...Cathcart 1 Ciera Cathcart Period 0 Mrs.Allan Honors English 28 April 2014 The Hidden Outlier Truth Lies, fairness and kindness is the reality of all americans no matter what color, race, or who you are. Nobody wants to be singled out ever.The treatment of women has always been a hard subject in society and many subjects of novels. Walker dramatically shows realistic imagery, as she reels the reader in by conditions black women put up with and what life can be like when you are abused. In The Color Purple ,by Alice Walker, tackles the subject of sexism in communties. The first amendment does issue the fact that women's rights should be their and that everyone has the freedom, and that we all have quality The Color Purple written by Alice Walker should not be banned, through various arguments. Some including that it is an honest depiction of African-American life in the early 20th century, it addresses child abuse issues, rape, that still need to be addressed in our society, and because the freedom of speech is a constitutional right. The Color Purple was banned due to explicit language, sexual content, and racist stereotypes. Although, you would think the banning of the book is very difficult or hard but it is actually simple. There are two different ways to get a book removed, either banning or challenging. Banning a book is the removal no matter what. A Challenged book is when its an attempt to remove...
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...Religion in ‘Wuthering Heights’ & ‘The Color Purple’ March 30, 2012 Orthodoxy in ‘Wuthering Heights’ Wuthering Heights takes orthodox Victorian Christian religion and turns it on its head. The narrative is delivered to us by Lockwood, who gets his narrative from Nelly Dean. Nelly is an orthodox Christian and gives us a biased viewpoint, calling Heathcliff a ‘devil’ and associating him with the demonic. With his black hair and unbridled wrath, violence, greed and lust, Heathcliff is an embodiment of everything Victorians feared. His passion was completely unacceptable. Heathcliff lures Catherine from being an acceptable Victorian girl to being brutally passionate as well. Catherine’s big choice in the novel whether to marry Heathcliff or Edgar reflects society’s pressure. She chooses Edgar despite the fact that her sense of identity is bound up in Heathcliff. That’s why she suffers so much when she marries Edgar. One issue in the novel is discerning the author’s voice. Bronte’s voice is not the voice of Lockwood, who in many ways is a farcical character who doesn’t understand at all the relationships of Wuthering Heights he has stumbled upon. Nelly Dean’s voice doesn’t seem to be one that Bronte wants us to trust; there are several incidents where Nelly lies, or at least conceals the truth of Catherine’s real situation from Edgar. Nelly tells us that Catherine dies and rests in peace, but her words are contradicted by the reports of Catherine and Heathcliff being seen walking...
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...The Color Purple, by Alice Walker, is a story that follows an uneducated black woman, Celie, during her life, through her suffering and attempts to find love and happiness in life. Celie seeks to gain power over herself and struggles to from the power of her father and her husband Mr.___ – later known as Albert. Shug Avery a friend and lover help her get the power. The message in The Color Purple is that there are certain qualities a woman needs in order to avoid being treated wrong. In order to avoid being treated wrong woman need to be brave and sometimes would have to do things that could cause fights. Having support will lead to being treated right since people are there for you when you need it. Another way is having hope. Hope prevents ending life! Women’s main objective is to be brave so no one treats them wrong! At first, Celie was treated badly by everyone and was scared of men in the book “He beat me today cause he say I winked at a boy in church. I may have got something in my eye but I didn’t wink. I don’t even look at mens. That’s the truth. I look at women, tho, cause I’m not scared of them. Maybe cause my mama cuss me you think I kept mad at her. But I ain’t. I felt sorry for mama. Trying to believe his story kilt her”(Walker,5). Celie is basically scared of men because all her life she has been beat by men. This makes her not look at men because she sees them as evil since they all treated her bad. When someone takes action from being harassed, abused...
