Their Eyes Were Watching God

1
Their Eyes Were Watching God

• 1. Setting the Context
• 2. Revisiting the Question of Language
• - reproducing power through the marginalized
  language
• - intersection of gender, class and sexuality
• 3. Contesting Dominant Narratives
• - slave narrative, Booker T. Washington and
  black nationalism

2
Alain Locke and the New Negro

• Du Boiss talented tenth and racial uplift
• Transform the stereotypical image of African
  Americans
• Cultural transformation would take place through
  the cultivation of African American art, music
  and literature.

3
Early Critiques of the Novel

• Painted an unrealistic picture of black life in
  the south
• Not critical enough of the treatment of blacks by
  whites in the south
• Novel had no theme or meaningout of line with
  serious fiction of the time, it was a useless
  love story.

4
Post-1970 Reviews

• For most black women readers discovering
• Their Eyes for the first time, what was most
• compelling was the figure of Janie Crawford
• powerful, articulate, self-reliant, and radically
  
• different from any woman character they had
• ever before encountered in literature
• (Washington xi).

5
Nourbese Philip

• In She Tries . . . I set out to be
• unmanageable. I refused to know my
• place, the place set apart for the
• managed peoples of the world.I intended
• to define my own place and space and in
• so doing I would come up against the
• role of language and the issues relating
• to that (296).

6
Their Eyes

• What she doin coming back here in dem overalls?
• Cant she find no dress to put on?Wheres dat
  blue
• satin dress she left here in?Where all that
  money
• her husband took and died and left her?What dat
• ole forty year ole oman doin wid her hair
  swingin
• down her back lak some young gal?Where she left
• dat young lad of a boy she went off here wid?
• Thought she was going to marry?Where he left
• her?What he done wid all her money?Betcha he
• off wid some gal so young she aint even got no
• hairsWhy she dont stay in her class? (2)

7
Their Eyes

• Ah aint never seen mah papa. Ah didnt know im
  if
• Ah did. Mah mama neither (8).
• Ah was wid dem white chillun so much till Ah
  didnt
• know Ah wuznt white till Ah was round six years
  old
• when we all looked at the picture and everybody
  got
• pointed out there wasnt nobody left except a
  real dark
• little girl with long hairwhere is me? Ah dont
  see
• me Dats you, Alphabet, dont you know yo
• ownself? Aw, aw! Ahm colored! (8-9)

8
Their Eyes

• Ah was born back due in slavery so it wasnt
• for me to fulfill my dreams of whut a woman
• oughta be and do. Dats one of de hold-backs
• of slavery . . .Ah wanted to preach a great
• sermon about colored women sittin on high,
• but they wasnt no pulpit for me . . . Ah said
• Ahd save de text for you. Ah been waiting a
• long time Janie, but nothin Ah been through
• aint too much if you just take a stand on high
• ground lak Ah dreamed (16).

9
Their Eyes

• She hated her grandmother and had hidden it
• from herself all these years under a cloak of
• pity. . .Nanny had taken the biggest thing God
• ever made, the horizon. . .and pinched it into
• such a little bit of a thing that she could tie
  it
• around her granddaughters neck tight enough
• to choke her (89).

10
Nourbese Philip

• To think of ourselves as marginalized is to put
• us forever at the edge and not center stage.
• The word margin, however, has another
• meaning which I prefer to think of when it is
• used as a descriptive term for managed
• peoplesit also means frontierFrom margin
• to frontieris an important and liberating first
• stepand demands nothing less than a
• profound revolution in thinking and
• metamorphosis in consciousness (300).

11
Their Eyes

• So she was free and the judge and
• everybody up there smiled with her and shook
• her hand. And the white women cried and
• stood around her like a protecting wall and the
• Negroes, with heads hung down, shuffled out
• and away Aw you know dem white mens
• wuznt gointuh do nothin tuh no woman dat
• look lak her (188-189).