How It Feels to Be Colored Me, Essay Example

Zora Neale Hurston’s,How it Feels to be Colored Me expresses her feelings towards being colored in America during a tumultuous time. Hurston uses forms of figurative language to convey to the reader her experiences of being colored. Contrary to many of her time, she embraced being colored. Hurston uses different time frames in her life to represent the transformation she endures to an epiphany of self-pride. Essentially, Hurston is conveys to the reader with various forms of figurative language that regardless to color, all people share the commonality of human nature.

Hurston opens the story by confirming that being colored is not a tragedy, but she discusses it from the perspective of an innocent child. First, she dispels the common tale that many African Americans of the day proclaimed-that their grandparents were of Native American origin. She says, “I am colored but I offer nothing in the way of extenuating circumstances except the fact that I am the only Negro in the United States whose grandfather on the mother’s side was not an Indian chief.”In order to understand how anyone could consider their race a tragedy, one would have to understand the time frame that Zora is speaking of. Hurston grew up in a small town in Florida- a town that was populated only by colored people. She discusses this in the first couple of paragraphs of the work. She speaks of how she enjoyed sitting on the porch and watching “white folks” pass by. She would greet them and they would greet her back. This was unusual for other colored people of the time. So, Hurston is conveying to her reader that she is different from everyone else. Although most colored people of the time would not let white folks see them watching them, to young Zora this was quite exciting. In this small town in Florida, Hurston was unaware of the fact that there was any difference between her and any other white person. Nonetheless, when she was thirteen she moved away from this small town and became abruptly aware of the differences that others perceived between them and colored people.

Living a sheltered life had quite an effect on Zora’s later life. It was only after she left that small town in Florida that she realized that she was colored. Although she did not consider race an important part of meaningful existence, she experienced times when it was quite difficult to ignore the color barrier. In fact, it is evident in the essay that there were times when race relationships made her uncomfortable.For example, she says, “Someone is always at my elbow reminding me that I am the granddaughter of slaves. It fails to register depression with me. Slavery is sixty years in the past. The operation was successful and the patient is doing well, thank you. These moments of discomfort were due to situations where members of the white race often had domination in certain arenas. One such situation occurred when Hurston was at a club listening to some Jazz music. She depicts this feeling using imagery. She discusses the whiteness of the white patron and how she felt standing against the purple and red background. This is the first time that Hurston discusses colors, which is also a metaphor for her actually seeing herself as colored for the first time.She related so deeply with the music because she felt it depicted the life of oppression many colors were experiencing. For example, “The great blobs of purple and red emotion have not touched him. He has only heard what I have felt.” However, a white patron could not connect with the music on such a level because he had not experienced the oppression the musician was depicting. Hurston conveys that this is one of the times when she becomes aware of color. The fact that they both react differently to the same piece of music listened to in a Harlem night club, drives home the differences between the two races for Hurston.

Another type of figurative language that Hurston uses is comparison. She compares herself and other races to paper bags. She implies that all people have some good qualities and some bad and that if all the contents of all different color bags were dumped out, no one would be able to discern which content came from which bag. This metaphor confirms her insinuation that all human beings possess the same qualities regardless to race. Hurston uses her old community and her new community to describe the experiences of colored people. Issues of race and barriers became apparent to Hurston upon entering this other part of society. In her all colored community, she was just Zora. Now, she has become to others Zora, the colored girl. Yet, she still embracesher race with pride and dignity. Some people see her pride and dignity as an air of egotism, but she is merely confident in who she is. For example, “At certain times, I have no race, I am me. When I set my hat at a certain angle and saunter down Seventh Avenue…for instance.”

In conclusion, Hurston uses this essay to convey her experiences and feeling towards race relations during a tumultuous time for colored people. She uses several types of figurative language to convey her feelings and emotions about race relations. She uses metaphors to say that all people are essentially the same, regardless to color. She uses comparison to show the difference between the races-initially, she felt that she was no different than any other white person. Finally, she uses imagery to paint a vivid picture of the way people are perceived by others. In the end, Hurston’s goal is to change the way that some colored people viewed themselves, as well as the way other races viewed them.