Their Eyes Were Watching God By Zora Hurston

Throughout life, everybody makes sacrifices that may become more beneficial to him or in ways they could not foresee. A sacrifice may be simply giving up an object or giving up something deeper in meaning. Their Eyes Were Watching God is a prime example of a book that reflects this theme. In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, the main character, Janie, struggles to figure out her identity and what she desires in life. As she matures in her relationships and in life, she learns to make sacrifices in order to seek what she really needs. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston illuminates Janie’s values and the text’s emphasis on self-actualization is demonstrated through Janie leaving stability with Logan to marry Joe,

Feminism and gender equality is one of the most important issues of society today, and the debate dates back much farther than Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God. To analyze Janie’s existence as a feminist or anti-feminist character requires a potential critic to look at her relationships and her reactions to those relationships throughout the novel. Trudier Harris claims that Janie is “questing after a kind of worship.” This statement is accurate only up until a certain point in her life, until Janie’s “quest” becomes her seeking equality with her partner. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie’s main goal pertaining to her romantic relationships undergoes multiple changes from her original goal of a type of worship to a goal to maintain an equal relationship with her husband.

Persistence is a firm continuance of action in spite of past obstacles and opposition. This is what women like Janie Crawford in Zora Neale Hurston’s novel had to have, to get through traumatic events such as domestic violence and oppression from other men. In Their Eyes Were Watching God the main character Janie Crawford faced oppression and domestic violence, but instead of this holding her back it made a stronger woman by the end of the novel.

In the novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie Mae Crawford deals with her loss of self and rediscovering herself through symbols that describe each of her relationships. After Janie discovers what she thinks love is, she undergoes three marriages that define her idea of love through the way her husbands treat her and the recurring symbols that appear in each one. These relationships range from passionless to abusive to positive and inseparable. The symbols act as either a help or a hindrance to her journey of realizing what love is. As Janie journeys to find herself, the pear tree, the gate, her hair, and her voice symbolize each of her relationships and the things she learns about herself as she discovers what authentic love and autonomy truly means.

Janie’s marriage to Logan takes the reader to another level. Throughout her marriage, because she was unlearned of things, Janie had to continually ask about this and that. Janie never loved Logan. She was forced into this marriage by her

After only two weeks of knowing him, she runs away with him. Instead of shutting down the notion of running away, like a married woman in love would, Janie “debated the matter” (28). Janie jumps at the chance to escape her old, overbearing husband by taking a chance with Jody, someone she barely knew. She went blindly into another marriage. Her naïve ways lead her to believe that she could easily find the love which she desired with someone she scarcely knew. Janie would soon come to realize that even though her husband loved her, his love was not what she was looking for. In fact, Janie came to notice the absence of her love for Jody very shortly after she and Jody settled down in a new town.

The first type of the love that Janie experiences are protective love from her Nanny (her grandmother). Her Nanny strives for her to have a better life than she ever did, and wants to make sure that Janie is well taken car of. This protective love that Nanny bestows to Janie is the way Nanny forces the arranged marriage with Logan Killicks. With Logan, Janie had the similar protective love much like Nanny had provided her. Logan owned a 60-acre potato farm, which represents a sense of security for Janie. Living on such a large acre Janie had to put it a lot of work on the farm. Janie was getting tired of working on the farm and wanted to be able to travel to the town with Logan but he never allowed because there was work that needed to be done on the farm. Even though Janie was given protection and land this type of love is not the one she had always desired.

The Harlem Renaissance was an artistic and cultural movement that took place in Harlem, New York after World War I until the 1930s. During this time many African-Americans including Zora Neale Hurston, used the movement to express their views on race and gender and used their voices to speak out for their rights and beliefs. By developing Janie’s relationships and how they affect her, Hurston demonstrates through Their Eyes Were Watching God that many factors can limit or influence man’s decision to speak out. Janie’s grandmother Nanny, who acts as Janie’s major female influence in her childhood, authoratively tells Janie how to live her life.

