Ntozake Shange's View Of The Oppression Of Colored Women

The passage “Lesson for Women” was a very informative and interesting work to read about. After reading the piece multiple times I would definitely recommend this to someone willing to learn about different eras. I think that close reading this piece was very important since it uncovered many great things I never thought of glancing over in the beginning. If someone had the chance to read this work and was hesitant I would definitely tell them to go ahead and read it since I enjoyed, it very

As with Chinese women, slave women in the U.S. experienced complete losses of power over their lives. Slaves were forced to live their lives to the orders of their masters just as these Chinese wives were forced to live their lives to the orders of their husbands and higher wives. By given no chance to survive by themselves and maintain an identity, these women suffered from great losses of self-esteem and hope. As far as non-slave women in the U.S. are concerned, their lives are comparable to those lives of Chinese women, as well. Non-slave women in the times of slavery and Chinese women both experienced great inequities and discriminations. Women in both situations were given very few rights and chances to survive by themselves. Many of these women chose to give up their freedom and power for the protection and secure lifestyle that a man could provide, despite how damaging it may be to their identity and self-esteem.

This class has brought a lot of change to my views on the seemingly everlasting prevalence of sexism in America. Before taking women and writing this semester I had not realized how the stereotypes surrounding masculine identity have taken hold of much of the Greek life on college campuses, male-dominated/labor intensive jobs, as well as influencing a significant portion of the mainstream advertising and media that my peers and I consume on a daily basis. The readings that accompanied the course were clear, informative, and provided me with more insight to the challenges and inequality that women have had to confront in the past and continue to face in the present. This class taught me many things about the current

This was extremely sad and portrayed a painful picture of how slaves were treated and the emotional turmoil they endured while living as slaves. The protagonist discusses how she was a victim of sexual violence, be treated by her master and her mistress, how slavery made her lose her innocence and they ability to feel safe.The protagonist discusses how she was a victim of sexual violence,betrayed by her master and her mistress, how slavery made her lose her innocence ad the ability to feel safe.She described how she lived in fear of reprimands from her master should she reveal his sexual request to her. Slavery affected southern society because the white women born to the slave owner had to watch their husbands do as they wish with

Firstly, oppression is evident through various types of abuse through the main characters, Aminata and Celie. Both have faced several forms of abuse such as physical, emotional, mental and sexual abuse that have stripped away their identity and dignity. For instance, Aminata fights for her freedom throughout her entire life, only to suffer from physical abuse almost everyday on the slave ship and to suffer from sexual abuse on the plantations. Moreover, Aminata

In analysis of the texts of these plays, it becomes evident that both periods and cultures suffered from similar types of problems with interracialism, though to a slightly greater and more violent extent in the latter piece of Hughes’s. However, merely analyzing the texts sketches an often incomplete picture, as these plays were, to a large extent, created for the purpose of protesting and attempting to manipulate the very attitudes they presented. Therefore, in order to truly consider how the nature and extent of attitudes towards interracialism had evolved from the pre-Civil War to the Harlem Renaissance, one must look not only at the texts of the plays, but also to their critical commentaries, manipulation in pre-production, and audience responses. These sources outside of the texts greatly contribute to the conclusion that although discrimination, maliciousness, and brutality were problems that accompanied interracialism in both periods, they were slightly increased in intensity and nature in the Harlem Renaissance of the 1930’s compared to the late 1850’s.

Though there was a heightened sense of tension over civil rights in the late 1950s when A Raisin in the Sun was written, racial inequality is still a problem today. It affects minorities of every age and dynamic, in more ways than one. Though nowadays it may go unnoticed, race in every aspect alters the way African-Americans think, behave, and react as human beings. This is shown in many ways in the play as we watch the characters interact. We see big ideas, failures, and family values through the eyes of a disadvantaged group during an unfortunate time in history. As Martin Luther King said, Blacks are “...harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what

the play are ―rich symbol[s]‖ that convey the barriers of a ―racist society‖ (Kenny par. 18). The

In a time period when women were considered inferior, as were blacks, it was unimaginable the horrors a black woman in the south had to endure during this period. African women were slaves and subject to the many horrors that come along with being in bondage, but because they were also women, they were subject to the cruelties of men who look down on women as inferior simply because of their sex. The sexual exploitation of these females often lead to the women fathering children of their white masters. Black women were also prohibited from defending themselves against any type of abuse, including sexual, at the hands of white men. If a slave attempted to defend herself she was often subjected to further beatings from the master. The black female was forced into sexual relationships for the slave master’s pleasure and profit. By doing this it was the slave owner ways of helping his slave population grow.

