God's Bits of Wood

“Three million francs is a lot of money for a Negro lathe operator,” Doudou said, “but even three million francs won’t make me white. I would rather have the ten minutes for tea and remain a Negro.”

Sembene Ousmane’s God’s Bits of Wood is an interesting, though surprisingly boring read simultaneously. As a fictionalized account of the 1947 railroad workers’ strike in what are now Mali and Senegal, Ousmane, a Senegalese writer and filmmaker, shows how the strike affected men, women, children, and the elderly from Dakar to Bamako. Published in 1960, the year of political independence for both Mali and Senegal from France, which briefly established a confederation that included both former colonies, Ousmane’s novel could be read as a call for unity between the peoples of Mali and Senegal. In this novel, that would be the Bambara, Wolof, Peul, and other ethnic groups of the region. Thus, God’s Bits of Wood, using the metaphor of the strike that shows the power of unity, serves as a reminder of the power that the people of both Mali and Senegal will need to maintain their independence.

            The novel is also quite similar to Jacques Roumain’s Masters of the Dew, a clearly pro-Marxist/Communist peasant novel about the power of collective organization, based on the Haitian koumbite peasant tradition. Like Roumain’s magnum opus, Ousmane relies on themes of colonialism, race, labor, and unionism to support socialist systems. Sembene Ousmane’s experiences as a worker in the docks of Marseilles struggling to strengthen working-class union activism and solidarity despite barriers of race is a theme he used in his semi-autobiographical novel, Le Docker Noir, his first novel. Due to his own background with unions and his presumably leftist or socialist sympathies, it is no surprise that God’s Bits of Wood focuses on the necessity of unions to protect the interests of the working-class, and weaken white French colonial domination and racism. Just as the peasants of Roumain’s novel struggle with their own village feud and a highly exploitative state, the men, women and children associated with the railroad strike transcend ethnic barriers, confront the liberation of women who initiate their own march and riot against the pro-white police, and address the issue of political autonomy for Africa. Unlike Roumain, Sembene’s novel actually deals with women’s liberation instead of reinforcing patriarchy. Before the strike, women never talked publicly, silently supporting their husbands at home. The strike, which led to starvation and government repression since the colonial government supported the white railroad administration, forced women to act autonomously from their husbands, thereby abandoning some gender roles assigned to women. Women such as Ramatoulaye, an elderly woman sick of the colonial regime and the suffering forced upon blacks, helps incite the women to riot and resist the police. Others, such as Penda, a prostitute, and Maimouna, a blind woman, lead a march to Dakar in order to win more press attention and support in the French colonies of West Africa. On the other hand, women are still expected to obey their husbands, who are polygamous, which creates tension between men and women during and after the strike. Indeed, some of the inspiration for men continuing the strike was the Frenchman Isnard and Dejean, the railroad manager, insisting that they could not provide family allowances since the blacks have so many concubines. Referring to the wives of the workers as concubines since polygamy is not practiced in France served as a rallying cry for anti-colonial, pro-labor activism among the men and women associated with the railroad strike. However, this displays a paternalistic attitude among the men, who continue to insist for family allowances and other benefits to protect the honor of their wives and themselves.

            Sembene Ousmane’s novel also explores the white settler mentality through the characters of Dejean, Isnard, and other whites. These Frenchmen refuse to give in to the demands of the strikers, especially regarding family allowances, because it will recognize and give in to Africans. To them, the Negroes are children who owe the railroad, or ‘smoke of the savanna,’ in addition to everything else to white men such as themselves. Their paternalistic attitude toward the people they see as children leads to them taking credit for everything in the colonies, despite the obvious fact that the majority of the labor that constructed and maintains the railroads as well as other colonial enterprises and industry was black. Like white settlers in colonies everywhere, these whites’ refusal to compromise and their racist paternalistic worldview leads to violence, intransigence that prolongs the strike, and their eventual dismissal from the railroad company. Ousmane obviously attacks anti-white racism as well in the workers’ struggle, with Fa Keita and Lahbib reminding Ibrahim Bakoyoko that “…happy is the man who does battle without hatred.” That is, the strikers cannot hatred enter their hearts during their struggle, since violence begets violence, leading to a perpetual cycle of murder and death. Indeed, throughout the strike, men, women, and children are tortured, killed, and imprisoned by the French colonial regime, which relies on its black agents to carry out the repression. So the union’s actions does not condone anti-white ‘racism’ of any kind, but seeks to ensure higher salaries, rights, and benefits for the workers, in addition to formal recognition of the union. Of course the only way the union’s strike succeeds is through collective action, which culminates in a general strike after the women’s march to Dakar and Ibrahim Bakayoko’s speech. Ousmane also deals with issues of colonialism in the battle over language (French versus Wolof and Bambara) and the character of N’Deye Touti, an educated, beautiful young woman who suffers from self-loathing and francophilism.

