Alice Walkers In Love and Trouble Essay examples -- Alice Walker Love

Alice Walker's In Love and Trouble Stories from In Love and Trouble, like other Alice Walker’s works, are the portrayal of black women. I would interpret the term â€Å"black women† as women who have gone through all sorts of hardship and struggles, but not all women in the world or only those with black skin. I strongly argue that Walker’s characters are better represented as women who suffer the way African American women do, than as women with black skin. I will justify my argument by referring to specific examples from two short stories in the book, namely Roselily and Everyday Use. The characters in In Love and Trouble are not represented by all women because not all women carry as many burdens as the characters in the book. One group of women excluded is the white. As Clenora points out African-American women suffer from â€Å"a tripartite form of oppression- racism, classism, and sexism† (192). All black women in the book have to bear the triple burden. Living in a white-dominant society, they are oppressed by the white. Their race also leads to their poverty. Being in a male-dominant society, they are abused by their husbands who are themselves abused by the white. â€Å"These women [are] simply defeated in one way or another by the external circumstances of their lives† (Washington 89-90). In Roselily, Roselily is also a victim of the triple burden. Although there is no direct description of how she is oppressed by the white, it is implied: â€Å"She can imagine God, a small black boy [my emphasis], timidly pulling the preacher’s coattail† (4). In Roseliliy’s imagination, God has black skin, which is a sharp contrast to the traditional white God image in the Western world. The black God image shows her ques... ...tudies.† Phylon 49.1 (Spring-Summer 1992): 33-41. Christian, Barbara T. Introduction. Everyday Use. By Walker Alice. New Jersey: Rutgers U, 1994. 3-17. Clenora, Hudson Weems. â€Å"The Tripartite Plight of African-American Women as Reflected in the Novels of Hurston and Walker.† Journal of Black Studies 20.2 (December 1989): 192-207. Hui, Fung-mei, Sandra. â€Å"Race and Gender in the Works of Maxine Hong Kingston, Alice Walker and Toni Morrison.† Diss. U of Hong Kong, 2004. Walker Alice. In Love and Trouble: Stories of Black Women. Florida: Harcourt, 1995. Washington, Mary Helen. â€Å"An Essay on Alice Walker.† Everyday Use. Ed. Christian, Barbara T. New Jersey: Rutgers U, 1994. 85-103. Weston, Ruth D. â€Å"Who Touches This Touches a Woman: The Naked Self in Alice Walker.† Critical Essays on Alice Walker. Ed. Dieke, Ikenna. London: Greenwood, 1999. 153-61. Alice Walker's In Love and Trouble Essay examples -- Alice Walker Love Alice Walker's In Love and Trouble Stories from In Love and Trouble, like other Alice Walker’s works, are the portrayal of black women. I would interpret the term â€Å"black women† as women who have gone through all sorts of hardship and struggles, but not all women in the world or only those with black skin. I strongly argue that Walker’s characters are better represented as women who suffer the way African American women do, than as women with black skin. I will justify my argument by referring to specific examples from two short stories in the book, namely Roselily and Everyday Use. The characters in In Love and Trouble are not represented by all women because not all women carry as many burdens as the characters in the book. One group of women excluded is the white. As Clenora points out African-American women suffer from â€Å"a tripartite form of oppression- racism, classism, and sexism† (192). All black women in the book have to bear the triple burden. Living in a white-dominant society, they are oppressed by the white. Their race also leads to their poverty. Being in a male-dominant society, they are abused by their husbands who are themselves abused by the white. â€Å"These women [are] simply defeated in one way or another by the external circumstances of their lives† (Washington 89-90). In Roselily, Roselily is also a victim of the triple burden. Although there is no direct description of how she is oppressed by the white, it is implied: â€Å"She can imagine God, a small black boy [my emphasis], timidly pulling the preacher’s coattail† (4). In Roseliliy’s imagination, God has black skin, which is a sharp contrast to the traditional white God image in the Western world. The black God image shows her ques... ...tudies.† Phylon 49.1 (Spring-Summer 1992): 33-41. Christian, Barbara T. Introduction. Everyday Use. By Walker Alice. New Jersey: Rutgers U, 1994. 3-17. Clenora, Hudson Weems. â€Å"The Tripartite Plight of African-American Women as Reflected in the Novels of Hurston and Walker.† Journal of Black Studies 20.2 (December 1989): 192-207. Hui, Fung-mei, Sandra. â€Å"Race and Gender in the Works of Maxine Hong Kingston, Alice Walker and Toni Morrison.† Diss. U of Hong Kong, 2004. Walker Alice. In Love and Trouble: Stories of Black Women. Florida: Harcourt, 1995. Washington, Mary Helen. â€Å"An Essay on Alice Walker.† Everyday Use. Ed. Christian, Barbara T. New Jersey: Rutgers U, 1994. 85-103. Weston, Ruth D. â€Å"Who Touches This Touches a Woman: The Naked Self in Alice Walker.† Critical Essays on Alice Walker. Ed. Dieke, Ikenna. London: Greenwood, 1999. 153-61.