An Analysis Of Black Women's Identity In Sula From The Perspective Of Post-colonial Feminism

Toni Morrison is the first black female writer to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in American history.Her main works are The Bluest Eyes,Sula,The Song of Solomon,The Tar Baby,Beloved,Jazz,Heaven,Love,and so on.This thesis is trying to analyze her second work,Sula.Sula tells the relationship between Sula and Nel and her growing journey and the hard plight of the black community living in the ?bottom? community.Many scholars at home and abroad have carried out detailed research on this work from different aspects,but few scholars have analyzed Sula from perspective of post-colonial feminist theory.Post-colonial feminism sprang up in the 1980 s,trying to find a theoretical model and interpretation strategy that women can adapt to the post-colonial cultural background.Post-colonial feminism exposes patriarchal and colonial discourses,building Third World women as others and subjecting women to double oppression.This article uses post-colonial feminism to analyze black women's arduous journey from identity loss to identity reconstruction under dual oppression of racial and gender discrimination.The mainstream American culture is the distortion of black women's thoughts and destructive effect of self-subject consciousness in American white culture.From above all,it can be seen that black women should love their identity and traditional culture and resist the impact of white culture.This article is divided into three parts,including an introduction,main body,and conclusion.The introduction first briefly introduces famous writer Toni Morrison and her main work Sula,then reviews the relevant comments on Toni Morrison and her works at home and abroad,and then explains post-colonial feminist theory.The innovation of this thesis is to use post-colonial feminist theory to analyze identity of black women in Sula.The principal part mainly interprets Sula from three chapters.The first chapter mainly discusses embodiments of three black women's identity loss.This chapter begins with three black women to describe the manifestation of black female identity loss.Firstly,from analysis of Eva,she shows an unusual love for her children.Secondly,Sula is deeply influenced by her mother and grandmother.She performs unusual behavior and lives an experimental life.Finally,Sula's best friend Nel has been losing herself since she is married.The second chapter mainly introduces the main causes of the loss of black women's identity.This chapter begins with the living environment of black women.They are living in the 1920 s and 1960 s before and after the end of the First World War,when Black Civil Rights Movement and Women's Liberation Movement were soaring.Under double oppression of racial and gender discrimination,traditional male are superiority.Gradually they accept traditional thought and lose themselves.The third chapter describes reconstruction journey of black women after the loss of identity.The first is Eva's journey to rebuild.Eva's sacrifice,she is abandoned by her husband.She sells one of her legs to support her family.When she sees her daughter burning in the fire,she jumps straight upstairs regardless of her own life.Eva provokes traditional black community.Secondly,Sula pursues self-rebellion in the youth and limitations of Sula's pursuit of herself.Sula's escape,because she hates traditional lifestyle.She chooses to go out and try a new living condition.Finally,it is Nel's childhood consciousness.When she takes a train to the south with her mother,she experiences physical and spiritual humiliation.She first realizes that she is self-existing.She realizes that she can find herself when she is with Sula.They realize that they are neither white nor male;they have no status and no rights.Nel pursues identity in Nel's friendship with Sula.She chooses the rational path of seeking herself.Finally,conclusion part is the sublimation of the theme.Black women who are under dual oppression of racial and gender discrimination must choose the rational road,respect themselves,love their traditional culture and maintain their subjectivity in the white supremacist society.At present,some ethnic minorities in the world are still subject to economic,political and cultural oppression.Therefore,it is significance to analyze Morrison's Sula from perspective of post-colonial feminism.