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Zora Neale Hurston

By Faith Akinje

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ZORA NEALE HURSTON'S BACKGROUND

• ZORA NEALE HURSTON WAS BORN IN NOTASULGA, ALABAMA, U.S ON JANUARY 7 1891

• SHE LIVED IN AN ALL AFRICAN-AMERICAN COMMUNITY FOR HER CHILDHOOD YEARS.

• SHE WROTE SEVERAL NOVELS AND SHORT STORIES.

• HER LIFE’S MOTTO WAS “JUMP AT THE SUN!” GIVEN TO HER BY HER MOTHER.

• HER WRITING HELPED SHAPE FUTURE FEMALE AFRICAN-AMERICAN WRITERS’ APPROACH TO AUTHORSHIP AND DEVELOPMENT OF IDENTITY.

• SHE WAS A WRITER, ANTHROPOLOGIST AND POLITICAL ACTIVIST.

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Zora's Early Life

• Hurston was the fifth of eight children of John Hurston and Lucy Ann Hurston

• Her father was a Baptist preacher, tenant farmer, and carpenter, and her mother was a school teacher

• In 1904, Hurston's mother died Her father remarried to Matte Moge but there were rumours that they were dating before her mothers death

• Zora was sent to a boarding school but her parents soon stopped paying for her and got expelled

• Zora went to college a few years after and got into book writing and literature

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Adulthood and Marriage Life

In 1927, Hurston married Herbert Sheen, a jazz musician and former classmate at Howard who later became a physician. Their marriage ended in 1931. In 1939, while Hurston was working for the WPA, she married Albert Price, who was 25 years younger than she; this marriage ended after only seven months

In 1934 she established a school of dramatic arts "based on pure Negro expression" at Bethune-Cookman University (at the time, Bethune-Cookman College), a historically black college in Daytona Beach, Florida.

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HARLEM RENAISSANCE

• LASTED FROM 1919-1937.

• GOALS OF THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE:

• TO RESPOND TO THE SOCIAL CONDITIONS OF AFRICAN- AMERICANS;

• TO BREAK WITH THE 19TH CENTURY MINSTREL STEREOTYPES OF AFRICAN-AMERICANS;

• TO PLACE GREATER EMPHASIS ON BLACK FOLK CULTURE;

• TO PROVIDE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL UPLIFT FOR AFRICAN-AMERICANS THROUGH SOCIAL PROGRAMS SUCH AS THE NAACP.

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ZORA NEALE HURSTON’S INFLUENCE ON THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE

• THEIR EYES WERE WATCHING GOD IS CONSIDERED THE LAST TEXT OF THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE.

•HER PORTRAYAL OF AN AFRICAN-AMERICAN FEMALE ABLE TO DEFINE HERSELF OUTSIDE OF SOCIAL CONVENTIONS AND STEREOTYPES HAS PROVIDED A MODEL FOR MODERN AFRICAN AMERICANS SEEKING THEIR IDENTITIES IN UNCONVENTIONAL ROLES.

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FEMINIST ISSUES IN THEIR EYES• THEIR EYES WERE WATCHING GOD IS CONSIDERED THE

FIRST MODERN FEMINIST TEXT BY AN AFRICAN-AMERICAN.

• THEIR EYES ARE WATCHING GOD DESCRIBES JANIE’S SEARCH TO FIND HER IDENTITY AND VOICE APART FROM HER THREE HUSBANDS.

• JANIE LEAVES HER FIRST HUSBAND IN SEARCH OF A MORE FULFILLING RELATIONSHIPS.

• JANIE FINDS HER VOICE THROUGH HER FEMININITY AND THROUGH HER COMMUNITY.

• JANIE CHOOSES TO WORK OUTSIDE THE HOME TO FIND PURPOSE OUTSIDE OF DOMESTIC LIFE.

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HURSTON’S VIEWS OF THE SOUTH•ZORA NEALE HURSTON BELIEVED THAT AUTHENTIC BLACK

CULTURE CAN ONLY BE FOUND IN THE SOUTH.

•HURSTON OPPOSED THE INTEGRATIONIST MEASURES IMPLEMENTED IN THE BROWN VS. BOARD OF EDUCATION DECISION, SEEING INTEGRATION AS A WAY FOR CULTURAL VALUES TO BECOME TAINTED.

•HURSTON BECAME A SPOKESWOMAN FOR THE FIRST INTEGRATED ALL-BLACK COMMUNITY, EATONVILLE, FLORIDA.

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Zora Neale Hurston was a historical female figure that made changes to the English literature that we use today and she was amazing and a great help to our society that we see today.

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