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Themes contributing to janie's self discovery
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Those living in today’s world are constantly bombarded with the stereotypes and distorted images of a consumerist society. As a result, they often struggle with a loss of identity because mass media try to dictate what they should want to be and do. Zora Neale Hurston tackles this age-old search for self-discovery in her fictional frame story Their Eyes Were Watching God. Janie Crawford tells her best friend, Pheoby, about her quest for her own voice, despite setbacks in the form of relatives, two husbands, and entire towns that attempt to silence her. From a young age, Janie yearns for enlightenment; however, the roles Nanny, Logan Killicks, and Joe Starks force upon her prevent her from reaching selfhood until she meets and falls in love with Tea Cake, her equal. Recovering from an identity crisis that lasted most of her childhood, Janie realizes who she wants to be with the help of a pear tree, but her grandmother disapproves of her dissimilar feelings and forces her to cast away her horizon. With no parents there to raise her, Janie loses her sense of identity. She spends her childhood under the care of her grandma and the white people Nanny works for, and as a result, she spends all of her time playing with the Washburn’s four children. Janie does not realize that she is different from them until she turns six. When she sees a photograph of herself for the first time, she refuses to recognize her darker skin color. To compensate for her lack of self, she goes by the nickname “Alphabet” because she has so many different names. Both her connection to the Washburn family and her biracial ethnicity isolate her from the black and white communities. African-American children mock her for her nice clothes; vulnerable and frail, Jani... ... middle of paper ... ...w behind Joe in his shadow, Janie experiences a loss of identity because, like Logan, her husband treats her as an object—a thing no smarter than livestock that only serves to make the life of its owner easier. He commands that she tie up her beautiful hair in an old rag, showing that no matter how many times Janie attempts to assert her opinion, Joe will always have power over her. Joe perpetuates his wife’s submission until he becomes decrepit and sick. His death brings Janie’s independence, and she lets down her hair to demonstrate her regained liberation. No longer willing to “run off down a back road after things,” the empowered Janie will only settle for her horizon (Hurston 89). Janie’s oppressive marriages to Logan Killicks and Joe Starks take away her freedom of expression, but her unrestrained voice returns after she escapes these poisonous relationships.
Zora Hurston’s novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God” depicts the journey of a young woman named Janie Crawford’s journey to finding real love. Her life begins with a romantic and ideal view on love. After Janie’s grandmother, Nanny, soon grows fearful of Janie’s newfound sexuality and quickly marries Janie off to Logan Killicks, an older land owner with his own farm. Janie quickly grows tired of Logan and how he works her like a slave instead of treating her as a wife and runs away with Joe Starks. Joe is older than Janie but younger than Logan and sweet talks Janie into marring him and soon Joe becomes the mayor of an all African American town called Eatonville. Soon Joe begins to force Janie to hide not only her
In the beginning of the novel, Janie attempts to find her voice and identity; the task, of harnessing
Janie’s character undergoes a major change after Joe’s death. She has freedom. While the town goes to watch a ball game Janie meets Tea Cake. Tea Cake teaches Janie how to play checkers, hunt, and fish. That made Janie happy. “Somebody wanted her to play. Somebody thought it natural for her to play. That was even nice. She looked him over and got little thrills from every one of his good points” (Hurston 96). Tea Cake gave her the comfort of feeling wanted. Janie realizes Tea Cake’s difference from her prior relationships because he wants her to become happy and cares about what she likes to do. Janie tells Pheoby about moving away with Tea Cake and Pheoby tells her that people disapprove of the way she behaves right after the death of her husband. Janie says she controls her life and it has become time for her to live it her way. “Dis ain’t no business proposition, and no race after property and titles. Dis is uh love game. Ah done lived Grandma’s way, now Ah means tuh live mine” (Hurston 114). Janie becomes stronger as she dates Tea Cake because she no longer does for everyone else. Janie and Tea Cake decided to move to the Everglades, the muck. One afternoon, a hurricane came. The hurricane symbolizes disaster and another change in Janie’s life. “Capricious but impersonal, it is a concrete example of the destructive power found in nature. Janie, Tea Cake, and their friends can only look on in terror as the hurricane destroys the
In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston uses colloquial language to show readers exactly why Nanny raised her granddaughter, Janie Crawford, the way she did. When Janie is sixteen years old, her grandmother wants to marry her. The teen pleads to her grandmother for claims of not knowing anything about having a husband. Nanny explains the reason she wants to see Janie married off is because she is getting old and fears once she dies, Janie will be lost and will lack protection. Janie’s mother was raped by a school teacher at the young age of seventeen, which is how Janie was brought into the world.
People are constantly searching for their voices. A voice gives someone independence and the ability to make her own decision. The First Amendment ensures that all United States citizens possess the freedom of speech; however, not all people are given the ability or opportunity to exercise that right. When a person has no voice they rely on others to make their decisions. Throughout Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Are Watching God, Janie constantly struggles to find her voice. Her marriage to Logan Killicks, Joe Starks, and Tea Cake help her discover and utilize her voice in different ways. During Janie’s first marriage to Logan she has no voice, Joe silences Janie’s tiniest whisper and controls her similar to a slave; in contrast to Logan and Joe, Tea Cake encourages Janie to use her voice and make her own decisions. Janie cannot express her voice until she discovers happiness and independence through her final marriage.
