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Their Eyes Were Watching God Identity Essay

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In the Novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, author Zora Neale Hurston uses themes of identity and challenging traditional roles to reflect ideas of the Harlem Renaissance. The novel follows the life of Janie, a black woman who finds her way through the challenges of life independently for the most part. Janie finds herself in a society that is portrayed as men lead the world. She challenges these stereotypes by becoming a strong and independent woman. Throughout the novel, Janie struggles to find herself and who she really is in a society where opportunities are limited. Janie challenges traditional gender roles throughout the novel by doing a mens job and changing the way women were looked at. Hurston states that “She was stretched on her …show more content…

Finding her identity was a very difficult and powerful process and Janie is deemed as a strong independent woman because of it. Janie shows this when the novel states that “She was looking for the kiss of life. She was searching for something that was inside herself, and always had been” (Hurston 9). This proves Janie’s quest to find herself and who she is because she knows she has a purpose and that her life has meaning. Janie’s determination shows how she’s trying to fight the expectations for her and doesn’t want to die just being a normal woman. Another scene that represents Janie is when it states “She had waited all her life for something, and it had killed her when it found her” (Hurston 190). Janie waited the majority of her life for true love and someone that will treat her the way she wanted. When she found Tea Cake this changed completely, Janie truly loved him and thought he was the perfect man. This didn’t end the greatest for the two of them but it represents the way Janie grows and finds out who she is and what her standards are. This represents ideas of the Harlem Renaissance by showing how even in a horrible time, people are able to find that light in the darkness and find their true identity even with little opportunities. This represents how Janie finding her identity might not always be in the most perfect way but everyone has a purpose and their life has meaning no matter their background or who they

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Her grandmother wants Janie to live the life that she herself could not live. Janie’s grandmother says, “Ah been waitin’ a long time, Janie, but nothin’ Ah been through ain’t too much if you just take a stand on high ground lak Ah dreamed” (Hurston 16). This is only the beginning of Janie’s journey. By listening to her grandmother’s advice, Janie is able to realize what she truly wants out of life and continues her quest to find

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(Hurston 55). Jody’s determination to keep Janie safe and protect her from other men causes Janie to be upset. Janie feels as if her only purpose “was there in the store for him to look at, not those others'' (55).

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Hurston describes Janie’s quest to finding love and to recovering herself, though

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Through the disbelief of societal values, Janie escapes the internalized hatred of those who believe in such rhetoric. After running away with Tea Cake, Janie meets several figures in the book, most notably Mrs. Turner, a self-hating black woman. During Janie's interactions with her, Hurston writes, “Through indiscriminate suffering, men know fear and fear is the most divine emotion... Half gods are worshiped in wine and flowers. Real gods require blood…

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Through these obstacles she persists and, in the end, becomes exactly who she wanted to be later in her life. Janie changes from a young naïve teenager to a free woman when she returns to Eatonville. Janie is introduced as a teenage girl who is being pressured to marry by her grandmother and does not really have any ratification when it comes to that subject. From the beginning readers can tell that Janie is living for someone else and not herself. Janie is very unsure of who she is at the beginning.

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The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston is a psychological fiction. It was Narrated in third person by Janie Crawford, although structured to be janie telling the story to her friend Pheoby. During this time Janie's Grandmother was a slave in the south, to her, being wealthy and not having to work was a sign of happiness and because of that she believed that that was the perfect life for Janie. The story is taken place in 1928, Janie Crawford, a black women living in southern Florida returns home in eatonville after being away for about a year.

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Their Eyes Were Watching God, a novel written by Zora Neale, expresses a black womens growth towards independence. Janie Crawford, the protagonist, is in quest of her ideal love but is surrounded by powerful men who take advantage of her youth and beauty. Janie’s first husbands keep her dependent but Tea Cake, through true love, exposes her to independence she seeks and later learns to embrace. Logan and Joe treat Janie as if she is unequal to them and nothing more than an object to be used and observed, therefore secluding her from the independence she deserves. Janie’s first marriage, arranged at the prime of her youth by her nanny, was a forced relationship with a man Janie took no liking too.