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...The Color Purple Film Report Tanya Castillo, Vanessa Holloway, Ronda McEwen, Volonda Montgomery BSHS 422 April 9, 2012 Joy Gaeraths The Color Purple Film Report Cultural competence is important to human service professionals it allows for the appropriate delivery of services to the clients he or she services. Cultural competence is defined as “The understanding of diverse attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, practices, and communication patterns attributable to a variety of factors (such as race, ethnicity, religion, SES, historical and social context, physical or mental ability, age, gender, sexual orientation, or generational and acculturation status” (Cross-Cultural Care, 2012). The human service professional can deliver tailored services and care that caters to diverse beliefs, behaviors, and value systems. Team B will examine characters Celie and Mr. (Albert) in the movie “The Color Purple.” This essay will define the cultural issues or problems of Celie and Mr. (Albert), develop a plan for the delivery of culturally competent services to the characters, develop culturally competent strategies to address those issues, explore the richness of cultural diversity, and the benefits, and drawbacks as portrayed by Celie and Mr. (Albert). The movie “The Color Purple” is an adaption by Steven Spielberg of the novel written by Alice Walker. Walker addresses the issues of sexual abuse, domestic violence, and how these unhealthy traits do not have to be passed on to future...
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...Elements of fiction “The Color Purple” by Alice Walker The Color Purple is an epistolary novel by American author Alice Walker which won the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award for Fiction. It was later adapted into a film and musical of the same name. This novel is making arguments on the topic “racism and sexism”. The Color Purple is an extraordinary novel that’s full of surprises. Taking place mostly in rural Georgia, the story focuses on female black life in the 1930s in the southern United States, addressing numerous issues including their exceedingly low position in American social culture. Alice Walker’s biography [pic] Alice Walker was born on February 9, 1994, in Eatonton, Georgia. Living in the racially divided South, Walker attended segregated schools. She graduated from her high school as the valedictorian of her class. With the help of a scholarship, she was able to go to Spelman College in Atlanta. Later, she switched to Sarah Lawrence College in New York City. While at Sarah Lawrence, Walker visited Africa as part of a study-abroad program. She graduated in 1965—the same year that she published her first short story. After college, Walker worked as a social worker, teacher and lecturer. She became active in the Civil Rights Movement, fighting for equality for all African Americans. Her experiences informed her first collection of poetry, Once, which was published in 1968. Better known now as a novelist, Walker...
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...Culture in the Color Purple “Culture is the widening of the mind and of the spirit.” That is a quote by Jawaharlal Nehru, former Prime Minister of India. I interpreted this as culture expands your knowledge as well as you spiritual life. This statement is false. In the novel by Alice Walker, The Color Purple, the Characterization of the protagonist, Celie, and the setting of the novel disprove this. Mohja Kahf also shows evidence against this in her poem, My Grandmother Washes Her Feet in the Sink of the Bathroom at Sears, with the plot of the poem. The main protagonist in Walker’s, The Color Purple, is Celie, a young African American woman fighting through the struggles of living in the early 1900s as a black female. The novel is written in an epistolary style with Celie writing letters to her distant sister Nettie, and god in the beginning. Eventually Celie stops writing to god and solely writes letters to Nettie. “‘…the god I been praying and writing to is a man. And act like all the other mens I know. Trifling, forgetful, and lowdown.’”(Walker 73). At this point Celie has finally given up belief in god, which in a way removes the blindfold from her eyes. When Celie was relying on god nothing good was coming from it. So once Celie became less spiritual and cultural and acted on things that displeased her by herself, she got results. The whole time these cultural beliefs were just blinding her. It’s the early 1900s in Georgia, in the Deep South, a region...
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...Unfortunatly, The human race has been known to enforce their ability to oppress people through many avenues such as an individual belief in religion, a physical handicap or the way an individual may dress. However, for this essay, I have looked closely at specific females that were oppressed through unequality in specific to their individual race, social heirarchy of power, and sexuality. Unequality between male and female has been seen all over the United States. For example, American females finally were given the right to vote in 1920. In a racial sense, whether male or female, black and white people were segregated in public up until the 1950s. Financial status determined your ranking on the social hierarchy of power granting an individual the ability to have a great influence or to f. dFinancial status was signifigant; higher amounts of incomes meant one had a strong influence in society and respect was demanded. All of which were based on the norms of the time. Currently The United States of America does enforce laws that restrict physical harm onto others and enacted an equal opportunity act, thus enabling all Americans regardless of gender, financial status or race to be treated equally. Although we have seen oppression decline publically, we still see it happening on a daily base through sexual oppression. For example, in the book, The Color Purple, by Alice Walker, she introduces the readers to the time around the 1930s when racial, gender, education, and financial oppression...
