The Reinforcement of Racial Hierarchies in Morrison's "The Bluest Eye" and Neal's "The Black Arts Movement"

Toni Morrison, the author of The Bluest Eye, centers her novel around two things: beauty and wealth in their relation to race and a brutal rape of a young girl by her father. Morrison explores and exposes these themes in relation to the underlying factors of black society: racism and sexism. Every character has a problem to deal with and it involves racism and/or sexism. Whether the characters are the victim or the aggressor, they can do nothing about their problem or condition, especially when concerning gender and race. Morrison's characters are clearly at the mercy of preconceived notions maintained by society. Because of these preconceived notions, the racism found in The Bluest Eye is not whites against blacks. Morrison writes about

The Black Arts movement refers to a period of “furious flowering” of African American creativity beginning in the mid-1960’s and continuing through much of the 1970’s (Perceptions of Black). Linked both chronologically and ideologically with the Black Power Movement, The BAM recognized the idea of two cultural Americas: one black and one white. The BAM pressed for the creation of a distinctive Black Aesthetic in which black artists created for black audiences. The movement saw artistic production as the key to revising Black American’s perceptions of themselves, thus the Black Aesthetic was believed to be an integral component of the economic, political, and cultural empowerment of the Black

Throughout Toni Morrison's novel The Bluest Eye, she captures, with vivid insight, the plight of a young African American girl and what she would be subjected to in a media contrived society that places its ideal of beauty on the e quintessential blue-eyed, blonde woman. The idea of what is beautiful has been stereotyped in the mass media since the beginning and creates a mental and emotional damage to self and soul. This oppression to the soul creates a socio-economic displacement causing a cycle of dysfunction and abuses. Morrison takes us through the agonizing story of just such a young girl, Pecola Breedlove, and her aching desire to have what is considered beautiful - blue eyes. Racial stereotypes of beauty contrived and nourished by

The novel The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison presents the certain type of beauty admired by the main character in this fictional story, which seems to be the main content of the novel. The first thing that the people judge is the physical appearance, no matter from which part of the world anyone comes from. The stereotype of defining a beauty in a certain way still prevails in our society. On the other hand, human beings being a social animal, cannot remain secluded from the society. They shape themselves into the societal beliefs, values, trend, culture etc. of the society. Especially, the ones who do not have the tendency or ability to contend are easily influenced. Likewise, the main character, the young black girl self-loathes up to the point

The affiliation between beauty and whiteness limits the concept of beauty only to the person’s exterior. The characters are constantly subjected to images and symbols of whiteness through movies, books, candy, magazines, baby dolls and advertisements. Another example of the images and symbols in the novel is when the black protagonist, Pecola, feasts on a ‘Mary Jane’ candy.

“The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison, is a story about the life of a young black girl, Pecola Breedlove, who is growing up during post World War I. She prays for the bluest eyes, which will “make her beautiful” and in turn make her accepted by her family and peers. The major issue in the book, the idea of ugliness, was the belief that “blackness” was not valuable or beautiful. This view, handed down to them at birth, was a cultural hindrance to the black race.

The desire to feel beautiful has never been more in demand, yet so impossible to achieve. In the book “The Bluest Eye”, the author, Toni Morrison, tells the story of two black families that live during the mid-1900’s. Even though slavery is a thing of the past, discrimination and racism are still a big issue at this time. Through the whole book, characters struggle to feel beautiful and battle the curse of being ugly because of their skin color. Throughout the book Pecola feels ugly and does not like who she is because of her back skin. She believes the only thing that can ever make her beautiful is if she got blue eyes. Frieda, Pecola, Claudia, and other black characters have been taught that the key to being beautiful is by having white skin. So by being black, this makes them automatically ugly. In the final chapter of the book, the need to feel beautiful drives Pecola so crazy that she imagines that she has blue eyes. She thinks that people don’t want to look at her because they are jealous of her beauty, but the truth is they don’t look at her because she is pregnant. From the time these black girls are little, the belief that beauty comes from the color of their skin has been hammered into their mind. Mrs. Breedlove and Geraldine are also affected by the standards of beauty and the impossible goal to look and be accepted by white people. Throughout “The Bluest Eye” Toni Morrison uses the motif of beauty to portray its negative effect on characters.

Racist ideology is institutionalized when how people’s interactions reflects on an understanding that they share the same beliefs. However, in The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, the topic of racism is approached in a very unique way. The characters within the novel are subjected to internalizing a set of beliefs that are extremely fragmented. In accepting white standards of beauty, the community compromises their children’s upbringing, their economic means, and social standings. Proving furthermore that the novel has more to do with these factors than actual ethnicity at all.