            Besides dealing with issues of colonialism, gender, class, and race, the novel avoids romanticizing the strike. The individuals involved in the leadership are all flawed, including Ibrahim Bakayoko, the Bambara spirit of the strike whose character only becomes significant near the conclusion. As he says himself, he prostitutes his life to the strike, ignoring his family obligations and lacking a heart. His infidelity toward his wife, Assitan, and absence after the murder of his mother illustrates his willingness to put his life into the struggle before his personal obligations. Others, such as Penda, lived an idle live of harlotry prior to becoming involved in the strike. Or N’Deye Touti, who hates her own people for practicing polygamy, living in poverty and ugly dwellings, and lacking the ‘civilization’ of French whites, whose literature she devours, eventually learns to accept who she is and serves the strike through manual labor, collecting water. The problem of internal division and ethnic barriers should have been stronger, perhaps. For example, the strikers all seem to concur on the importance of using Wolof instead of French, since it is one of their languages, yet the Bambara of Mali seem to have no problem with the use of Wolof instead of their own tongue. One would think that the ethnic tensions between the two groups would have remained high, despite the widespread comprehension of Wolof across Senegal and apparently, Mali. Perhaps the use of Wolof over Bambara was due to the fact that when the issues arose when to use French or Wolof, the situation was set in Senegal rather than Mali. Regardless, the novel’s heroes and heroines are from both ethnic groups, reinforcing the message of solidarity in order to achieve mutual goals of liberation.

            Overall, God’s Bits of Wood is an interesting novel, though somewhat hard to follow at times. Each chapter switches its focus to a different city with different characters after every chapter, so it becomes confusing keeping up with all the names. However, the tactic does work in showing how the strike becomes more inclusive and significant in the lives of people from Mali and Senegal, since men, women, and children from the cities of Dakar, Thies, and Bamako ebb and flow during the strike. Still, I cannot help but feel that the novel would have been better if it had focused on the strike in one particular city, allowing some of the characters to become more fully developed and incorporated in the story. Still, for essential francophone African literature, this novel remains a classic taught in university courses.

Maryse Conde's Crossing the Mangrove

The stranger gave him a look of incomprehension, which settled for Moise at least one point: This was not a Guadeloupean, for even the Negropolitans who have been yellowing their hides for years from the sunless winters of the Paris suburbs know what these words mean.

Conde's novel is interesting, but I cannot help but feel disappointed. I was expecting something akin to a detective novel, but what Conde provides us here is a series of character portraits of the various inhabitants of a small town in Guadeloupe. The Rashomon effect is present in how each character (who gets their own chapter) explains and recalls their experiences with the deceased stranger, a Colombian of uncertain racial origin who comes to live in their small town, impregnates two different local women, and is discovered dead with no apparent explanation for his death other than a curse dating back to his European ancestors. Indeed, this man is supposedly a descendant of a cruel sugar planter who lived in Guadeloupe known for torturing his slaves. Since the man shows up, everyone recalls their own life stories and how it relates to the dead man. Each story reveals a lot about Guadeloupe, a French Caribbean island known for its ethnic diversity since Indians, blacks, mulattoes, 'whites', Desinor the Haitian, and others congregate in this small island. The novel also has an interesting passage where one character recalls reading Jacques Roumain's Masters of the Dew, a Haitian whose flowery language is quoted and appears to be a definite influence on the beautiful prose used by Conde and her translator in Crossing the Mangrove. So this short novel about the mysterious cases of the death of a stranger is actually about Guadeloupe itself, and the French Caribbean more broadly. The internal battles of color, class, political autonomy versus French colonialism, and exile. Conde is also very humorous in her satirical look at the contradictions of Guadeloupean social relations, the legacy of slavery, leftists versus right-wing parties, and Negritude. Indeed, one of the characters, the mother of the mentally handicapped child, marries a man who publicly defended autonomy and used Creole, but when with French whites listened to opera, spoke eloquent French and went out of his way to serve them. Many of the most vocal of nationalists demanding autonomy from France were also those who lived on the state budget, derived from French France. Unfortunately, the indefinite conclusion regarding what really killed the stranger made the novel a little disappointing. Still, its an interesting read that reveals much of 20th century Guadeloupe, an island losing its people to exile in France, receiving Haitian immigrants who provide cheap labor and a scapegoat for self-loathing blacks, the dying sugar industry, shrinking forests, and the incredible ethnic diversity of Guadeloupe.

