ipl-logo

Gender Roles In Their Eyes Were Watching God By Zora Neale Hurston

633 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Their eyes were watching god character development

The United States Constitution states that the country values liberty, life, and happiness for all of its citizens. These three values shape the ideal American experience. Most view it as living freely, where all men, women, and races are created equal, and where oppression of genders and races does not exist. In the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, however, Zora Neale Hurston challenges the traditional view of this experience by illustrating how gender roles and racism change it, manifesting that it is not close to what the average citizen goes through, especially if he or she is black. Throughout the course of the book, Janie experiences oppression as a woman, revealing the hidden gender roles in American society that help form the American …show more content…

In Janie’s third marriage with Tea Cake, they encounter a white racist woman named Mrs. Turner. She is comfortable talking to Janie because she is part white and wants to bring her from the dark side to that of the light. One of her beliefs is that “it’s too may black folks already. We oughta lighten up the race” (Hurston 140). 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. These kinds of whites disintegrate the American experience of equality, leaving behind a

Show More
Related
435 Words | 2 Pages

She writes through Tea Cake saying on 156, “De white folks ain’t gone no where. Dey oughta know if it’s dangerous” and on 158 where Hurston writes, “The folks [blacks] let the people [whites] do the thinking”. With so much white influence blacks have allowed their views to be veiled by the anglo-saxon ideaology that the whites spread. In another use of non- sequitur, Tea Cake announces not only that the Indians are wrong about the hurricane but that they, “...don’t know much uh nothin’ tuh tell de truth. Else dey’d own dis country

Read More
2216 Words | 9 Pages

De thought uh mah youngness don’t satisfy me lak yo’ presence do’ ” (Hurston 127). Janie and Tea Cake’s newfound relationship expresses the theme of personal happiness verses social pressure because their age difference will stir up trouble amongst the townspeople, but they can not help but spend time together because it makes them feel joyful and

Read More
799 Words | 4 Pages

Is it worth risking everything in order to be happy? In the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, an African American woman named Janie makes many challenging decisions in order to be happy. This novel takes place in the 1920’s which creates many obstacles that Janie must overcome in order to achieve happiness. There are many stereotypes and inequalities during this time that make life extremely difficult for Janie. Although Janie allows others to mistreat her at points throughout the novel, she is overall an excellent role model for young readers because she overcomes several stereotypes of African American females during this time period, and she makes many difficult decisions based solely on her own happiness.

Read More
1148 Words | 5 Pages

The novel begins showing Janie as a young girl. Hurston explains Janie 's family history by recounting how her black mother was raped by a white school teacher, leading to her biracial nature. The story instills in the reader a reason to be against white men. The novel is centered around the main motif of hair and most specifically Janie 's hair. Throughout the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie 's hair represents her strength as a woman, and by showing how a woman 's strength collides with both masculine ideals as well as white power, Hurston shows ingrained problems of acceptance within the world.

Read More
584 Words | 3 Pages

The black culture is very diverse in different parts of the world-even in different parts of the state. Janie as moved throughout Florida to places such as West Florida, Eatonville, and the Everglades. Residing in these different places helps develop and define the character of Janie. Throughout Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie experiences many variations of black culture that helps build her character as she travels through Florida.

Read More
553 Words | 3 Pages

Duncan Padgitt Mrs. Froemling English 10 honors 3/8/23 The Irony of Racism In her novel, “Their eyes were watching god '', Hurston writes about the hardships and cycle of being oppressed using imagery, dialogue, and even irony to show the true redundancy of racism and the cycle it creates. As Janie was home alone she saw some native americans, and after they warn her of a hurricane she brushes it of and thinks “ Beans running fine and prices good, so the Indians could be, must be, wrong. You couldn’t have a hurricane when you’re making seven and eight dollars a day picking beans. Indians are dumb anyhow, always were”(Hurston 178).

