Janie's Spiritual Growth in Their Eyes Were Watching God: A Deconstruction Approach

Yimei Jing

doi:10.54097/ijeh.v6i2.3468

Authors

Yimei Jing

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.54097/ijeh.v6i2.3468

Keywords:

Zora Neale Hurston, Deconstruction, Binary opposites, Self-liberation.

Abstract

The woman image in Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God is vivid and forward-looking, which lays the foundation for feminism. Janie, the heroine of the novel, achieved spiritual growth by subverting the traditional female image in the male-dominated society. This essay will use Derrida's deconstructive criticism to subvert the binary opposition in the text-older members of a family deciding the marriage fate of the younger generation, the superiority of husband over wife and woman’s personal freedom depending on her marriage with a man, analyzing how the heroine deconstructs the traditional ideology in the male-dominated society to realize her spiritual growth and revealing the meaning of the advanced thinking represented by Janie and its social meaning.

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