Thesis+and+Critical+Essay

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** In both Toni Morrison's __The Bluest Eye__ and Sojourner Truth's speech “Ar'n't I a Woman?”, the two "communicators" import orality in order to effectively create a form of emotive expression regarding racial and gender discrimination, persecution, and desire for conformity and equality and the effects these influences have on African Americans and societal progress as a whole. ** = =

Synopsis
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** In the critical essay discussing the import of orality within Toni Morrison’s __The Bluest Eye__ and Sojourner Truth's speech “Ar'n't I a Woman?,” the writers begin by briefly discussing the evolution of African American oral culture. They contend that this culture, as relevant to African Americans, began as local communities and indigenous Africans passed folk stories and legends between generations, transitioned into the “New World” as slaves brought the culture into the colonies, and penetrated African American literature through the progress of such figures as Jupiter Harmon, Phyllis Wheatley, Sojourner Truth, and William Wells Brown. After using this brief discussion on the evolution of African American orality as a supporting basis for the writers’ thesis, they argue that the importation of orality increased, over time, as its emotive potential and protest capabilities were fully realized. Referring to Emevwo Biakolo’s article, “On the Theoretical Foundations of Orality and Literacy,” the writers claim that orality is a cultural expression of values, and can be enhanced through the use of repetition, patterns, alliterations, and other stylistic methods. ** Using this evolutionary framework of orality, the writers, of this essay, discuss some of the situational, stylistic, and content differences between the two primary texts they chose to analyze. Interestingly, over one hundred years separated the texts. According to the essay, this difference in time period is significant enough to depict a clear progression of imported orality. Another obvious distinction is that Sojourner Truth’s speech was a literal extension of the import of orality. In this form, Truth consistently used repetition as the main method of expression on the topic of gender equality. On the other hand, the essayists realize that Toni Morrison incorporated a story from the Dick and Jane primer, one that would have been read aloud in elementary schools, into her novel, __The Bluest Eye__, to mold the plot of each of the primary characters into a comprehensive look into African American desire for beauty, as manifested by Pecola Breedlove’s obsession for blue eyes, pale skin of Caucasians, and social conformity.

 ** ** Once again, the writers identify other differences between the speech of Sojourner Truth and Toni Morrison’s novel. Agreeing with Obioma Nnaemeka’s article, “From Orality to Writing: African Women Writers and the (Re)Inscription of Womanhood,” the writers examine why African American women write the way they do with regard to styles, gender realities, and time period differences. With regard to her style, Sojourner Truth utilizes a fundamental comparison of herself to men, in multiple activities, in order to combat male-oriented stereotypes. Likewise, the essayists believe that the brevity of Truth’s speech and included gender comparison contributed heavily to its powerfulness. However, the writers believe that Toni Morrison implements orality through the inter-character dialogues and plot progressions which contributes to the over-arching themes of the novel. **


 * After looking at the differences between the two primary sources, the writers contend that the works are similar in their use of and reliance on orality to portray each figures’ intended message and comment on such things as racial and gender discrimination, persecution, desire for conformity and equality, and societal progress. Referring to Kwasi Wiredu’s article, “An Oral Philosophy of Personhood: Comments on Philosophy and Orality,” the writers contend philosophical thinking has been, and continues to be, heavily based on oral tradition. Thus, the importation of orality into literature constitutes a logical step for African American “philosophical” thinking regarding societal issues, as mentioned previously. Overall, through the writers’ analysis of Sojourner Truth’s speech “Ar'n't I a Woman?,” which was given before the Women’s Rights Convention in Akron,[[image:s_engl_ec_01570_4x3.jpg width="460" height="259" align="left" caption="interpretation of Sojourner Truth's famous persuasive speech"]] Ohio in 1851, and Toni Morrison’s novel, __The Bluest Eye__, one can obtain insight into the importation of orality and its importance as a method of African American social commentary and protest. **