Analyzing Alice WalkerS Unique Perspectives In The Color Purple

2006 Words9 Pages
Exit Paper by Nancy Gordon For the dean of humanities Analyzing Alice Walker’s Unique Perspectives in The Color Purple If Alice Walker’s fiction, The Color Purple, had a thesis, I believe it would be that until mankind stops assigning gender and race to its Gods, mankind will not stop sexual and racial oppression and abuse. Two ageless and current issues Walker immediately presents in the novel are God and sexual child abuse. They are introduced through the voice of an innocent child coping with terrible abuse and hardship. Several references quickly unfold alluding that everyone seems to know of some unsafe sexual environment for girls or some actual battered wife. Sofia says, “All my life I had to fight. I had to fight my daddy. I had to fight my brothers. I had to fight my cousins and my uncles. A girl child ain’t safe in a family of men.” (page 42) She also says, “…my mama…she under my daddy foot. Anything he say, goes.” (43) These threats to girls and women seem to be common knowledge, practically behavioral norms. Celie writes about it to God saying, “Harpo ast his daddy why he beat me. Mr.___ say, Cause she my wife.” (23) In other words, that’s the way it is son. Albert later advises his son, “Well how you spect to make her mind? Wives is like children. You have to let ‘em know who got the upper hand. Nothing can do that better than a good sound beating.” (37) Celie’s Dear God is like her beating drum of survival, page after brutal page. Walker invites readers into their own overworked, ineffective, recurring thoughts of God’s significance under such circumstances. I wondered what God’s value would be to Celie in surviving her events. Will this story be about the power of God or about atheism? Walker lets me fish my own mind, preparing me for hers. She is going to make me question the impact my personal view of God has on the behaviors of men

More about Analyzing Alice WalkerS Unique Perspectives In The Color Purple

Open Document