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Their Eyes Were Watching God Harlem Renaissance

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“The earth is the mother of all people, and all people should have equal rights upon it.” (Chief Joseph) The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural, artistic, and social movement of the African American people. Blacks united and grew as one, formed new arts and developed their own culture. Their eyes were watching god is a novel about a young black woman who struggles to find her individuality. Zora Neale Hurston’s writing in Their Eyes Were Watching God, reflects the Harlem Renaissance through Janie 's individuality, and departs from the Harlem Renaissance with the common recurrence of black woman empowerment. In the novel, Hurston reflects the ideas of the Harlem renaissance with the ways in which Janie rebels and goes against norms for women. …show more content…

When tea cake shows up janie 's feels something she has never felt before, she is set free but the townspeople don 't think so.“‘Ain’t you skeered he’s jes after yo’ money him bein’ younger than you?’” (Hurston pg.133)Janie is in love with Tea Cake because he loves her for her youthful young side that was forced into hiding for so long because of her previous husbands. However the rest of the community is discouraging her and trying to keep her in the image as a mayor 's wife. They told Janie that Tea Cake was after her money but she didn’t listen to them and she continued to be with tea cake going against what her community said, empowering herself. This is departing from the Harlem Renaissance because the townspeople are trying to restrict her, and the Renaissance is all about setting yourself free of restrictions.“Well, you know whut dey say ‘uh white man and uh nigger woman is de freest thing on earth.’ Dey do as deyplease” (Hurston 189).The quote within the book clearly shows the departure from the Harlem Renaissance during the Renaissance black people weren 't really equal and in this part of the book it is said that a black women is as free as a white man. The empowerment of black women wasn 't present in the Harlem Renaissance and in this novel it shows the empowerment of black women.Zora Neale Hurston’s writing in Their Eyes Were Watching God, departs from the Harlem Renaissance through the common recurrence of black women

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