sexual awakening. As it was written in the conservative early twentieth century, much of this sexuality is masked in metaphor. Zora Neale Hurston takes a naturalist approach to expressing sexuality in her book. The experience in which Janie attempts to make her first expression of love, Nanny resents her actions and proceeds to turn it into something to be ashamed of.

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As a direct result of this belief, she feels hatred towards Tea Cake because he is a common black man, and tries to convince Janie to leave him for her brother. Through this, Hurston puts forth Tea Cake’s experience of discrimination based on his race as a microcosmic example of what takes place in American society. Part of Mrs. Turner’s views come from the fact that “it was distressing to emerge from her inner temple and find these black desecrators howling with laughter before the door” (145). For her, black people are too rambunctious and too foolish; she fails to recognize that the black people she knows simply have a different way of life than her, and, as a result, becomes prejudiced. Hurston demonstrates that racist whites like Mrs. Turner meet a few black people, decide that they are too loud, careless, or whatever trait they dislike, and characterize the entire race based on the traits of these few people.

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321 Words | 2 Pages

Thanks to this disparity between black and white people as well as the use of the African American Vernacular English, Hurston cherishes the black culture. Importantly, Benesch claims that: “if it were not for the abundant use of Black English, which in itself ties the text to a specific cultural background, Their Eyes Were Watching God night easily [...] refer to ubiquitous problems of human existence” (Benesch, 1988: 628). The problem of the relations between the black and the white in the novel is also discussed by Jürgen C. Wolter (2001). He argues that the progression visible in Janie`s character symbolizes the change in thinking about skin color.

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824 Words | 4 Pages

The pursuit of dreams has played a big role in self-fulfillment and internal development and in many ways, an individual 's reactions to the perceived and real obstacles blocking the path to a dream define the very character of that person. This theme is evident in Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, which is about the search for identity. A woman of a mixed ethnicity resides in several communities, each playing an important role and serve as crucial influences on her life. During the story, she endures two failed relationships and one good relationship, dealing with disappointment, death, the wrath of nature and life’s unpredictability.

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870 Words | 4 Pages

The imagery used throughout the essay describes how the author feels when she is surrounded by white people. Hurston describes the feeling as is she is a “dark rock surged upon, overslept by a creamy sea”. The dark rock represents the author, while the creamy sea represents the white people surrounding her. The author uses this as a way to describe how she isn't changed by being around white people. They might surround her but she is still herself.

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663 Words | 3 Pages

Hurston’s description shows that Mrs. Turner thought that Janie’s whiteness made up for her unkemptness. She thought that because Janie had white features, it did not matter if she dressed well, implying a double standard between white and black people. Mrs. Turner’s admiration of whiteness shows how internalized racism afflicted the black community in the early twentieth

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739 Words | 3 Pages

Most teenagers struggle with finding themselves. Sometimes, this struggle continues for their entire life. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston emphasizes that life-long battle. She shows her readers that everyone toils with finding themselves and that loving someone won’t always help them find their identity. She uses many symbols to help describe this struggle.

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760 Words | 4 Pages

Racism can be defined as prejudice, discrimination, or contributions to a system that perpetuates the idea that one race is inferior to another. Racism was heavily enforced throughout American history, specifically in the early 1900’s. Coincidentally, this was the same time feminists, or women’s-rights activists, were in the in the midst of their fight for equality. Feminism is the theory that women should be treated equally to men in terms of social, political, and economic matters. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston uses the protagonist, Janie, to convey both concepts through her journey to self-love and acceptance.

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1012 Words | 5 Pages

In Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, the long-lasting effects of slavery have taken a toll on Janie Crawford. Janie’s grandmother was raped by her master and had a child named Leafy. Leafy, although not born into slavery, endured a similar fate, which led her to run away, leaving her mother to raise her child, Janie. Janie’s appearance, showing strong European features, was both praised and shamed by society. This double standard was created by racism and was able to remain present due to segregation.

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