They each dealt with confrontations in different ways. Julian’s mother was nice to the little black children, but totally ignored the parents. Mrs. Turpin had no choice but to be nice to the black people. If she was mean or rude to them, they might not go back to her fields to work. Even though the end of these two stories seemed to be similar, they were actually very different.
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd analyses two of the most prominent types of inequalities felt in 1960s southern United States and the protagonist’s journey in overcoming stereotypes. Lily is a white teenage girl who grows up suffering the consequences of gender discrimination and throughout her journey learns about her own prejudices and how they affect other people. Racial prejudice, prominent in the South at that time, is viewed from her perspective as learns about stereotypes and misconceptions. Lily doesn’t consider herself racist, but throughout the story, discovers that she’s accepted certain prejudices as fact. One of the stereotypes the book bursts is that African Americans and women are lesser than white men.
The Fight for Change Ever since human beings have walked this Earth, they have formulated various standards and stereotypes towards what they believe are truly sublime in human appearance. As for “the others” who are believed to not reach these standards, they suffer from self-degradation and the cruelty of others. In Toni Morrison’s novel The Bluest Eye, she tells the story about a young black girl who believes she is ugly and wishes for blue eyes because the community bases their ideals of beauty on whiteness. Throughout her autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Maya Angelou gives an account of her journey of becoming a woman and dominating the misfortunes and racist oppressions of her life. Both authors illustrate the idea that because of oppression the victim develops a self-hatred that enforces a desire to change.
Throughout this story, difficult choices were made by Sarah, Andrew, and Lawrence all revolving around Little Bee; some made selfless choices and some made selfish, morally wrong choices. Sarah, before anything, is a mother, but she gets lost in her own world, she starts an affair which Sarah’s response to Little Bee has always been selfless; Sarah has the maternal instinct to help Little Bee. Sarah does right by Little Bee, she cut off her own finger for the girl to save her life. In addition to that, when Little Bee gets deported back to Nigeria, Sarah follows her in order to keep Little Bee from the third world dangers. After Sarah finds Andrews miscellaneous works exposing injustice in third world countries, she decides to finish his work by writing about Little Bee’s story and many more like hers to bring to light the mass murders, and furthermore help Little Bee.
Jody Starks’s Domineering Force Against Janie Written by Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God is a story about Janie Mae Crawford, a young African-American woman who searches for self-identity as she ventures through womanhood. Being raised by a grandmother who lived through slavery and other harsh circumstances, Janie is taught to value social status and wealth, as they are the key to an enjoyable life. However, unlike her Grandma, Janie does not find comfort in materialistic possessions and searches for what is missing in her life, her missing part at the end of the ‘horizon.’ In her journey to complete herself, Janie meets three men, Logan Killicks, Jody Starks, and Tea Cake, all of which make a separate but significant impact on her life. In particular, Jody Starks, is the individual Janie is with when she makes some of the biggest transitions in her attitude, based on the way he treated her as an inferior. As a result, an important concept in Their Eyes Were Watching God to understand is how Jody Starks tries to mold Janie’s character into something she is not by exerting control, manipulation, and power.
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings In Maya Angelou’s autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, we read about Maya’s struggle with her feelings about not having her parents around to help her through the racism of her time. Though Maya had a rough upbringing, the hard times of her childhood help shape her into the bright, strong, and independent woman she is today. Maya, or commonly known as Ritie, was raised with no parents. Ritie was content with living with her “momma” until the “terrible Christmas.” RItie was confident that her parents were dead, even though people told her that they were in California eating all the oranges they could. By receiving these gifts Ritie felt, “rudely awakened.” Though they don’t want to this made Ritie and Bailey think, “What did we do so wrong?” They Know that they did nothing wrong, but they couldnt help pondering the question.
While Sister seems to be at odds with her whole family throughout the story, she especially holds a grudge against sister for stealing away Mr. Whitaker. Sister does not believe Stella-Rondo when she says that her 2 year old daughter, Shirley-T, is adopted. When Sister makes a comment about how Shirley-T looks just like “a cross between Mr. Whitaker and Papa-Daddy” (Welty, 43), Stella-Rondo gets angry at sister for mentioning her daughter after asking
A Modern Review of the story “Everyday use” By: Christopher Jiang Closely capturing the story “Every day use”, we can assert our empathy and imagine the difficulties African Americans experienced, for they were discriminated, forced into quandaries, and served with pain. Alice Walker created the narrator as an obstinate masculine mother, who refused the exchange of a quilt between her two daughters. She refused Dee for her betrayal and granted Maggie for her loyalty. Although, the three characters all expressed their feelings, However Dee, the new generation, disbelieved her heritage was the key, and carries contradicted attitudes with that of her mother. Dee believes she has successfully adapted survival therefore, deserves to frame the memory tree.
She explains how slaves suffered when being denied basic human rights and legal protection, how female slaves suffered from sexual harassment and the feeling of responsibility towards her family, particularly her children. She points out, with her personal experiences, that the psychological abuses of slavery were more devastating than its physical abuses. Jacobs was not a slave of always being beat and doing hard labor, but she was a slave that was denied of her basic human rights. Black slave women’s rights were non-existent. They could not have a legal marriage, they were frequently forced to sleep with the masters they despise, and their families were torn apart, with their children sold to a place far away from them.
com) The characterization of the book occurs when at the beginning of the story, the author presents Maya’s character as weak and scared for her future and at the end her character ends up being very strong. (“Characterization” Sparknotes.com) The conflict of the book occurs when Maya and her brother Bailey are sent to live with their grandmother in Stamps, Arkansas because their parents were getting a divorce. As a result, through most of her childhood and youth, she never feels like she belongs to anyone or anything. Her emotional isolation is intensified by the fact that she is raped by her mother’s boyfriend at the age of eight. (“Conflicts” Thebestnotes.com) The book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings has many settings.