Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God is the story of one black woman’s attempt to realize her dreams and to achieve happiness in her life. Throughout the book‚ the reader follows Janie Woods as she travels from one man to the next and from one town to the next in search of happiness‚ freedom‚ and love. Janie abandons her first husband and the oppressive‚ conventional life that she lives with him in order to pursue a more stimulating‚ adventurous‚ and exciting one with Jody Sparks.
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society. Zora Neale Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God is one of the most famous novels of the Harlem Renaissance. The novel focuses on the plight of an African-American woman‚ Janie‚ achieving a joyous‚ respectable life from a humble background. Janie struggled through life due to her mostly unsuccessful search for love. After many years with an oppressive husband‚ Janie finally found her true love and started to live life the way she wanted. This theme can be seen in the way that Hurston wrote
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However‚ occasionally an author would strategically place language and poetic devices in a work making it a glorious and enticing piece to read. Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God is a novel that does such action‚ mixing both language and poetic devices to convey a mood and message. Their Eyes Were Watching God tells the story of an African-American woman name Janie living in the South during the 1900’s. The story spans over her life time starting from her youth days when she was raised
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In Their Eyes Were Watching God‚ Zora Neale Hurston uses the recurring image of Janie’s hair to symbolize the theme of feminine virtues and strengths‚ and capacity of being a bold‚ independent female character in a sexist and racist power-filled society. Before anyone really had a major influence in Janie’s life‚ she was free of worries and was able to wear her finest features given by God. Janie’s beauty brings much attention to her‚ of which other women are envious of; though they still give
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than worrying about how those around her may perceive her. In Their Eyes Were Watching God‚ Zora Neale Hurston uses vivid imagery and metaphors paired with a unique dialect in order to paint a colorful picture of black life in West Florida during the 1930s. The more “literate” language of the narrator paired with the “uneducated” way of speaking in the dialogue creates a
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Dialectical Journal: Their Eyes Were Watching God 1. “Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board. For some they come in with the tide. For others they sail forever on the horizon‚ never out of sight‚ never landing until the Watcher turns his eyes away in resignation‚ his dreams mocked to death by Time. That is the life of men. Now‚ women forget all those things they don’t want to remember‚ and remember everything they don’t want to forget. The dream is the truth. Then they act and do things
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they want to prove that independence to others. No matter the amount of independence a person receives they will always want more. If their independence is snatched away from them‚ they lose the motivation to be who they really are. In Their Eyes Are Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston‚ Janie struggles to break from the confines of Joes‚ her husband‚ control. Hurston’s purpose of using the two symbols Janie’s hair and head wrap is to prove that everyone seeks independence and when it’s taken away‚ a
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Finding one’s voice takes more than a simple ah ha moment. It is a journey that involves finding your identity and embracing it. Identity also plays a large role in your ability to have a voice in the first place. In the United States‚ white men have power and freedoms which afforded them an easier path toward having a voice partly because they have a clear identity in society. The identity of being superior. The same path is riddled with obstacles for women and “Negros” because their roles are more
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World Connection Question: If you were in a unhappy relationship but that you prospered greatly from‚ what would you do? Would you stick it out or look for an escape? Close-Ended Question: What do the townspeople think of Janie when she returns in the beginning of the novel? Open-Ended Question: Is Janie truly not happy with her relationships or is she just dissatisfied? Universal Theme/Core Question: How are personal dreams and goals treated in the novel? Literary Analysis Question:
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An Analysis of Black Folklore in Their Eyes Were Watching God I. Introduction to Zora Neale Hurston and Their Eyes Were Watching God Born in Notasulga‚ Alabama and raised in Eatonville‚ Florida‚ the first incorporated all-black town in America‚ Hurston knew this black culture firsthand. Not only did she grow up in all black community in the south‚ but she traveled throughout the South and in the West Indies as an anthropologist collecting folk materials independently with funding from private
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