Community Heal Thy Self
Community is an important issue in African -American in addition to female culture. ... The male-female prejudice in the black community mirrors not only the pretentiousness of the dominant white culture, but also the white-black hierarchy. ... As Janie and Sula intermingle within the community they test its values creating a new formula for its functions. Their self-assertion is both discouraged and supported by their communities. ... In both novels, a framework for the story and a dwelling-place for the characters is provided by the community. ... The community is the foundation. ... In order for Janie and Sula to go out into the world they must depend cultural and social structure of the Community, which provides their economic freedom. ... Through these social structures, the community embodies the values and expectations, which shape the circumstances of the novels. Part of the related role of community is to enforce the models of conventionality. ... These community restrictions represent a threat to the empowerment of black women. ... She has been captivated the social convention for so long that when it determinates it leaves her without any self-identity to rely on. ... Her power of self-expression and sense of self is concealed. ... She feels the black community "pelting her with dirty thoughts" (176). ... This hierarchical division, which governs the imagination of the community, extends the enforcement of these ideas into the moral realm by creating distinctions between good and bad and between the vision of women as virgins or mothers and the vision of women as whores. ... Although the black community of Medallion fears and condemns Sula’s evil "they let it run its course, fulfill itself, and never invented ways either to alter it, to annihilate it or to prevent its happening again" (89-90). The community still shelters its wayward members. Even beyond this negative contribution, the community provides a nurturing space for self-expression. ... For Sula, self-expression is sexual. The community is able to provide her with men with whom to express herself, unlike their gossip would have you to believe, the community takes no action against her. In both novels, the communities whose standards they have violated fulfill the protagonists’ need for self-expression. In addition to providing a context for the characters, the community takes an active role as the protagonists attempt to assert themselves.