Another great quotation:
"Those days are long gone, alas, since Guadeloupe, that cruel stepmother, no longer nurtures her children, and so many of them are forced to freeze to death in the Paris suburbs."

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

The family claims that the first sign was that Abelard's third and final daughter, given the light early on in her father's capsulization, was born black. And not just any kind of black. But black black--kongoblack, shangoblack, kaliblack, zapotecblack, rekhablack--and no amount of fancy Dominican racial legerdemain was going to obscure the fact. That's the kind of culture I belong to: people took their child's black complexion as an ill omen (248).

Junot Diaz's The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao is a fascinating novel I have read about 3 or 4 times now since senior year of high school. Diaz's tale of Dominican-American experience takes us back to the source, Trujillo's brutal dictatorship, which exalted the cult of Trujillo to define a nation for much of the 20th century. By tracing Oscar's origins back through his mother's family's Fall due to Trujillo's sexual appetite and the fuku, a curse. Since Junot Diaz explores the Dominican-American experience, or Diaspora, issues or race and color predominate throughout the text. The narrator, Yunior, uses ebonics and phrases often associated with inner-city youth of African-American descent, such as the common use of the word nigger and Negro. Oscar, his mother, Belicia, and his sister, Lola, also share dark skin and, in the case of Oscar and other Dominicans, possesses a "Puerto Rican 'fro." Belicia Cabral, Oscar's mother, is also described as very dark-skinned, though coming from an elite father with a 'demi afro' and a mulatto mother. Her dark skin was considered a sign of ill omen after birth, which says a lot about Dominican attitudes toward race and blackness. Indeed, as Diaz himself reveals in a interview, self-loathing of our blackness is "the darkness that binds us," the us being people of African descent throughout the Caribbean and the United States. This loathing of the blackness that nearly all Dominicans possess also requires an understanding of the role of Haiti, a black neighboring nation whose dark shadow becomes the Other for Dominican national narratives, usually composed by white elites. Thus, the image of Haiti in The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao features prominently in the prejudice that dark-skinned Dominicans like Oscar's mother face.

Trujillo's call for the genocide of suspected Haitians in 1937 along the border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic demonstrate antihaitianismo at its best. At least 10,000 Haitian-Dominicans were killed  with machetes for being unable to pronounce perejil without thick Haitian accents. The very fact that Dominican soldiers committing these atrocities had to ask victims to say a Spanish word before killing them shows that the differences between Haitians and Dominicans are not as deep as one would think, especially in the border region. Indeed, the border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic was never really defined until the Trujillo years, which led to an expulsion of Haitian farmers and workers due to fears of 'Haitian imperialism.' Exactly how could Haitian peasants working in the Dominican Republic change the racial composition and bring savagery to a nation of millions of Afro-descended people is never explained, but fears of the 'blackening' of the already black and brown Dominican Republic were the justifications for Trujillo's actions. With Negrophobes like Balaguer in his administration, who is "considered our national 'genius'" (90). Intellectual Dominicans of white descent such as Joaquin Balaguer used their control of information and manipulation of history to portray Haiti as an all-black, voodoo threat to the Spanish Catholic culture of the Domincan Republic. Elite narratives of Dominicanness then permeated popular culture, manifesting in literature, language, television, etc. Even dark-skinned Dominicans and Dominicans of Haitian descent, such as Trujillo himself, "a portly, sadistic, pig-eyed mulato who bleached his skin..." (2) internalized these views of blackness that date to the colonial era.

