Harpo, Who Dis Women!?!?!?

Host: Synai, Devin, Seyiram, Aliyah, Phoebe

In the second episode of our podcast, we will go through the novel using a feminist lens. We will break down our women characters and react to the situations that are brought upon them and how it affects their mental health and responses.

https://anchor.fm/devin-hang

Synai

Works Cited “International Women’s Day 2022: Why Colour Purple Symbolises Feminist Movement.” News18, 8 March 2022, https://www.news18.com/news/lifestyle/international-womens-day-2022-why-colour-purple-symbolises-feminist-movement-4834931.html. Accessed 10 January 2023. Jackson, Lauren Michele. “Alice Walker’s Journals Depict an Artist Restless on Her Laurels.” The New Yorker, 18 April 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/04/25/alice-walkers-journals-depict-an-artist-restless-on-her-laurels-gathering-blossoms-under-fire-valerie-boyd. Accessed 10 January 2023. WATKINS, MEL, and Alice Walker. “Some Letters Went to God.” The New York Times, 25 July 1982, https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/98/10/04/specials/walker-color.html?module=inline. Accessed 10 January 2023.

Out of the three articles I read, I think I enjoyed the New York Times on the web because it dove deep Into the context of the book and addressed several lenses, with feminism being the most prominent one. It also sums the book up from a different perspective and opened my eyes to more information that I didn’t automatically see about the story. One idea I thought was important was the role and influence that the women character had on each other and the influence she had on the males, especially her husband Albert who changed his ways because of Celie,” it is Albert’s real love and sometimes mistress, Shug Avery, and his rebellious daughter-in-law, Sofia, who provide the emotional support for Celie’s personal evolution. And, in turn, it is Celie’s new understanding of an acceptance of herself that eventually leads to Albert’s re-evaluation of his own life and a reconciliation among the novel’s major characters.”

Devin

Wilson, Jennifer, “Untangling the Legacy of The Color Purple.” New Republic, 1 February 2021, https://newrepublic.com/article/161165/legacy-color-purple-alice-walker-book-review

This source tends to connect the novel with the musical a lot because it blew up during the time the broadway was airing. With the feminist lens, we would see the book as a girl who is a rape survivor. And it is connected to Alice Walker on a personal level. However, male writers who do not see through this lens think the book is an attack on them. Black Writer Ishmael Reed believes that this book is an attack on black men and how they are characterized as rapists. With an open mind and with or without a feminist lens, this book is not the case. It is more focused on how there was sexual abuse and what it is like to experience it at a young age rather than race and time period. It is one of the main things that is throughout the book because this trauma has been carried out the entire way and the plot that is continuing the story. From young sexual abuse to marriage at a young age. And through all of its mistreatment of women.