In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston presents a story of self-love as Janie goes from one love to the next in hopes of finding someone to value her. Initially Janie sees that she is more than just a possession and being mistreated. She knows that she can find better. Later she finds Joe and believes that she is valuable because of her looks, and he just sees her as a possession and not his wife but this does not last. Eventually Joe dies, and Janie is single again and must decide on what to do for love. This time around, Janie finds her own voice, and she finds love with Vergible “ Tea Cake” Woods who embraces her as a full person. Vergible “Tea Cake” Woods wanted to talk to Janie to and listen to her whatever she has to say. Vergible “ Tea Cake” did not force Janie to do anything that she did not want to do. In her other relationships, they were dominate and want to control or use her for their own image. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie’s journey from one marriage to another reveals her discovery of her own value. How does each man view Janie? What does she learn in each marriage? How is she different in the end of the book from the beginning? How does Janie feel about herself and each of her husband 's? Does Janie value herself?

Who has power? In the book Their Eyes Were Watching God, men have the upper hand. while the women did not and were seen more as an obeying pet. Throughout the book Zora Hurston show men dominating Janie (main character) through her three marriages. Janie 's first husband, Logan Killicks, uses his power to use her as a worker. Janie 's second husband, Joe Starks, uses his power on Janie to make her obey him and is not allowed to talk to other men. Now Janie 's last Husband, Teacake, uses his power to make Janie follow him wherever he goes. Why would Hurston portray men as powerful and women as powerless? Is it because this is the way our society depicts men? That men should be tough, fearless, and strong. Creating a tough interior

Everyone in the world today whether is be now or later on in your life, hopes to find a special someone that can spent the rest on their life with and fall in love as well. In the Novel, Their eyes were watching god written by Zora Neal Hurston, this is exactly what the main character Janie goal is. Janie encounters three different man she hopes to achieve her life goals and fall in love with. Each relationship that she experiences differs due to the different cultural context present or brought by each man. The relationship that stands out the most to me is her second relationship with Joe Starks(Jody). Janie is introduced to Jody when she is working outside and see him walking past. She is instantly faltered, and lets down her long hair to show she in interested in him. Jody notices her, and makes his feeling towards her apparent. He tells her to meet him the next morning, if she is interested to start a new life with him. The next morning, she meets him in the morning, and this begins their new relationship together. In this novel, Jody surrounds Janie with a cultural context containing a lack of respect, companionship and authority in marriage which restricts janie from truly expressing her love for him.

According to leading psychologist Abraham Maslow and his Hierarchy Of Needs model, human beings have a variety of needs that must be met before they progress. The need to be included and belong to a group is second only to the need for safety and food and water. If this need is not satisfied, the chronic anxiousness developed from wanting to be included could cripple success in correctly choosing between the decisions and judgements of daily life. This anxiousness is prevalent in literature and is expressed as fear of not belonging and become a social outcast. This fear of not being accepted into a population causes conformity, behavior that adheres only to accepted standards, which ultimately inhibits social progress.

The first man Janie marries is Logan Killicks. It was not her decision to marry him however. It was her grandmother 's decision. Janie does not want to marry Logan at all. Nanny wants her to marry Logan because he has a lot of land and will protect Janie. Nanny says "Tain’t Logan Killicks Ah wants you to have, baby, it’s protection. Ah ain’t gittin’ ole, honey, Ah’m done ole"(Hurston 15).She says this because she wants Janie to have protection and to avoid the fate that she and Janie 's mother had. She does not care if Janie loves him or not right now. She wants Janie to be well off and safe before she dies. Nanny tells Janie she will learn to love him once they are married. When she marries Logan she is sixteen years old. Their relationship is good in the beginning, but she does not love him. Also, Janie feels bored and confined by his rules. She is unhappy with the way Logan

The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, written by Zora Neale Hurston, centralizes over the story of Janie Crawford. The story starts out with middle- age Janie visiting her home in Eatonville. The town begins to gossip about her clothing and her younger husband. Janie tells Pheoby her life story in order to relay it to the townspeople and end the gossiping. She believes that she does not need to explain herself to the people.

Janie's first love Logan Killicks was the start of her journey from becoming a young lady into a woman. She got married for