In addition to the dominance of European-derived elites and Catholicism in defining Haiti as the Other, examples of Haitian occupation and invasion of the Dominican Republic from the 19th century are revived in national narratives to justify excluding Haitians. For example, many Dominicans, of the popular and elite classes, see Haitian imperialism in everything Haitians and Haitian-Americans do. Thus, protection of Dominican nationality requires refusing to grant citizenship rights to people of Haitian descent born in the United States, by swearing they no existe, like Lola's friend Leticia, a Dominican of Haitian descent (26). Anti-Haitian and antiblack Dominican writers twist the actual history of the Haitian "occupation," which lasted only from 1822-1844 with a few Haitian attempted invasions by later 19th century leaders. Oh, and Toussaint Louverture and Dessalines' invasions of Santo Domingo in the early 19th century as well, are oft-cited examples of Haitian imperialism and attempts to 'Ethiopianize' the Dominican Republic. Haitians 'invaders' had popular support at a time from the populace, and received no resistance when Jean Pierre Boyer, president of Haiti came to Santo Domingo in 1822. Indeed, the Haitian occupations of Santo Domingo in this period emancipated the remaining slaves on the island, redistributed land, and had popular support from the black population. In fact, the Haitian state relied on Dominicans (the Dominican Republic did not exist at this time, so one should not use that term) for military forces. The mulatto elite of Haiti, who spearheaded the occupation, focused on French republican goals of limiting the power of the Catholic Church, and creating a state that could serve as a buffer in the case of French invasion (a realistic threat prior to French recognition of Haiti in 1825). The liberation of Dominican slaves (occurred under Toussaint and Boyer), the incorporation of Dominican blacks into the Haitian military and the records of praise songs to Boyer for liberating the slaves, shows that the Haitian occupation, though far from perfect, initially had some popular support.

Whites of Santo Domingo, however, immediately fled the island and refused to recognize the authority of black (actually, mulatto Haitians, who foolishly made French the official language and tried to raise taxes to pay the indemnity to France) Haitians. These former colonial elites' struggle to maintain a Eurocentric, Catholic Spanish orientation of the nascent Dominican national consciousness led to the rewriting of history. Even in thecontemporary Dominican Republic, Dominicans still invoke Haitian invasions when they encounter Haitian workers in Santo Domingo. Indeed, one character in the novel, when attacking people from the Cibao region of the island for their regional pride, was "convinced masked imperial ambitions on a Haitian level" (107). Moreover, Oscar's great-grandfather's family contributed to the 1937 massacre by giving horses to Trujillo's forces. So Oscar's grandfather's family, coming from light-skinned elites with education and property, participates in the self-loathing of dark-skinned peoples who are their servants, relatives, and friends. Oscar's grandfather, however, does treat those with machete wounds afterward, and his wife hides the servants (215). Trujillo's genocide forever changes the "country's historically fluid border with Haiti--which was more baka than border..." (224). This fluid zone, with a reference to baka, a creature of Dominican/Haitian Vodou exemplify the mixed character of all border regions, and the mixed character of Dominican national identity as well.

The aforementioned Belicia's dark skin demonstrates the antiblack prejudice of Dominicans and Dominican-Americans. Belicia is so dark that nobody on her father's side of the family would take her (252). She only lived because a dark-skinned woman named Zoila (possibly Haitian) rescues and feeds her with her own milk (253). Her mother's relatives only take Beli in later to possibly receive money from the Cabral family (which by this point had fallen from grace after Abelard refused to let Trujillo rape his oldest daughter), and once it's clear that they will not receive any money, sell her as a criada or restavek in Outer Azua, an impoverished region of the country. The use of the word restavek, a Haitian Creole word for a child slave, demonstrates another similarity between both nations, where slavery survives and often only for the darkest-hued members of both Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Haitian braceros on the sugar cane plantations are often mentioned  in the novel as well, with obvious symbolism of slavery and racism. Indeed, when Beli's beaten body is discovered in the canefields by Dominican musicians, one of the possible negative things she could be is haitiano (in the same company as ciguapas and baka, mythological beings of the supernatural) (151). Furthermore, during the savage beating she received from Trujillo's sister's goons, Yunior writes, "They beat her like she was a slave. Like she was a dog" (147). Once again, Haitians are a stand in for slavery, dark skin, and the supernatural, all qualities which can likewise be found in Dominican history with slavery, racism, and the exclusion of blacks from political power. Interestingly, Belicia herself internalizes the loathing of Haitians (really the loathing of herself since she's just as black). After her father's light-skinned cousin frees her from slavery in Azua, she is sent to an elite private school where everyone excludes her because of her skin. Even the Chinese girl with no friends because of her nonwhite, foreignness, points out her blackness. Belicia falls for the most handsome boy in school (obviously white with no traces of African blood and blues eyes), demonstrating Dominicans' exaltation of the whiteness and white features that few Dominicans have. Belicia also shares Dominican animosity toward Haitians, referring to peddlers on the streets of Santo Domingo as "maldito Haitians" in spite of her own blackness (273). Later, at a upscale restaurant in the zona colonial of the city, the waiters give Oscar and his family strange looks (presumably because of their dark skin, causing Lola to warn her mother, "Watch out, Mom, they probably think you're Haitian," to which she replies, "La unica haitiana aqui eres tu, mi amor" (276). Clearly both Lola and Belicia are dark-skinned, and could be mistaken for "haitianas," yet Belicia's disparaging remarks and beliefs toward Haitians prevents any positive self-identification of her own African ancestry, which she conspicuously wears on her skin.

