Gender Roles In Their Eyes Were Watching God

Connor Lamb
Dr. Ward
2/19/23
Being tasked with growing up and living your life in the Jim Crow South as a colored person is definitely not an easy task. However, adding the issues of being a woman in those societies only adds to your problems. Especially for Janie in Zora Neale Hurston's novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God. Janie grew up in these exact conditions and with past family problems involving being a woman and not having the same rights as others, white or colored. In this novel, the problems caused by being a woman stemmed from a variety of social factors. While Janie’s stature changed as a woman as she moved on with different relationships, they all kept tight with the overall message that she was the weaker part of the relationship.

Janie does not understand the structure of society at the time. In fact, she almost completely contradicts her social role as a woman. During this time, the woman in the relationship was to be dependent on the husband and fulfill the stereotypical role of women following their husbands. Janie is able to overcome these roles by finding happiness in what she does and ignoring what she is told to do in order to fulfill these roles of women not only to support herself and her family, but also to protect herself, as seen early in the story when Nanny forces the marriage to Logan Killicks. Nanny begs, "Tain’t Logan Killicks Ah wants you to have, baby, it’s protection. Ah ain’t gittin’ ole, honey. Ah’. done ole" (Hurston 15). This demonstrates Nanny’s worries for Janie. From her past, Nanny doesn’t want the same to happen to Janie, who dealt with the unfortunate parts of being an underprivileged woman under slavery. She trusts Logan Killicks as a good man and one to protect Janie and not allow her to take the same path as

Janie went through multiple marriages with men that are very different from each other, providing problems within. Some of those relationships go better for Janie, providing a safer and more enjoyable route to live her life without enforcing too much. But what stays the same throughout them all is that they all do something that affects how she lives. Seen most through the work she was told to do. While with Joe Starks, Janie was tasked with working the counter at their store. Working there Janie had many interactions with lots of new people. When a man would walk in the store, often they would start to try and flirt with her acknowledging some of her physical features first like her hair for example. In the store town folks noticed Janie's new appearance, "Whut make her keep her head tied up lak some ole ‘oman round de store? Nobody couldn’t git me tuh tie no rags on mah head if Ah had hair lak dat" (Hurston 49). This indicates that Jody is jealous and believes he should be the only one allowed to see her hair. Janie’s hair is a big symbol to this story not only to symbolize her beauty but it also shows how women are treated unfairly compared to a man in this society. Janie should be allowed to wear her hair however she wishes, but because of Jody’s jealousy and insecurity over her, she is forced to tie it up and hide her true figure. After Jody’s death, the barriers brought