Samantha Fink

English 121

THE COLOR PURPLE & BELOVED

AFRICAN AMERICAN FEMINISM

For centuries African American Women have been discriminated against, being viewed as the non-dominant sex. They were ignored as a social class and neglected from ever learning how to read, write, and in some cases even speak. They were beaten, abused, and at times were separated from their children.

SLAVERY

For thousands of years there has been an enormous amount slavery and discrimination. In The United Sates we are familiar with slavery and discrimination against African Americans, especially in the south. These people suffered through horrid conditions, barley getting by. They didn’t have much of a life and had no freedom. For those who got lucky and made a safe escape to the north regained freedom though that meant leaving their loved ones behind more often then not.

THE COLOR PURPLE

Celie starts out as a young and uneducated African American girl living in rural Georgia in the 1930’s with an abusive father, who rapes and beats her. Her father impregnates her twice, and eventually gets rid of both children. Her sister Nettie lives with a couple and goes to Africa for missionary work. Nettie finds out that the couples children were actually her biological niece and nephew.

Their father eventually dies and Nettie returns home. Although Celie and Nettie have not seen each other in years, they began writing letters a short time before they returned to The States. When they are finally reunited they are both rather old but feel younger and better than ever.

Alice Walker was born in 1944 in the small rural town of Eatonton, Georgia. Her parents were share

croppers and Alice is the youngest of their eight children. She began writing at at very young age after an accident with her brother, blinding her permanently in one eye. As soon as she got to

college she became active in the African American civil rights movement. The Color Purple, published in 1982, became her most popular novel and later won her a Pulitzer Prize and the American Book

Award.

ALICE WALKER

The story of Beloved takes place in the 1800’s. Sethe is the main character and lives at home with her daughter

Denver. Sethe suffered many hardships with being an African

American women in the time period in which she lived. She even had to go

through the horrifying experience of killing one of her daughters. The

house is haunted and no one likes the ghosts presence being there other

than Denver because she believes the ghost is the sprit of her sister.

However, after a while Denver is forced to seek help so that her sisters ghost will stop controlling her mother.

BELOVED

In 1931, Toni Morrison was born into a working class family the state of

Ohio. As a child, Toni was a frequent reader and later attended Howard

University in Washington D.C. There she became a member of Alpha Kappa

Alpha and received a Bachelors degree in English. Eventually, she became an English professor. She

stuck with this career until her and her husband, Harold Morrison, got a divorce. She then decided to move to New York and started her new career as a textbook editor. She was the first African American to receive a Noble

Prize in Literature and she also won a Pulitzer Prize in 1988.

TONI MORRISON