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...What are the purposes of Nettie’s letters in ‘The Color Purple’? Nettie begins to write to Celie, from the first letter you can see that she is writing close to Standard American English. Nettie is a key character in ‘The Color Purple’, Walker wants to show the parallels and contrasts between Celie and Nettie- there are remarkable similarities and significant differences. Celie is the primary Narrator, but Nettie becomes the secondary narrator. Her first letter shows that she is able to voice other characters. Nettie has been saved by Celie from a young age, and she is aware of this. The two sisters have a strong bond, Nettie has a more developed education than Celie. Nettie acknowledges the sacrifices that Celie has made for her-“I think about the time you laid yourself down for me”. Alice Walker uses Nettie to explore to some extent the links between African American heritage and their relationship with Africa. Nettie learns that Africans were sold to the West because Africans “loved money more than their own brothers and sisters”. Nettie is important to the novel, for the news that she gives Celie about Olivia and Adam help to keep the children alive in Celie’s heart. She explains that after leaving Celie she went to the Reverend’s place and discovered a girl who had the same facial features as Celie- “she had your eyes set in your face”. Nettie’s letters convey that the two sisters had a very different upbringing. Nettie has had greater freedoms, she has had a more...
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...Beteckning: Humanities and Social Sciences Double Oppression in the Color Purple and Wide Sargasso Sea. A Comparison between the main characters Celie and Antoinette/Bertha. Ingela Lundin 2008 C-essay English Literature Supervisor: Dr Maria Mårdberg Examinator: Dr Helena Wahlström Table of Contents 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Purpose and main questions ............................................................................................. 1 1.2 Method and material......................................................................................................... 1 1.3 Theoretical approach ........................................................................................................ 2 1.4 Previous research – an overview ...................................................................................... 3 1.5 Introducing the novels ...................................................................................................... 4 2. A comparison of the double oppression in the two protagonists’ marriages.................. 6 2.1 The diminishing and isolation of Celie and Antoinette/Bertha........................................ 6 2.2 The upholding of the white man’s norm ........................................................................ 14 Conclusion..........................................................
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...Alice Walker's The Color Purple is an elaborate mixture of women joined by their love for each other, the men who abuse them, and the children they care for. Celie, a nearly illiterate black Georgia girl, writes letters to God, telling him that she is only fourteen, but already treated like a house working mother. She is busy every day with cooking, cleaning, and caring for a lot of brothers and sisters because of her mother's failing sickness. To make things worse, her father has raped her. The Color Purple is more than just entertainment because the story shows what poverty in the old days was like, especially among the colored people and the hard way of life created from the white man. This novel deals with real life situations which no one would talk about. As a little girl, Celie is frequently unprotected to abuse both verbal and physically. She thinks that she can fight it off by keeping it to herself and god. She feels that if she’s invisible enough, it’ll go away. Her sister Nettie has written countless letters to Celie, all of which, Albert, also known as Mr. as Celie identifies him, has hidden. When Celie discovers Nettie's letters, she not only catches up on her sister's amazing life, she also finds out that her two children are alive and now living with a couple that Nettie is also staying with. Nettie's letters...
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...Stacy Jackson C. Liegh McInnis ENG 105-09 December 7, 2011 Critical Analysis of Alice Walker’s The Color Purple Alice Walker wrote The Color Purple to give her insight of men, women, love or the lack thereof, physical, mental, and verbal abuse. The men within this book were very powerful. It would be safe to say that the men were as slave owners and the women were treated as slaves. Celie, being the main character of the book, endures every form of abuse from individuals in her life that should have been showing her love. Everyone abused her except her sister Nettie, whom she found herself trying to protect from their father. Celie’s mother abused and cursed her, even while being on her sick bed because her husband, Celie and Nettie’s father, desired to have sex with Celie more than he did with his wife (Celie’s mother). Marriage is a union between a man and a woman although in today’s society in some states it could be man and man or woman and woman. However, within the traditional marriage, the man is said to be the head of the household, especially within the Christian faith. Marriage consists of God, the husband, and then the wife which is how it was intended to be. In this context, historically, the men within a marriage ruled or oppressed the wife. The wife had to do whatever her husband demanded of her. Alice Walker’s The Color Purple explains the marital oppression of women, which included an older widowed man who is given a younger unattractive wife by her step-father...