Toni Morrison highlights this best in her novel “The Bluest Eye”. “Except for an occasional and unaccountable insurgent who chose a black, they married “up” lightening the family complexion and and thinning out the family features”(Morrison 168). Throughout the book Morrison depicts the differences in treatment of the lighter end and the darker end of the African American race. In Morrison’s book there was a character by the name of Maureen Peal and because Peal was a biracial child both black people and white people adored her, they didn’t abuse her with their words or actions. Peal was safe from the violence against her race and believe she was not black because of it, as though being black was a curse that should feared. Similar to Maureen Peal we are introduced to another character in her same position, her name was Geraldine. With Geraldine readers are able to see the economic differences between black people. Morrison describes the light skinned woman's house as being beautiful and large in contrast the the main character Pecola’s clothes described as “dirty and torn”(Morrison 89-91). This division has carried through the 21st century; today people are still characterising others by the complexion of their skin. Things have improved

Race often plays an important role in how an individual is viewed based on societal standards and quality of life. A vast majority of the characters in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye attribute the difficulties they face and the outcome of their lives to being African American in an era when people with dark pigmentations of skin were viewed as second class citizens. Morrison’s novel focuses on the different spectives of African Americans, both male and female, who differ in the standard by which they live their lives based on their experiences with racism following the depression era of the twentieth century. The issue of race and class is essential in understanding the mindset and actions of characters such as those in The Bluest Eye, the lengths the characters were willing to go to in order to conform to society, and how consequential decisions they made in order to endure and to survive had a lasting impact on the quality of their lives. Race and class defined how characters throughout the novel dealt with elements such as beauty, self awareness, ethnic identity, morality and the idea of society’s opinions.

In this novel, The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, the author depicts a culture in which white people and white lifestyles are idealized and the standards for beauty are very generalized around whites. In this novel, the author questions the truths by which white standards of beauty are held and depicts the impact and growth it has on her characters and the long-term effects of these “beauty standards”. Claudia was much better able to handle rejecting the white, middle class America’s standards of beauty. Claudia and Pecola are similar in the sense that they both suffered from racist beauty standards and abuse growing up. However, Claudia was always the stronger of the two and did not feed into the standards of beauty set in her society.

Although Rosemary is viewed as white, she is still part of the working class. Yet Rosemary looks down on Claudia and Pecola because her father owns a store as well as a car. Although Rosemary is their next door neighbor, material ownership as well as white features sets her apart from them. Rosemary's superiority complex is fostered by a society which views ownership and race as symbols of success.

The Bluest Eye concentrates on the key contemporary American issues: racial and sexual politics. More distinctly, the novel centres on the impact that socially constructed views of race have on gender relations within the black community. As Butler-Evans highlights, “race rather than gender had become the overriding sign for the oppression of black people” and Morrison’s novel responds to this political issue by focusing on this in correlation with the Eurocentric society setting of the novel. The racial oppression suffered by the black community shape ideas of black masculinity based on male feelings of inferiority and consequent sexual oppression of black females. Morrison systematically explores the relationship between the racial oppression of black males and sexual oppression of black females. The main focus of this essay will be an exploration of how racial oppression experienced by black males, specifically Cholly and Junior, relate to the sexual oppression they enforce on black females.

For decades there has been an ongoing discussion on society’s standards of beauty and what makes someone beautiful. In Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye she challenges white standards of beauty. Just like today, the society in Loraine, Ohio establishes a standard of beauty, and this beauty is defined as being as close to white as possible, having blonde hair, blue eyes, and a “Jack and Jill” family. Most of the characters in The Bluest Eye attempt to conform to society’s standards (complicating this idea) and believe if they can achieve at least one of the aspects of beauty their life will be better and they will be treated in higher regards. Through the female characters of Pecola, Claudia, Maureen, Geraldine, and Rosemary it is prevalent that there is a spectrum of beauty and the person who is closest to this standard, white skin, blonde hair, and blue eyes, is considered pretty and is respected by society, while a person who is not close to this standard is considered ugly and is treated poorly by society. By ascribing to society’s expectations of beauty, Geraldine extends the role of white supremacy and undermines her own self-worth.

The middle class black society and the lower class black society, for example, are quite different from each other and are constantly conflicting. In The Bluest Eye, Morrison distinguishes these divisions and their tensions through characters like Geraldine, Junior, and Maureen Peal, who represent the privileged division of black culture. On the contrary, the less privileged division is represented by the MacTeer family and the “relentlessly and aggressively ugly” Breedlove family (The Bluest Eye 38). Tension between the divided African American society is clearly represented by such characterizations throughout Morrison’s novel.