Janie’s first discovery about herself comes when she is a child. She is around the age of six when she realizes that she is colored. Janie’s confusion about her race is based on the reasoning that all her peers and the kids she grows up with are white. Janie and her Nanny live in the backyard of the white people that her Nanny works for. When Janie does not recognize herself on the picture that is taken by a photographer, the others find it funny and laughs, leaving Janie feeling humiliated. This racial discovery is not “social prejudice or personal meanness but affection” (Cooke 140). Janie is often teased at school because she lives with the white people and dresses better than the other colored kids. Even though the kids that tease her were all colored, this begins Janie’s experience to racial discrimination.
During her marriage to Joe, Janie reflects on how Nanny’s strict upbringing has influenced her life and concludes that “Nanny had taken the biggest thing God ever made, the horizon-- for no matter how far a person can go the horizon is still a little way beyond you, and pinned it in...” (89). Hurston emphasizes the vastness of the horizon as a way of alluding to the countless possibilities it holds. In saying that Nanny “pinned it in”, Hurston argues that Nanny was too narrow-minded to appreciate the opportunity held by the horizon, scared of the freedom it held. Nanny breeds this fear in Janie by imposing her own values on her without allowing Janie to discover what was important for her. Clogging the horizon provided the control she inherently craved, a desire implanted in her by the materialistic beliefs she held. A smaller horizon made Nanny feel as though she was closer to achieving her dreams, but in reality, all it did was narrow her options. By clogging the horizon and its limitless possibilities, Nanny clogged her “veil” as well, making it more difficult to sift through (what she valued in life?) good and
She is unaware of life?s two most precious gifts: love and the truth. Janie is raised by her suppressive grandmother, who diminishes her view of life. Janie?s quest for true identity emerges from her paths in life and ultimately ends when her mind is freed from mistaken reality. Failing to recognize herself as the one black child in a photograph, Janie begins her story without a name or color (Meese 62). Do all usters call me Alphabet?
The beginning of Janie’s marriage to Joe shows promise and adventure, something that young Janie is quickly attracted to. She longs to get out of her loveless marriage to Logan Killicks and Joe’s big dreams captivate Janie. Once again she hopes to find the true love she’s always dreamed of. Joe and Janie’s life is first blissful. He gives her whatever she wants and after he becomes the mayor of a small African American town called Eatonville, they are the most respected couple in town. Joe uses his newfound power to control Janie. When she is asked to make a speech at a town event, she can’t even get out a word before Joe denies her the privilege. He starts making her work in the store he opens and punishes her for any mistakes she makes. He enjoys the power and respect her gets when o...
Although not the beginning of her life story, the book starts with a prominent description of Janie: “The men noticed her firm buttocks like she had grape fruits in her hip pockets! The great rop of black hair swinging to her waist an unraveling in the wind like a plum” (Hurston 2). Janie is the center of attention when it comes to looks, but as things progress, she finds herself caught up in a tangle of sexualization.
As the novel begins, Janie walks into her former hometown quietly and bravely. She is not the same woman who left; she is not afraid of judgment or envy. Full of “self-revelation”, she begins telling her tale to her best friend, Phoeby, by looking back at her former self with the kind of wistfulness everyone expresses when they remember a time of childlike naïveté. She tries to express her wonderment and innocence by describing a blossoming peach tree that she loved, and in doing so also reveals her blossoming sexuality. To deter Janie from any trouble she might find herself in, she was made to marry an older man named Logan Killicks at the age of 16. In her naïveté, she expected to feel love eventually for this man. Instead, however, his love for her fades and she beco...
Through her three marriages, the death of her one true love, and proving her innocence in Tea Cake’s death, Janie learns to look within herself to find her hidden voice. Growing as a person from the many obstacles she has overcome during her forty years of life, Janie finally speaks her thoughts, feelings and opinions. From this, she finds what she has been searching for her whole life, happiness.
Janie’s incredible search for voice and autonomy starts under the pear tree. The pear tree represents the standard of Janie’s emotional accomplishment in the novel (Berridge 8). Nanny decides to marry Janie off to Logan Killicks after seeing Janie kiss Johnny Taylor. Nanny says, “Yeah, Janie, youse got yo’ womanhood on yuh. So Ah moutez well tel yuh whut Ah been savin’ up for uh spell. Ah wants you married right away. (Hurston 12)” Nanny thinks marrying Janie off to Logan is the best way to protect her. At first, Janie disagrees with Nanny’s decision, she declares, “Me married? Naw, Nanny, no ma’aam” (12). After a bit of grumbling, naive Janie accepts to marry Logan Killick...
The contrast of these two places reinforces the theme of a search for love and fulfillment. To see what an ideal situation for an independent woman like would be, Hurston must first show the reader what Janie cannot deal with. Hurston has her character Janie go on a quest, one that was begun the day she was forced to marry Logan Killucks. The contrast in the setting is similar to one between good and evil.
Zora Neal Hurston’s book, Their Eyes Were Watching God, reveals one of life’s most relevant purposes that stretches across cultures and relates to every aspect of enlightenment. The novel examines the life of the strong-willed Janie Crawford, as she goes down the path of self-discovery by way of her past relationships. Ideas regarding the path of liberation date all the way back to the teachings of Siddhartha. Yet, its concept is still recycled in the twenty-first century, as it inspires all humanity to look beyond the “horizon,” as Janie explains. Self-identification, or self-fulfillment, is a theme that persists throughout the book, remaining a quest for Janie Crawford to discover, from the time she begins to tell the story to her best friend, Pheoby Watson. Hurston makes a point at the beginning of the novel to separate the male and female identities from one another. This is important for the reader to note. The theme for identity, as it relates to Janie, carefully unfolds as the story goes on to expand the depths of the female interior.