Their eyes were watching god essay questions

Their eyes were watching god essay questions

Their eyes were watching god essay analysis on the community reveals a society that is conservative in nature and passes harsh judgment on those who against their norms and standards, their eyes were watching god essay questions. The background setting of the novel plays a critical role in developing the plot of the novel. Why is the porch important? Remember me. The novel starts and ends with Janie and Phoeby sitting on the front porch.

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In the main, her novel is not addressed to the Negro, but to a white audience whose chauvinistic tastes she knows how to satisfy. Why might Wright have objected to Their Eyes Were Their eyes were watching god essay questions God? Discuss the idea of the horizon in the Their Eyes Were Watching God, their eyes were watching god essay questions. What does it symbolize for Janie? What initially pulls her to each of the three men? How do they differ from one another? What does she learn from each experience? In her marriage to Jody, Janie is dominated by his power. At several points, however, it is obvious that he feels threatened by her. Why their eyes were watching god essay questions Jody need to be in control of everyone around him?

How does Janie threaten Jody and his sense of control? Their Eyes Were Watching God is concerned with issues of speech and how speech is both a mechanism of control and a vehicle of liberation. Yet Janie remains silent during key moments in her life. Discuss the role of silence in the book and how that role changes throughout the novel. Their Eyes Were Watching God SparkNotes Literature Guide Series PRINT EDITION Ace your assignments with our guide to Their Eyes Were Watching God! Search all of SparkNotes Search Suggestions Use up and down arrows to review and enter to select. No Fear Literature Translations Literature Study Guides Glossary of Literary Terms How to Write Literary Analysis.

Biography Biology Chemistry Computer Science Drama Economics Film Health History Math Philosophy Physics Poetry Psychology Short Stories Sociology US Government and Politics. SparkTeach Teacher's Handbook. Character List Janie Mae Crawford Tea Cake Jody Starks Nanny Crawford Mrs. What does the title mean? Why is the porch important? Why is Joe Starks a natural leader? Why are people in Eatonville scandalized by the romance between Janie and Tea Cake? How do Janie and Tea Cake support themselves while they are in the Everglades? How does Janie interact with the women she meets in the Everglades? Why does Janie kill Tea Cake? After she returns to Eatonville, how does Janie let people know what has happened to her in her absence?

Important Quotes Explained By Theme Language Marriage Gender Inequality Race. By Symbol Hair Pear Tree and Horizon The Hurricane By Setting Rural Florida, their eyes were watching god essay questions. Suggestions for Further Reading Related Links Movie Adaptations Zora Neale Hurston and Their Eyes Were Watching God Background. Please wait while we process your payment. Unlock your FREE SparkNotes Plus Trial! Unlock your FREE Trial! Sign up and get instant access to save the page as your favorite. Essays Suggested Essay Topics. Popular pages: Their Eyes Were Watching God. Take a Study Break.

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Various characters in Their Eyes were Watching God have different notions about the best way to gain power in a white-dominated world. Nanny's idea is that her granddaughter should marry a wealthy man so that she doesn't have to worry about her financial security. Joe gains power in the same way that whites traditionally did, by gaining a position of leadership the mayorship and using it to dominate others. However, Janie finds that the type of power that she prefers in a man is personal, rather than constructed. She thinks that a person's power is derived not from their material possessions, but from their personal experiences, and their manner of relating to others. One of the most politically notable aspects of Their Eyes were Watching God, a decidedly apolitical novel, is the concept of black autonomy.

Jim Crow laws were still in effect in the South during the s, keeping blacks and whites in seperate schools, churches, and bathrooms. Eatonville, the town in which Zora Neale Hurston grew up, was famous as the first all-black incorporated municipality in the country. Hurston's novel is a ringing affirmation of black autonomy, portraying a town with a black mayor, post office, and so on. But she questions the methods of the leader of this town, concerned with whether he achieved power through traditionally white avenues. Hurston was by no means a capitalist, but this does not mean that she was unaware of some of the evils of capitalism.

The easiest way to divide the "good" and "bad" characters in this novel is to ask which characters value material possessions. Nanny, Logan, and, to a certain extent, Joe, all value goods because they see how hard it is for African-Americans to attain them. However, their goods only make these characters look foolish. Joe's golden spittoons are a pitiable attempt to approximate the fashions of his white former bosses. Hurston is careful to draw the connection between characters like Janie and Tea Cake and nature, rather than consumable goods. The distinction between activities appropriate for men and those appropriate for women is strongly drawn in the first half of this novel.

Janie is prohibited from speaking her mind, playing checkers, and attending mule funerals. Hurston suggests that these gender constructions are absurd, however. One of Tea Cake's most appealing characteristics is that he empowers Janie to break these rules. Tea Cake encourages her to work, play checkers, speak out, fish, and shoot a gun. There is a high incidence of African-Americans with mixed black and white descent in this novel. Janie's mother, Leafy , was the product of a rape by a plantation master, and was visibly white enough to garner punishment of Nanny by the plantation master's wife. Janie is described as having coffee-colored skin, and Hurston is careful to describe the degree of blackness of all of her characters.

Caucasian characteristics can have a positive Janie's shiny hair or negative Mrs. Turner 's pointed nose and thin lips effect on the character's attractiveness. Hurston is consistent on one point, however, and that is that people who try to look like something that they are not usually whiter than they are always end up looking terrible. Janie differs from many of the other characters in Their Eyes were Watching God in that she is financially stable throughout the book with a fair amount of money in the bank. Therefore, for Janie, work is isolated from making money, and depends entirely on the nature of the labor. Contrary to most people, she enjoys laboring in the field more than clerking in a shop despite the fact that the latter is "higher class" because it allows her to be near nature and the man that she loves.

Janie's naturalism extends beyond her sexuality to include which type of labor she prefers. Discuss the role of silence in the book and how that role changes throughout the novel. Their Eyes Were Watching God SparkNotes Literature Guide Series PRINT EDITION Ace your assignments with our guide to Their Eyes Were Watching God! Search all of SparkNotes Search Suggestions Use up and down arrows to review and enter to select. No Fear Literature Translations Literature Study Guides Glossary of Literary Terms How to Write Literary Analysis. Biography Biology Chemistry Computer Science Drama Economics Film Health History Math Philosophy Physics Poetry Psychology Short Stories Sociology US Government and Politics.

SparkTeach Teacher's Handbook. Character List Janie Mae Crawford Tea Cake Jody Starks Nanny Crawford Mrs. What does the title mean? Why is the porch important? Why is Joe Starks a natural leader? Why are people in Eatonville scandalized by the romance between Janie and Tea Cake? How do Janie and Tea Cake support themselves while they are in the Everglades? How does Janie interact with the women she meets in the Everglades? Why does Janie kill Tea Cake? After she returns to Eatonville, how does Janie let people know what has happened to her in her absence? Important Quotes Explained By Theme Language Marriage Gender Inequality Race.

By Symbol Hair Pear Tree and Horizon The Hurricane By Setting Rural Florida. Suggestions for Further Reading Related Links Movie Adaptations Zora Neale Hurston and Their Eyes Were Watching God Background. Please wait while we process your payment.