The Bostonians, by Henry James was a very interesting piece. James' underlying tone for the spiritualism and fascination is clearly a picture of the time when the piece was written. I thought that is played an important influence in his writing. Ruth Hall, by Fanny Fern is an unofficial biography of her own life as a women activist. One of the underlying issues that stand out in her novel is the way that she includes the lower-class women right along with the middle-class. This was not a common ideal shared by all women activists at this time. Both of these underlying issues in these books keep the reader interested it their works.

She emphasizes that the life of a slave woman is incomparable to the life of a slave man, in the sense that a woman’s sufferings are not only physical but also extremely mental and emotional. Whether or not a slave woman is beaten, starved to death, or made to work in unbearable circumstances on the fields, she suffers from and endures horrible mental torments. Unlike slave men, these women have to deal with sexual harassment from white men, most often their slave owners, as well as the loss of their children in some cases. Men often dwell on their sufferings of bodily pain and physical endurance as slaves, where as women not only deal with that but also the mental and emotional aspect of it. Men claim that their manhood and masculinity are stripped from them, but women deal with their loss of dignity and morality. Females deal with the emotional agony as mothers who lose their children or have to watch them get beaten, as well as being sexually victimized by white men who may or may not be the father of their children. For these women, their experiences seem unimaginable and are just as difficult as any physical punishment, if not more so.

One of my favorite books we read in class was Fun Home written by Alison Bechdel. This was one of my favorites because of her writing style and the way she showed her women’s and gender issues. She uses a lot of detail as she writes which is one thing I like about her writing style. Another thing I like about her writing style is the way she describes the issues that she has encountered. For example, she uses the pictures to help the reader better understand how she has struggled. I find that this helps me better understand the plot of the story. This story has greatly changed how I feel about women’s and gender issues. Before reading this story, I did not realize how many issues women suffer from regarding who they are. Bechdel shows her struggle with her father and being a lesbian.

During my English comp summer session class, I was instructed to read several essays and give my feedback on them. In my opinion, the last three writings were probably the most memorable and important. “Hurricane Katrina”, a story on the immediate and after affects of Hurricane Katrina on the city of New Orleans, was first of these three stories. It focused on real life experiences of people who lived through it, victims giving their heartrending testimonies. “It’s Not Just A Bike”, is about Lacey Taylor and her tireless pursuit in her cause to help bring to a halt thieves stealing bikes from off her school campus. Another story I read was “Free The Children”. It gave constructive criticism to parents who would not generally let

The origin of this novel stems from a time with great attitude changes within the African-American way of life. Tensions between gender specifically had begun to emerge, women, who were thought of as subservient, belonging to the house as well as to their husbands. During the timeframe of this story, women had been beginning to emerge with dignity, grace, and authority. The play takes place in Pittsburgh, during the 1950’s when the gap between genders had been shrinking, as women had been introduced further into society as more than just mothers. To most, this diminishing gap, to most would be a seamless concept, however, to the characters of this play would be a deciding factor for many conflicting scenes. The main characters of this play

“For Colored Girls” involves seven women who represents a different shade of the rainbow. The colors are brown, red, yellow, white, green, orange and blue. Their costumes and make-up transformed each of them and were significant of the color their character embodied. As a group their acting made all of their roles of equal importance, without one dominating the other. These women together formed a bond through their various adversities, gradually taking them from strangers to companion. From an objective view, the audience is allowed to simply observe the events as they take place chronologically. Throughout the movie during some of the conflicting and traumatic scenes, one of the women recites a poem to signify and release the emotion being felt at that time.