Post #3

Before I read and during the beginning of my reading of The Color Purple by Alice Walker, I thought the story focused on the rights and the lives of African Americans. As I continued to read, I found that this novel is about women's rights and their place in society. Alice Walker presents two characters who particularly struggle with the idea that women are forced to be what the man expect-- Celie and Nettie. I love that Alice Walker places these characters in two completely different settings-- Africa and the Deep South. These locations have become important to the role of women's rights in this novel because it shows how even in a more civilized society, America; women experience the same loss of rights as those who live in uncivilized and uneducated societies. The message of women's rights became apparent to me pretty late in the story. I was a little disappointed in myself for not seeing this earlier and making a stereotypical judgment of a book. I didn't realize that the book is about women's rights until women in Nettie's village began to integrate into the schools and when Celie finally stood up for her happiness and left her husband. The moment that Celie left stuck out to me in particular. It felt a little abrupt, but in the best of ways. As she reads her sister's letters she finds out that her children are actually with her sister in Africa and that her father is not biologically related to her. The most powerful moment in the story is when she stated, "I don't write to God no more... He gave me a lynched daddy, a crazy mama, a lowdown dog of a step pa... the God I been praying and writing to is a man. And acts just like all the other mens I know" (187). This moment blew me away because she connects her problems back to a man. She was once so dedicated to God and put her trust in him. Walker creates a revelation for this character to see the injustice that men put on her through the injustices God put on her. I relate to this moment because I have recently been very interested in cultivating beliefs in religions other that mine to create my own religion that guides my values. I do not agree with many of the Catholic beliefs and sometimes feel almost the same way Celie does. This one all powerful man tells us what is right and wrong. That that gay marriage and abortion is completely unacceptable. I can't follow a religion that restricts what I feel are basic human rights. Through losing her faith in God, Celie loses her binding to men. She disconnects from the highest ranking man and finally feels like the powerful woman she is. It is interesting that it takes losing faith in religion in order to find power in oneself. Walker seems to write her book not only to challenge women's rights but also to challenge the idea that there is an almighty man deciding the fate of the human race. 

Because we see the dominance of man in religions and in different regions, Walker makes the issue of women's rights become a wider topic. She illustrates that more than one culture suffers the degradation of women and how powerfully that affects how a society runs as a whole. Both the African and American societies believe that their women are good for nothing. They view women as their slaves and as having absolutely no competencies. Because Walker demonstrates that women are degraded in more than one setting, she unites them and influences them to work together to improve their rights everywhere. Nettie's letters influence Celie in such a way that she finally stands up for herself and moves up North. Although her husband says, "You ugly. You skinny. You shape funny. You too scared to open your mouth to people,” Celie sees the good in herself and knows that no man can define her (203). She grows into the tree that she said she is at the beginning. As I said in an earlier post, a tree grows and in turn transforms. I knew that Celie would find the good in herself because the tree symbol showed up so early in the story. Women from all parts of the world can have an influence on each other just as Nettie and her village had on Celie. The communities that this novel so subtly establishes gives this book a hopeful and empowering tone. As I read, I feel that I am not alone. I see that other people in the world struggle with the same things I do, even if they are not women's rights.