Toni Morrison's "Recitatif,"" narrates the temporally isolated encounters of two women first brought together within the walls of St. Bonaventure, a state home for ... absent, dancing" mother, "one of the things she said was that they never washed their hair and they smelled funny. Roberta sure did. Smell funny, I mean"" (Morrison 243). Immediately, we see this characteristic as a hint for racial distinction, but on what grounds exactly? The narrator's mother certainly intended her statement to be classify a ... absence in Twyla's memory. "Maggie didn't fall. No, Twyla. They knocked her down...

• Word Count: 1383
• Approx Pages: 6
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

In her novel Sula, Toni Morrison immerses the reader in the rich and diverse lives to be found in the black community of Medallion. Morrison illuminates the harmful effect white patriarchal society has on minority members of society; she fights back against this historical oppression by centering her novel on the internal life of the black community. Morrison portrays their everyday struggles and in ... well as his reflections on the cursed black people and the burden of their rehabilitation that is placed on white society seem all the more absurd and ignorant having read Morrison's revealing...

• Word Count: 1501
• Approx Pages: 6
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... , or educationally and economically privileged). We have also critiqued culture and history in these terms, articulating at least some of the consequences of such constructed oppositions and exclusions. For example, Toni Morrison, in her critical text Playing in the Dark, has argued that everything that constitutes whiteness as a racial identity--from the national literature of the United States to its Constitution to ... Americanness. And it shows. (6) Thus, racial opposition--though misrecognized by whites--has allowed for the creation of a self-narrative of the (so-called) white race ...

• Word Count: 301
• Approx Pages: 1
• Grade Level: Undergraduate