The image of Haiti as a symbol of 'African savagery' and blackness manifests in the lives of Oscar, his sister, and his mother. All are clearly of African descent themselves, but a certain adoration for their European heritage and whiteness, forever unattainable because of their dark skin (or Oscar's kinky hair), leads to self-destructive behavior and the construction of a fantasy. Indeed, Dominicans like Oscar's mother are pissed to be called morena, preferring indio or india despite their dark skin and African features. Due to the negative conceptualizations of Haiti and blackness that date from the colonial period and epochs of slavery, its no wonder that so many dark-skinned individuals would rather identify themselves with fictive indigenous Taino ancestry or Spanish blood. It also becomes obvious why Oscar embraces science fiction and fantasy, the genres based, which is evident in Caribbean societies themselves as a practically unreal place where poverty, extreme economic inequality and the cultivation of the cult of Trujillo and other dictators who exploit African-derived religions (Papa Doc in Haiti) to support their rule define the 20th century. The Caribbean is a world where different races, cultures, and epochs blend, where Santo Domingo appears to be a modern city, but immediately outside of the city one feels like being in a time machine to see unimaginable horrors long thought to have died. Since Diaz does not attribute this self-loathing solely to Dominicans, it is clear that the novel's message of self-acceptance and defeating the fuku is for everyone, not just dominicanos. Indeed, Diaz begins the novel with Yunior writing, "The Puertorocks want to talk about fufus, and the Haitians have some shit just like it. There are a zillion of these fuku stories" (6). This is a pan-Caribbean thing that affects everyone, including the Diaspora that interacts with African-Americans and other Latino ethnic groups in Paterson, NJ. Perhaps Lola says it best, "Ten million Trujillos is all we are" (324). Dominicans, oppressed by Trujillo, also share the same self-loathing, preference for fantasy to make sense of their world. Like Trujillo, they then create a society fundamentally absurd and fantastic, such as Trujillo's Dominican Republic where his megalomania and love for culo defined the nation. The image of Haiti provides the stereotypes of blackness which become 'Othered' in the Dominican Republic. The great irony of it is how similar both nations are, and part of a Caribbean history that shows the unity of all peoples of African descent through similar experiences of slavery and colonialism.

Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

"And dey makes me tired. Always laughin!' When somebody talked mah husband intuh comin' down heah tuh open uh eatin' place Ah never dreamt so many different kins uh black folks could colleck in one place. Did Ah never woulda come. Ah ain't useter 'ssociatin' wid black folks. Mah son claims dey draws lightnin'." They laughed a little and after many of these talks, Mrs. Turner said, "Yo husband musta had plenty money when y'all got married."

Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God is the black feminist novel. Stories, plot devices, and themes from Zora's magnum opus appear in many more recent novels by black women, such as Edwidge Danticat, Toni Morrison, Alice, Walker, and others. Moreover, reading Their Eyes for the 2nd time makes me appreciate Zora's use of the black southern vernacular and the formal, 'standard' English through the Janie and the third person narrator. The novel is also interesting since it was rediscovered in the 1970s by black feminist writers after being despised by the predominantly black male critical establishment of literary criticism. Writers and philosophers such as Alain Locke believed Zora's masterpiece wasn't political enough and didnt directly address issues of the 'race' in a political way, which is complete bullshit. Hurston's novel cleverly critiques slavery, racism and sexism through Janie and her family, her grandmother Nanny being raped by her white slave master and her mother being raped by her schoolteacher. Hurston's novel was hated by the male-dominated literary world of the 1930s and 1940s because her story emphasizes female empowerment and independence from male sexual control, and its use of southern black vernacular, which some critics saw as supporting racial stereotypes of blacks.

