Subverted Madness Of Black Women In Beloved And Sula

Toni Morrison is the first black female writer winning the Nobel Prize in America for her imaginative words and true representation of an essential aspect of American reality.Among Morrison's works,Beloved and Sula attract much attention from the world of criticism for creating subversive and rebellious black women,and playing back the historical trauma of black women caused by slavery.These two novels highly represent the influence of power system on black women and their living conditions in and after slavery.Scholars analyze these two works mainly from perspectives of feminism,postmodernism and psychoanalysis.To reveal the persecution and marginalization of black women under the racial,cultural and gender power system,Morrison creates a series of crazy women in these two works.Based on Foucault's madness theory and power theory,this paper tries to explore causes and the essence of black women's madness.In presenting varied statuses of black women's madness in relative power systems,this paper exposes the inner mechanism of power and the strategies of their resistance to break the disguise of madness and reveal the nature of madness under the disciplinary power system.This paper consists of five parts.Introduction briefly presents the general situation of Morrison and her works,studies on Beloved and Sula overseas and at home,and the research background of this paper.Chapter one reviews power systems where black women live in in Beloved.In slavery,the punishment becomes the main technique of power mechanism.The essence of black women's madness in slavery is revealed in Sethe's liberating madness under the persecution of racial power system.Chapter two shows power systems where black women live in in Sula.The hierarchical observation is the main technique of power mechanism.The truth of black women's madness after slavery is revealed in Sula's revolting madness in power system of race and patriarchy.Chapter three reveals the inspirational function of madness as black women's strategy of survival,resistance,and an approach of historical interpellation.The last part concludes the truth that black women,as the most inferior group in American society,are controlled and oppressed by multiple power systems.When the stability of ruling class is threatened by black women's rebellion,the mechanism of power system would suppress and expel them under the title of madness.The black women who survive and resist in these two works bring new understanding and recognition of madness to readers and society.In virtue of Foucault's madness theory and power theory,the meaning that Morrison retrospects the miserable experience of black people under the disciplinary power system and represents the marginalized black women's unique way of resistance is shown.