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She has always longed for a life of true love and they believe that she will find her happiness in a man, a family, or marriage. Throughout the story she goes through three different relationships with men, each one giving her a new outlook on life as well as some hardships she has to face with each. Janie is an African American but in the story unlike most women during this time period wears her hair down because she feels different than them. She dresses in overalls rather than dresses which makes her character come off with a sense of independence. Janie is a very smart woman but she is also sarcastic, which gets her into conflict with men in her life because they are used to women who listen to everything they say without back talk.

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Janie shows determination as she persists and struggles to define love on her own terms through her marriages. First, her determination shows when Janie runs away with Jody. She becomes aware that her marriage with Logan does not satisfy her goals and dreams for love, so she takes a chance and marries Jody. Hurston states, “Janie hurried out of the front gate and turned south.

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in their Eyes were watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston, it's far difficult to see Janie or her interactions along with her community as feminist. whether or not Janie is living in Eatonville or the Everglades, her status as a black running class lady locates her on the very bottom of the social hierarchy. The guys objectify her, her lover beats her, her community misunderstands her, and she fails to withstand. however, if we examine the fragmented narration and Janie’s position as the major narrator, a special view emerges about woman employer. The narration switches between the first- and third-person angle, and those perspectives, each one by one and collectively, assist to assert Janie as a narrator with authority and organization.

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At the beginning of the story, Janie always wants to discover the outside world and has an ambitious attitude towards chasing her goals in life, and she often would “search as much of the world as she could”(11), showing how curious and confident Janie is to put herself out there. Additionally, enthusiastic and lively attributes are embodied by Janie’s character at first, as well as her aspirations because she has “glossy leaves and bursting buds”(11), wanting to achieve the chance to live life. Lastly, before Janie met Joe, she was happy and eager to get out and know the outside world and often “looked up the road towards way off”(25), longing for the adventure of that long road and not feeling discouraged or controlled to stay in one place. Although Janie was free and optimistic at first, when Joe came into the picture that attitude changed as he was restraining and controlling over Janie. With Joe wanting to be a big voice it ended up restraining Janie to just staying in the market place and having no value, which further lead her to putting “up a drape over her dreams”(72), showing how shattered and invaluable she felt in the position Joe gave her, not even

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1023 Words | 5 Pages

Having never fully formed it in years past, the silencing of her opinions and lack of a community to support her actively works against her search for identity. However, once Jody passes, Janie is free from the oppressive stereotypes that he had placed upon her and is free to express herself. This shift in mentality can be seen through her change in physical

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Nearing the end of her and Joe’s relationship and following Joe’s death, Janie discovers once again that her horizon is still far away. The way that Joe treated Janie as an object and as a puppet drove Janie to resentment. Hurston states that, “Digging around in herself like that she found that . . . she hated her grandmother and had hidden it from herself all these ears under a cloak of pity” (89). Janie’s self-reflection allows her to realize how much Nanny suppressed Janie from being able to reach her horizon.

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After she married Logan that had become “the end of her childhood” (Hurston, 1937/2013, p.12). Janie was not happy and although she did not love him she hoped she would after they got married like her grandmother had told her. Nevertheless, since she had no say in her marriage this caused Janie to desire a more fulfilling relationship that came with love and not just a “house bought and paid for and sixty acres [of] land” (Hurston, 1937/2013, p.23). She constantly felt trapped especially after Logan stopped pampering her and made her perform manual labor. However, once she had met Joe Starks she felt as though she had another opportunity in life.

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Many symbols are used throughout the book to represent this struggle. Two of the main symbols Hurston uses are the horizon and the pear tree to help symbolize Janie’s future and Janie’s youth. These symbols are also used to represent Janie’s life and her want for

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