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How Does Janie Use Race Relations In Their Eyes Were Watching God

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Janie’s experience with race relations influenced her journey of self-revelation. Her story was set in the Deep South before World War II, a time period with strict racial segregation laws. While race was not the central part of the story, Janie’s experiences with racial tension guided her path to discovering individuality. “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston was written during the Harlem Renaissance and published in the 1930s. The two most notable experiences of race relations in the story are Janie’s interactions with Mrs. Turner, a black woman who takes pride in her white features, and the treatment of the mule, which symbolizes slavery and oppression of the black community. Both examples are vital to Janie’s self-reliance. In “Their Eyes Were …show more content…

Turner is a strong example of the obstacles that Janie had to overcome to achieve self-reliance. Additionally, the mistreatment of the mule is a strong symbol of the oppression experienced by black individuals during slavery. Janie felt empathy for the mule and confronted the people of Eatonville when she said, “‘They oughta be shamed, uh, themselves! Teasin’ dat poor brute beast lak they are! Done been worked tuh death; done had his disposition ruing wid mistreatment, and now they got tuh finish devilin’ em to death’” (Hurston 56). This quote shows the difference between Janie’s ideology and the Eatonville community. Both the mule and the African Americans were forced into intense labor and dangerous circumstances. Janie’s understanding of the parallel and the injustice leads to her ability to find self-awareness. According to Hurston, “Everyone was having fun at the mule baiting. All but Janie” (Hurston, 56). Her refusal to partake in the mule baiting shows her understanding and awareness of injustice in the story, which contributes to her personal growth. The mistreatment of the mule became a vital moment in her realization of the importance of embracing her identity and having

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In Their Eyes were Watching God, Janie’s hair is described ad nauseum; in fact, it is described so often that one cannot help but notice its importance to the text as a whole. The author uses Janie’s hair to demonstrate Janie as an independent woman. To Janie, her hair is one of her defining features, and it becomes a surrogate for her identity. While Janie works inside her and Jody’s store, Jody forces her to wrap up her hair in a head-rag. To Janie, the “business of the head-rag irked her endlessly”, even though she did not want it wrapped up, Jody did.

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In Their Eyes Were Watching God we get to meet a plethora of characters Janie, Tea Cake, Jody, Logan, Nanny and so many others. All of them play a major role in Janie's life and the paths she will

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Janie tells “ talkin’ don’t amount tug uh hill uh beans when yuh can’t do nothin’else”. In contrast to Joe start, who seeks to be a big voice only to have his wish become true when Janie informs him that he “big-bellies round here and put out à lot of brag, but ‘tain’t nothin’ to it but yo’ big voice”. Janie seeks for a voice which can picture, which can make you see. The ability to find this voice is important in a world where , as Nanny says “We don’t know nothin’ but what we see. The heavy use of imagery shows that Hurston knows

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Hurston narrates belief to motivate African American women to conquer and be strong. (49) The story finally tells that Janie found liberty and tranquility in her life. Her experience reflects on promoting women’s

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Wright argues that Their Eyes Were Watching God does not convey any ideas or themes of importance, but I believe that his masculinity blinds him, and he is unable to see how this novel is able to call attention to how women of color are oppressed by men. Throughout the entire story, Janie is constantly being oppressed by, not by a person, but by an idea, which was created by men. The idea that black women were at the bottom of the social pyramid, they are forced to carry the weight of the world on their shoulders, therefore they were “de mule uh de world.” Hurston communicates this idea through Nanny by writing, “So de white man throw down de load and tell de n***** man to pick it up.

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she is just purely a brilliant writer and 2. The text as a whole is divided into two parts; the first part where she goes to Eatonville and Florida collection folktales and the second part which is where she goes to New Orleans to study on the practice of “hoodoo”. In the first part (Of Mules and Men) her focus of observation is African-American folktales and how they have evolved over time. This is strange to me because usually folktales are filled with so much fantasy that it is difficult to believe them, but she goes anyway to these two places (Eatonville, Florida) and gathers these folktales. Whilst I was in my quest for insight I found out that Hurston actually grew up in Eatonville after her family moved there due to racial complications in the town that (her and her family) were previously living (Alabama), and she supports this when she says “I was delighted.

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Many authors utilize the events that have occurred throughout their lifetime as an inspiration for not only their novels’ plots, but also their novels’ themes. The author of Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston, is one of the many authors who have utilized their life’s experiences as inspiration for her novels’ themes. Throughout her major novels, she has utilized events in her life, such as her early life, her relationships, and the fact that she grew up in an all-black town, in order to inspire several themes in her novels, and several of her beliefs that she conveys in her novels. Themes, and beliefs, such as African-Americans are not all good nor are they all bad, experiences contribute to finding one’s true self, there is no

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( 55). Hurston’s symbolization of Janie’s hair connotes Jody’s jealousy of her and causes the reader to understand that Janie does

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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

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Hurston tells the story of Janie, a black woman who because of her grandmother experiences and beliefs was forced to marry into a loveless marriage with Logan Killicks, a hard-working farmer who had 60 acres of land and could provide for Janie. This marriage ended when Janie ran away with Joe Stark, a man that she fell in love with and thought could give her the love absent between her and Logan. But Janie soon realized that her second marriage wouldn’t turn out better than her first. Joe was just as controlling and degrading as Logan. He hardly expressed his love for Janie and spoke to her like an incompetent child.

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Janie’s grandma made efforts to warn Janie of the systematic hardship she’ll endure as woman of color. (p.14) Nanny essentially told her that in terms of societal value, black women were the most taken for granted, for they’re the “mules uh de world” as far as she knew. Nanny was constantly urging Janie to find a man because of this. She believed that a man could better her granddaughter, whether there was requited love or not, by providing security and financial stability. Janie tried to refute this idea that only a man could complete her life.

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Zora Neal Hurston was an African American novelist who was born in the year 1891. Her most notable novel was of course, “Their Eyes Were Watching God” which is a story of a young attractive woman named Janie who is voiceless but wants to control her own destiny. In Zora’s book, she not only discussed the racial malcontent in the 1900’s but gender roles in society. She also greatly discussed how African American women are valued or even devaluated in marriages. Zora Neale Hurston has such a timeless appeal to the youth of the upcoming 21st century is due to the fact, that a lot of what she mentioned in her literature involving life for blacks in the south still relevant and true today in some forms but it greatly differs from what it was for an African American person in the 1900’s in the south.

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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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She carries a distant dream, however, to be able to travel the world and live in a wagon like the salesman she meets. Their encounter enlivens Elisa as she delights in the stranger’s interest in her flowers. Hurston’s Janie has a grimmer reality as an African-American woman trying to achieve her hopes and dreams in a male-dominant town. Her frustration is streamlined through the pity she takes on the town’s mule. She

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