Question

Write a full commentary on the setting and the characterization of the author in the autobiographical essay, “How It Feels to Be Colored me”, by/ Zora Neale Hurston, page 900 and highlight how the places shaped her views and ideas. .

Answer 1

• In "How It Feels to Be Colored Me," Zora Neale Hurston describes her experiences as an African American woman in early 20th Century America. She describes people as different colored bags, all of which are filled with the random bits of things that make up life.
• Despite her position as a black woman, in this essay, Hurston does not engage in self-pity, but takes racial difference and discrimination in stride.
• She uses the metaphor of colored bags to describe what people are like;bags full of hopes, desires, disappointments, and the stuff of life. If you were to dump these bags out, everyone would be more or less the same, regardless of the color of their skin/bag.
• Hurston fosters a perspective that looks beyond pride in one’s race to pride in one’s self. Through her witty words, Hurston delivers a powerful message to challenge the mind-sets of her, and our, time. While growing up in Florida,she obviously felt this discrimination because of the colour and after leaving the place her mindset changed and she embraced her color and considered the importance of race as important to one's identity and there is no need to be ashamed of it but wear it confidently because all of us are unique.
• She suggests that racial identity is important, but if it is made the single defining characteristic of an individual it is damagingly reductive. This is a contentious issue which continues into the modern day.