In truth, Hurston's novel cleverly uses the black vernacular to accurately represent the speech of Floridians of African descent. Furthermore, her story's center is in the small town of Eatonville, an all-black town that Janie's 2nd husband, Joe Starks, establishes control over after leaving, is the same town Hurston had lived in. This all-black world, with no whites, allows Hurston to focus on how black men and women interact within their own sphere, albeit a sphere still subservient to whites who control Florida's government. In addition, the all-black town of Eatonville symbolizes black self-rule and self-sufficiency, with its own post office, a shop owned and operated by Starks and Janie (against her will), and the practice of black rural culture, such as playing the dozens. Her virtually all-black world where whites are only the backdrop of their lives, also relates to the fact that Hurston wrote the novel in 7 weeks while conducting research in Haiti for what would become her Tell My Horse. Haitian peasant culture, like African American rural culture, is also rich with oral traditions, and similar values and practices. As Hurston said in Tell My Horse, women in Haitian society were treated poorly by men, as if they were beasts of burden. The world Hurston takes the reader into in Florida is a similarly patriarchal society, where women were expected to cook and work for men. Janie, the heroine in this novel, must counter these patriarchal tendencies, causing her to rebel against her controlling first husbands, and losing her third husband after fleeing a hurricane in the Everglades, although Tea Cakes also tried to control her at times. Anywho, the image of Haiti likely influences the novel's black world, where blacks can establish their own towns, stores, post offices, and their own mayors/political leaders. Now I will compose a list of themes, literary devices, characters, and plots that owe something to Zora Neale Hurston's great novel.
1. Janie being the daughter of the rape of her mother appears in Edwidge Danticat's Breath, Eyes, Memory, whose protagonist is the daughter of her mother's rape in Haiti.
2. Toni Morrison's Beloved features Sethe's mother-in-law, Baby Suggs, who does deliver a humanizing sermon from the pulpit to the black peoples of the small Ohio town her family relocated to after fleeing Sweet Home. Janie's grandmother, Nanny, was never able to deliver her sermon on the mount, and due to her own hard life as a victim of rape and slavery, no longer believes in love. For Nanny, marriage is for protection and security, nothing more and nothing less. Women are to serve their husbands in exchange for protection.
3. Toni Morrison's Sula also features a character, Sula, who returns to her small town after traveling and living life as an independent woman. After Janie leaves Eatonville to marry Tea Cakes and make a life in another part of Florida, Janie later returns to the scorn and derision of the people. She is perceived as a troublesome woman for marrying a younger man, who had no money, justifying the town's beliefs that Janie should not marry for love and should have chosen a mate from an older, more professional pool of men. In Sula, Sula returns and sleeps with various men of the town. Both women do not follow the expected rules for female sexual behavior, and therefore become objects of scorn.
4. Toni Morrison's Tar Baby is a love story between Son, a lower-class black man, and Jadine, an educated black woman. Her relationship with Son has some similarities with Janie and Tea Cakes, since both men are fall for women with wealth, and survive a series of ordeals in their respective relationships. Of course, in Hurston's novel, Janie and Tea Cakes share a similar love for fun, merriment, etc. Son and Jadine cannot reconcile their vastly different African-American and European-American worldviews.

In summation, read this novel. I must also share a similar story from Haitian history that could've influenced Hurston's story of the dead mule, beloved by the town of Eatonville. After dying, the entire town (except Janie, who under orders from Joe, could not attend because of his bourgeois standards of proper womanhood) attends the pushing of the carcass out of town with much praise. In Haitian history, a president of peasant origin loved his goat so much that he ordered an elaborate Catholic funeral in the national cathedral in Port-au-Prince. The Haitian peasant's love and appreciation for animals could've impacted the funeral for the beloved mule of Eatonville. Once again, Zora's background in Haiti and her own experiences in entirely black towns with rich oral traditions and the belief in black self-sufficiency can be found throughout the novel. Moreover, the novel's use of 'formal' English for the 3rd person narration and the use of the black vernacular also represents the double consciousness of African Americans, and the double consciousness of Zora Neale Hurston herself, since she was both black and a woman. Hurston also highlights internal divisions among blacks besides gender and sexism, such as color prejudice among blacks. Indeed, Mrs. Turner, the light-skinned black women who hates blacks, takes a liking to Janie because of her light complexion and long hair. Janie, however, transcends color prejudice by marrying dark men and defending blacks in conversations with Turner. Turner is so delusional that she believes whites will accept light-skinned, biracial blacks if the darker ones weren't pulling the mulattoes down with them. I think it's obvious that Hurston's novel does address issues facing 'the race.' She highlights the importance of as well as race, in a clever novel that uses folklore, oral traditions such as the dozens, and Ebonics.