Dust Tracks On A Road Analysis

Hurston tells the story of Janie, a black woman who because of her grandmother experiences and beliefs was forced to marry into a loveless marriage with Logan Killicks, a hard-working farmer who had 60 acres of land and could provide for Janie. This marriage ended when Janie ran away with Joe Stark, a man that she fell in love with and thought could give her the love absent between her and Logan. But Janie soon realized that her second marriage wouldn’t turn out better than her first. Joe was just as controlling and degrading as Logan. He hardly expressed his love for Janie and spoke to her like an incompetent child.

According to Hinrichsen, when the narrator spends time with a wealthy white millionaire who is pedagogic as he “provides a type of instruction in cosmopolitan culture and white upper-class ways” (183). As a result of these lessons, which include taking the narrator to Paris and buying him high quality clothes, the Ex-Colored Man saw himself as being an equal to the millionaire (Hinrichsen 183). However, similar to the narrator’s formal education experience, his time with the narrator is still plagued by plantation language and ideas. Hinrichsen points to the millionaire’s frequent use of “my boy” and his frequent “loaning” of the Ex-Colored Man to his friends as examples of “mastery and ownership” (182). Thus, unlike her first supporting point, Hinrichsen illustrates how the narrative of being was created by the narrator.

Hurston’s metaphors help the reader to understand the great deal of oppression that the handkerchief symbolizes. The author’s metaphors such as “girl was gone”, “woman had taken her place”, and “the glory was there” emphasize that Janie is able to reveal her true beauty in overcoming her struggles. The author implies that by Janie uncovering her hair, she is revealing the constant shadow that has prevented her from her self-examination and in finding her true identity. The author’s metaphors are used to help the reader understand that the moment for an individual to overcome a struggle is profoundly beautiful and

Hurston narrates belief to motivate African American women to conquer and be strong. (49) The story finally tells that Janie found liberty and tranquility in her life. Her experience reflects on promoting women’s

The Harlem Renaissance is widely considered the uprising of African American culture. The duration of this movement started in the 1920s and went on until the start of the Great Depression. This age reflected African Americans' talent to flourish through cultural, social, and artistic events. Zora Neale Hurston’s, “Their Eyes Were Watching God” reflects and departs ideas from the Harlem Renaissance to bring perspective to black womanhood in America. Through the character of Janie Crawford, Hurston explores the complexities of black femininity and identity, defying the male-dominated narratives at the time.

In Zora Neale Hurston’s short story “Sweat” and her essay “How It Feels to Be Colored Me” the African American social group is being represented in many ways. The texts have similar ways that African Americans are represented for the time period. The African Americans or “colored people” are represented in an aspect that comes from the author's point of view. The African Americans are represented as being unbothered, growing up in a closed community, playing the game with whites, and optimistic.

Zora Hurston uses vivid imagery, natural diction, and several literary tools in her essay “How It Feels to Be Colored Me”. Hurston’s use of imagery, diction, and literary tools in “How It Feels to Be Colored Me” contributes to, and also compliments, the essay’s theme which is her view on life as a “colored” person. Throughout “How It Feels to Be Colored Me” Hurston carefully incorporates aspects of her African American culture in an effort to recapture her ancestral past. Hurston’s use of imagery, diction, and use of literary tools shape her essay into a piece of Harlem Renaissance work. Imagery in “How It Feels to Be Colored Me” is quite abundant.

In Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, the long-lasting effects of slavery have taken a toll on Janie Crawford. Janie’s grandmother was raped by her master and had a child named Leafy. Leafy, although not born into slavery, endured a similar fate, which led her to run away, leaving her mother to raise her child, Janie. Janie’s appearance, showing strong European features, was both praised and shamed by society. This double standard was created by racism and was able to remain present due to segregation.

The empowerment of black women wasn 't present in the Harlem Renaissance and in this novel it shows the empowerment of black women. Zora Neale Hurston’s writing in Their Eyes Were Watching God, departs from the Harlem Renaissance through the common recurrence of black women

During this rough time period, segregation was common and prohibition was recently introduced. Along with this, many other social and political issues played a role in Hurston's "Sweat." Consequently, a historical background of the early twentieth century would be ideal in order for the reader to better comprehend and appreciate the work thoroughly. In this story, Hurston writes about Delia and Syke's work lives. In the early 1900's, approximately sixty percent of African American woman and about twenty percent of men were employed (Mclaughlin).During this time period, men felt that they were vastly superior over women.

As Maria Tai Wolff says “for telling to be successful, it must become a presentation of sights with words. The best talkers are “big picture talkers”. For Hurston, the construction of African American identity requires a voice that can make you see, a voice that celebrates the visible presence of black bodies.

Rather than being disturbed by another, Hurston demands not to be woken. It would seem, then, that her positioning in western literature, unearthed by Walker, is an effect entirely of the poet's own. Hurston's connections remained undisturbed for years after her increasingly limited participation in the Harlem Renaissance. In one sense, her webs continued to glisten for those like Walker who expected to find them. “Journey's End,” while a cryptic reprisal of the author's own beginning, demonstrates the unfaltering power of meticulous craft.

In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston wrote in a way that conveyed a message through her characters, using a storytelling "frame" to express her ideas. Hurston did not stop by means to get her point across. Hurston uses Janie’s thoughts and actions to represents how during Reconstruction, African Americans were trying to find their identities and achieve their dreams of independence. At the start of the novel Hurston begins to illustrate how African Americans in Eatonville feel about their lives.

Zora Neale Hurston’s book, “The Gilded Six-Bits” is an important piece of literature due to its impact on the world during the Harlem Renaissance era. It is considered a brilliant piece of modernist literature due to Hurston staying true to her background and roots as a black woman from the south, in which segregation was still a huge issue. The reason why it is considered a piece of modernist literature is because she wasn’t afraid to write in the black vernacular which was considered uneducated as blacks were progressing in arts, literature, and the music was alive. The story is filled with many different themes and issues that people can relate to such as money, deceit, and for people who have a big heart forgiveness and reconciliation.

The story represents the culmination of Wright’s passionate desire to observe and reflect upon the racist world around him. Racism is so insidious that it prevents Richard from interacting normally, even with the whites who do treat him with a semblance of respect or with fellow blacks. For Richard, the true problem of racism is not simply that it exists, but that its roots in American culture are so deep it is doubtful whether these roots can be destroyed without destroying the culture itself. “It might have been that my tardiness in learning to sense white people as "white" people came from the fact that many of my relatives were "white"-looking people. My grandmother, who was white as any "white" person, had never looked "white" to me” (Wright 23).