Susanna Jacob
Dr. Arya Aiyappan
American Literature 331
29 August 2014
Literacy
and Oral Expressions Used in the Novel
Alice Walker places Celie and Nettie in a
society where there is an apparent hierarchy. The whites are higher than the blacks,
the men are dominant over the women and literacy is placed over oral
expression. In her novel The Color Purple, Alice Walker attempts to reorganize
these hierarchies, where the whites need not oppress the blacks, the women are
free from the dominance of the whites and oral expression is no longer
overpowered by literacy.
During this time in history the black
slaves were not allowed to be educated and literacy was used as a device to
overpower the slaves. It was looked at as a privilege reserved for the whites,
which emphasized the whites’ power over the blacks. But the blacks were eventually
given this liberty. As a result the black men decided which of their women
would receive formal education and which of who would be bartered into
marriage.
As The Color Purple is an epistolary novel,
language plays an important role in understanding the novel. Both Celie and
Nettie learn to read and write as a way of expressing and dealing with their
harsh environments. The novel begins with Celie writing a letter to God, an
entity foreign to her but one she believes is white and all powerful, this
shows the readers the extent of the white dominated society and the impact it
has on her.
You better not never tell anybody but God
It'd kill your mammy.
Dear God,
I am fourteen years old. I am I
have always been a good girl. Maybe you can give me a sign letting me know what
is happening to me.
(Walker 3)
This
shows us the desperation with which Celie begins to write her letters to God
and that literacy replaces the oral expression. When Celie’s stepfather
arranges her marriage to Albert, her ties with her beloved sister Nettie is
severed off. It is only after several years that she realizes that Albert hid
the letters of Nettie forcing her to lose contact with her sister and also
foregoing an opportunity for cultural education. Though the sisters lead
different lives, writing becomes very important to them. Celie writes in order
to understand the events unfolding around her. She believes that by writing
about these event it is possible for her to find herself. Nettie writes to
understand her consciousness better. The only common denominator between them
is the fact that they both write as a result of being imprisoned in a male dominant
society. Both Nettie and Celie realize that literacy their only way out of
their oppressive society.
She say, What?
I say, Write.
She say, Nothing but death can keep me
from it. (Walker
19)
The
above paragraphs show us the relation between literacy and two sisters. We will
now look into oral expressions and how it is addressed in the novel. Celie’s
experiences though written down are oral in nature. According to Walter Ong,
the following points characterize oral expression, rhythmic balanced patterns,
repetition-antithesis, assonances, use of proverbs known to a large population,
conservative use of language, and they are all present in varying degrees in
Celie’s writing.
I talk to myself a lot.... Celie I say,
happiness was just a trick in your case.... [Y]ou
thought it was time to have some, and
that it was gon last. Even thought you had the
trees with you. The whole earth. The
stars. But look at you. When Shug left,
happiness desert. (Walker 235)
At one point she even merges her writing with
oral, as believes that her writing would ‘speak’ for her.
Oh,
she say. He little. He cute. Got nice buns....
I
don't say nothing. I pray to die, just so I don't never have to speak.... I
went and
got a
piece of paper.... I wrote her a note. It said, Shut up....
But
Celie, she say....
He's
a man. I write on the paper.
Yeah,
she say.... But...
Spare
me, I write. (225-226)
Thus at the end of the novel it is almost
as if Celie creates a new type of literacy that combines both oral and written expressions. Her style of writing combines the functions
of orality (that is recording human history and it’s re-telling) to the
functions of literacy (permanently fixing the events in history so that it lead
to introspection.)
Works
Cited
1. Babb, Valerie. “The
Color Purple: Writing to Undo What Writing Has Done.” Phylon 47.2 (1986): 107-116. JSTOR.
Web. 20 August 2014.
2.
Blount, Marcellus. “A Woman Speaks.” Callaloo 18 (1983): 118-122. JSTOR. Web.
20 August 2104.
3.
Tucker, Lindsay. “Alice Walker's The Color Purple:
Emergent Woman, Emergent Text.” Black
American Literature Forum 22.1 (1988): 81-95. JSTOR. Web. 20 August 2014.
4.
Walker, Alice. The
Color Purple. London: Pheonix, 2004. Print.
5. Walter J. Ong,
SJ., Orality and Literacy:T he Technologizingo f the Word,N ew Accents Series,
ed. Terence Hawkes (New York, 1982), pp. 36-57
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