Community Influence/Race
Shayna Dailey
The purpose of this paper is to show how THEIR EYES WERE WATCHING GOD contains some aspects supporting New Negroism. In the time period of 1919-1929 a new form of writing, New Negroism, was being encouraged toAfro-Americans. A majority of critics penalized Zora Neale Hurston for her lack of this approach in THEIR EYES WERE WATCHING GOD. However, upon close examination New Negroism visages can be found in the novel. Various definitions exist for New Negroism. For this paper a definiton by a Negro editor, from Locke's novel THE NEW NEGRO, will be used. He describes New Negro artists as having a new line of thought. A New Negroism novel would not allow the center and standard of beauty to rest in the white race. This seems to call for a pride and dignity of one's own African American race and culture. The writing must not be influenced by whites but should be authentic. Zora Neale Hurston's THEIR EYES WERE WATCHING GOD is full of authentic imagery and dialogue. Her first hand experiences as a youth in Eatonville, Florida, unboubtedly infulenced her writing style. She was an anthropologist; this prompted her to appreciate the differences in cultures and language usage. Hurston uses the primitiveness of Afro-Americans on the muck, the high classs status of Jody adn Janie in the all black town of Eatonville, and a descriptive dialect to capture and elevate a past lifestyle in the minds of readers. This results in a supporting form of New Negroism.
Jamie Peters
This essay focuses on Janie's search for an individual's voice within the respective Eatonville and Everglade communities where she lives. One's voice is obviously affected by others, so the I will examine how the oral rituals--signifying and bull sessions on the porch--of the community's voice and individual's voices, respectively, affect Janie's development. It is also interesting to note the role class plays in Janie's identity. The essay will examine how Janie discovers her voice by exploiting oral rituals, and how her identity is intertwined in Eatonville's class constructs. Joe Starks belittles Janie and segragates her from the community through his words and her alienating status as the mayor's wife, where she is not allowed to engage in porch talk. Janie's voice slowly emerges, and she cruelly insults Joe to save herself from life-crusing oppression. With Tea Cake, Janie doesn't find equality, but a marriage that will allow her voice to emerge. On the muck, she engages in oral rituals. Upon her return, to Everglade the porch cruelly speculates about her life, still classing her off.The third-person narrative implies that Janie's emergent voice is reliant upon the community's oral rituals. Even though, her voice emerges, she never gains complete liberation from the community's class constructs because her identity is inextricably interwoven in them.
Anna Adkins
In Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God Janie finds her personality within the black culture through toil, tribulation and constant self-redefinition. After each relationship is over her attitude undergoes a metamorphosis, directing her towards her eventual independence. During her marriage to Killicks she is a naive young girl with romantic dreams that carry her into a disastrous marriage with Starks. Starks is a man with an agenda-to look high classed; and beautiful, lightskinned Janie fits right into his plan. Although her marriage with Starks is her most difficult struggle she comes through it stronger and more aware of her desires. Yet she continuously contradicts her words from her actual deeds. One example of this is during the marriage to Starks her thoughts seem to be of freedom and becoming part of the community but shecontinues to accept the demands of Starks and even succumbs to the beating of her third husband, Tea Cake, without a word. In addition, Janie tries to find her way in the two black communities of Eatonville and the muck but fights for their acceptance the whole time. The town of Eatonville seems jealous of Janie. The women feel resentful possibly because she is beautiful and is always being admired by the men of the town because of her physical appearance. The men are embittered because her light skin makes her more "white" and therefore, they believe, more respected in other societies than black men. In the muck Janie is seen as a outsider but with Tea Cake beside her she is welcomed, at least partially. Both communitiesseem to prejudge her on how she looks before they even speak with her or give her personality a chance. Also, they may be intimidated by her "white" qualities, which makes them bitter or a little uneasy towards her. However, Janie eventually makes peace with herself and gently pushes her way into the communities by exhibiting her similarities, such as storytelling, to the rest of the society. Therefore, Janie searches for her personal identity within the black race in order to liberate and free herself from the confines of men and society.
Matthew Courtad
This essay attempts to show the reader how to read the book by witnessing Janie's develpment of self as it reacts to the different communities in which she lived. These include the comunity of Eatonville (with Joe Starks) and the community on the muck (with Tea Cake). The basic way to understand this is to see how much more fulfilled Janie was living with Tea Cake as compared to when she lived with Joe (and Logan Killicks). It is my presumption that the reason for this was because Tea Cake exemplified oral capabilities while Joe was more liteate. "Literate," in this sense, does not mean that he (along with Mrs. Turner) was able to read and write. (They were the only characters, by the way, that were literate in the other sense.) Rather, because Tea Cake was an oral man, he was able to communicate in a spontaneous and rhythmic (musical) way with other people. This, in turn, attracted a community to him (and Janie) which was more enjoyable and fitted the needs of Janie's sense of worth. On the other hand, Joe and the community of Eatonville, which was created by Joe, a literate man, succumbed Janie to the point that she did not feel any purpose, nor was she allowed, to share herself with the surrounding Eatonville community and Joe as the mayor's wife and a wife, respectively.
Christopher Walker
I wanted to explore the relationship between community and individual. I did this by examining this relationship and noting that the race issue was not emphasized, by this lack of concern with this issue I theorized that Hurston was able to concentrate more fully on the aforesaid relationship.
Bradley Filicky
I plan for my essay to deal with some of the same issues as my project two focus. My essay will deal with the nature of community in Their Eyes Were Watching God. How did Janie use community to define herself? What role did community play in Hurstons life? I feel that Hurstons experience shaped how she protrayed Janie in the novel. Hurstonused her own experinces with community and projectd them to Janie.