Read More
1054 Words | 5 Pages

The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God is not just the story of Janie Crawford, but an exploration into the deeply rooted impacts of voice. The novel explores the idea that a person’s voice can be a powerful tool for self-expression and empowerment, but it can also be suppressed by societal expectations and gender roles. Janie’s journey towards finding her voice and using it to assert her independence and identity is a testament to the importance of speech. The writing also reflects on Zara Neale Hurston’s own experience as a black woman in Jim Crow America. The use of an “unrefined” African American dialect throughout the novel’s narration celebrated the depth, intellectual complexity, and very existence of black culture, a theme revolutionary

Read More
1464 Words | 6 Pages

She also describes how some women, like Janie, are able to overcome the stereotypical roles. These stereotypical roles should not play a part in society. Women should not just rely on their husband, following the traditional roles of women, being satisfied with her life as the weaker sex. Women should be like Janie, searching for their inner strength to gain their happiness while overcoming these ancient viewpoints about women. So, how will this issue be buried in the years to come?

Read More
1023 Words | 5 Pages

The novel, “Their Eyes Were Watching God'' by Zora Neale Hurston follows the experiences of Janie, as she shares her life story with some townsfolk. Themes of identity, gender, race, assimilation, and community are found throughout the novel, as Janie struggles with each as a black woman in the early 20th century. Janie’s story connects these themes to the terms, epithets, post-racial, and stereotype through showing the impact experiencing those terms has on the characters. Epithets are derogatory words used to describe a group. A prime example of this language in use is Mrs. Turner’s ideology about her appearance, “To her way of thinking all these things set her aside from “—---'' (Hurston 174).

Read More
1355 Words | 6 Pages

Everyone in town uses derogatory labels to address black people and discriminate anyone that associates with them. While Mrs. Dubose is having a conversation with Jem she says, “Your father’s no better than the niggers and trash he works for”(Lee 135). Mrs. Dubose is a resident of Maycomb and represents the racist mentality of the town. She and other white people discriminate black people and consider them criminals and slaves.

Read More
1318 Words | 6 Pages

The text belongs to a novel called The Planter’s Northern Bride, written in 1854 by Caroline Lee Hentz. It describes the first time that Eulalia, the daughter of an abolitionist, visits her husband’s plantation in the South. Race is one of the most important topics of the text. Taking in consideration the fact that this novel was written almost a hundred years ago and before the American Civil War, it is not surprising to see the way that African Americans are depicted in the excerpt. Therefore, racism and slavery are very present in Eulalia’ s train of thoughts.

Read More
1071 Words | 5 Pages

Growing up Hurston was always different from her family and friends; unlike the others she was welcoming to the white tourists that passed through her little town. She would wait on the porch of her house, watching and interacting with the tourists. Hurston began to develop the mindset that would later help her create the stage that would help her write her most influential books. This habit was not confined to her small town. From “How it Feels to Be Colored Me” Hurston describes, “During this period, white people differed from being colored to me only in that they rode through town and never lived there.”

Read More
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.

Read More
794 Words | 4 Pages

After watching her father fight hard for a case he was bound to loose, hearing all the mean names her family and Tom was called and hearing the news of Tom’s death she began to understand the reality of racism. “Just what I said. Grandma says it's bad enough he lets you all run wild, but now he's turned out a nigger-lover we'll never be able to walk the streets of Maycomb agin. He's ruinin' the family, that's what he's doin'.” (Lee, 110)

Read More
671 Words | 3 Pages

The story represents the culmination of Wright’s passionate desire to observe and reflect upon the racist world around him. Racism is so insidious that it prevents Richard from interacting normally, even with the whites who do treat him with a semblance of respect or with fellow blacks. For Richard, the true problem of racism is not simply that it exists, but that its roots in American culture are so deep it is doubtful whether these roots can be destroyed without destroying the culture itself. “It might have been that my tardiness in learning to sense white people as "white" people came from the fact that many of my relatives were "white"-looking people. My grandmother, who was white as any "white" person, had never looked "white" to me” (Wright 23).

Read More

More about Gender Roles In Their Eyes Were Watching God By Zora Neale Hurston

Open Document