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...The Color of Freedom Life for black women in the early 1900s was difficult, not only because of racism and lack of women’s rights, but because of the subjugation they faced from the men in their lives and from society. In the novel, The Color Purple, by Alice Walker, the narrator is an abused black woman named Celie. Walker uses this unique protagonist to comment on the racism, sexism, and abuse of women that was so prevalent in the early 1900s. Walker used Celie’s inner monologue (in the form of letters to God and her sister Nettie) to convey the overarching message of the novel; the power of finding that inner voice that leads to freedom from the oppression of society’s expectations. Celie started off the book as a powerless victim of the men in her life with no voice. Walker uses Celie’s first person point of view to tell her life story of abuse and submissive silence. Celie’s only form of communication about her thoughts and feelings are through letters to God that are brief at first but then are more complex as Celie gets more confident and finds her voice. In the beginning, Celie’s inner voice had been beaten into silence at an early age by her abusive step-father and later by her husband with emotional and physical abuse. She survived by “[not] fight(ing)… stay[ing] where (she) told” and staying silent letting her step father believe that she is” too dumb to keep going to school” (Walker 2.254, 3. 342) Celie was only able to find her voice once she stood up to her husband...
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...Alice Walker presents her ideas of love and marriage through the character in ‘The Color Purple’ and their relationships. Each character’s perception of love and marriage differs in the prime of the novel, yet as we progress and witness the trials and tribulations they endure, we see their ideas distort and reshape, or strengthen. Throughout the novel we are given a mixed bag of types of relationships, some are love-starved, others are brimming with love and some are only short bursts of love. From the early chapters of the novel we are given the fundamentals of the generic relationship back then; dominant male and submissive female (there is also the exception of Shug and Celie, even then it seems that Shug is more dominant than Celie). Most marriages throughout the novel aren’t particularly joyous; we rarely saw any love and most, and even when we do, violence is used to control their other-half’s behaviour. There are a few stable relationships that prevail, for example Nettie and the Reverend. With the different marriages that we encounter I believe that Walker is implying that marriage wasn’t so much to do with how much you loved the other person, but much to do with how much you could grow while being with the other person, or how much labour one would have to do while with their spouse. One message I feel that Walker is trying to depict is that marriage was just an institution that does not do much other than give men and excuse to control women. Another is that marriage...
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...In The Color Purple, by Alice Walker, Celie, Nettie, and Mr. are developed gradually throughout the novel and their actions all seem to be intertwined and what happens to one of them effects one if not both of the other two. There is a strong relationship between Celie and Nettie not just because they are siblings but because Nettie is one out of two people Celie loves, and this doesn't exist between Celie and any other of her siblings. There are various things that bring these two even closer, one being the discovery that they both come from a different father which Celie discover from a letter from Nettie which reads "...and I pray with all my heart that you get this letter, if none of the others. Pa is not our Pa." (182) and the one they thought was there flesh and blood father was actually only their step father. This brings them closer for it is so important and they are each other’s direct relatives for both parents are dead and they do not have any other brothers or sisters. The second point is that they keep in contact when Nettie is traveling to and from Africa. This is more or less an escape for Celie for she does not really have anyone except for Shug that she loves so the letters are a way for Celie to keep not only with Nettie but also her two children that she has only seen for a for a couple of days in her entire life. So the main bond between Nettie and Celie is one of love, and they demonstrate this by constantly trying to stay in touch even though...
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...The Color Purple Walker, Alice- 1982 Alexis Moss Alice Walker wrote The Color Purple (book titles in italics) to give her insight of men, women, love or the lack thereof, physical, mental, and verbal abuse. The men within this book were very powerful. It would be safe to say that the men were slave owners, and the women were the slaves. Celie was the main character of the book, and she endures every form of abuse from individuals in her life that should have been showing her love. Everyone abused her except her sister Nettie, whom she found herself trying to protect from their father. Celie’s mother abused and cursed her, even while being on her sick bed because her husband desired to have sex with Celie more than her. Walker uses this unique protagonist to comment on the racism, sexism, and abuse of women who was so prevalent in the early 1900s. Walker used Celie’s inner monologue (in the form of letters to God and her sister Nettie) to convey the overarching message of the novel; the power of finding that inner voice that leads to freedom from the oppression of society’s expectations. The plot takes place over a 30-year period in the reconstruction South of Georgia. They live in a rural farm community and were a hotbed of activity for civil rights and suffrage. This book was written from the other side of racism, from the victim’s point of view forcing the reader to see the result of bigotry. Racism not only affected Celie’s life but also the life of her friend Sofia...
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