In America, we are all black, does not matter if you are black American, Haitian, Jamaican, Trinidadian, except if you are from India.They are called Indian, even though some are darker. There needs to be a stop to that “hierarchy” within the black communities,especially in the Caribbean communities. We are all black, coming to America for a better opportunity. then, we get caught up in making ourselves feel better by bringing others down. We see Haitians and Jamaicans getting offended when mistaken for the other. Some Jamaican in their mistaken believe they are better because they flew to America while believing all Haitians came in a boat illegally. That’s not true. My first time in a airplane was when I came to America. In high school, you see them fighting each other over nonsense. What the Jamaicans forget is that Haiti helped them gaining their independence after Haiti gained its independence. The media portray Haiti as the poorest country in the hemisphere while forgetting it was the first black country to gain its independence and had helped many others to gain theirs. This game of who’s better is what the ones in power wants to keep us divided. We seem to forget that others are already treating us badly, therefore there is no need to tear each other up. We, immigrants, need to stick together and lift each other up. Together we are stronger than divide and divided we fall; they know that that is why they want us divided.We need to stop and come together to fight this oppression.

Ifemelu and Obinze have been dating for a while and of course they had the sex talk with Obinze’s mother where Ifemelu promised she will talk to her when they are ready to have sex; however that did not happen. She also promised to use protection. Fast forward to chapter seven, while massaging Obinze, they started touching each other and they had unprotected sex. She feels confused by the suddenness of them having sex. She thought they would plan how and when they would do it for the first time. The narrator stated: “she did not want him to stop, but she had imagined this differently, assumed they would make a carefully planned ceremony of it (Adichie,114).” She feels it was a weak copy of what she imagined it would be. She felt shaken and a little disappointed by the “unplannedness of it”.  Ifemelu said: “it seemed somehow as though it had not been worth it at all (Adichie,115).” Then she thought she got pregnant when she was having pain. This is similar scene to Esther’s experience in The Bell Jar, except for her protecting herself with the birth control. Esther had wanted the freedom that men had when it comes to sex so she got birth control and went to have sex; however after having sex she did not feel the difference that she expected to see in herself. She thought she would be different but it was anything but that. Just like Ifemelu’s experience, Esther got sick except her case, Esther was bleeding a lot and she had to go the emergency room while Ifemelu went to clinic to get a pregnancy test. Ifemelu found out that she had appendicitis. It is interesting to see the similarity of their experiences that I did not see while reading the chapter.

Much of Americanah takes place as Ifemelu sits in a salon getting her hair braided, so one can understand from the beginning that hair will play a big role in this book.  Ifemelu lives in Princeton, New Jersey, she must travel to Trenton to have her hair braided. Hair is a symbol of identity for Ifemelu. It begins with her mother’s hair when she is a child. Her mother cuts off her long, beautiful hair that was often referred to as her “crowning glory” once she found Christ (Adichie ,50). A Christian knows what it means when you found Christ; it means you are a new person, a new beginning. For Ifemelu, her hair represents her struggle for confidence and an identity as both a Nigerian immigrant and a black American. In Nigeria, Ifemelu always braided her hair, but when she comes to America she learns that she is supposed to straighten her hair with chemicals or else people will think she is unprofessional. Aunty Uju told Ifemelu that: “I have to take my braids out for my interviews and relax my hair. Kemi told me that I shouldn’t wear braids to the interview. If you have braids, they will think you are unprofessional (Adichie ,146).” As a result of the cultural pressure, black women like Ifemelu feel they have to straighten, dye, or somehow make their hair look more like a white woman’s hair becomes a symbol of the racism inherent in American culture. Racism is not just explicitly racist acts, but also social hierarchies like the fact that most popular women’s magazines offer no hair-styling tips for black women. Hair, particularly Ifemelu’s hair, is used in the novel to comment on her defiance of American cultural norms. Ifemelu’s hair, whether braided, relaxed, or natural, represents her attempts to pushback against that norm.

Shug Avery is a black woman in her 30s. She is not a nice person in the few pages, we read she is mean to Celie and Mr.; however, because of the life she has lived she built a tough exterior. Like most of the character in The Color Purple, she is born poor but she changed her financial status by becoming a singer. She has earned enough money to travel and have a luxury life. She has more freedom than most of the women in the book who are home with children and work day and night, which is the norm back in those days. One would say she is very independent and that is different than the women in that period of time, where most women are told what to do by their husbands. She does not let gender role to define her and does not let be dominated by anyone. Shug has always chosen her own way of life. Because of her life of a singer, she travels to different places, so her sense of styles is determined by our worldly view.  Many of the people in her town do not understand that and judge her by how she is dressed and believe her to a promiscuous person. One thing about Shug Avery is that she loves to be admired and she is not ashamed about it. She is not modest neither about her sexual intercourse. She has a number of children even though she is not married.  Shug is the opposite of all the women’s characters in The Color Purple and society’s expectations of the woman gender. She is independent, has her own money and enjoys her sexuality. She does not let people dictate her life.

Paper Topic: The Bell Jar essay assignment

1. Introduction

Women’s role and place according to society back in the 1960’s

1. Society’s expectations of woman’s role
2. Definition of gender
3. Definition of gender role (components of gender)

Second wave feminist

1. What is it?
2. How did it begin?
3. What did they fight for?

Thesis Statement

The Bell Jar brings to light the situation of women in the 1960s and shows the reasons why the second wave feminist has fought long and hard for women rights.

Body

Main Point: woman’s dissatisfactions (feminine mystique)

1. females want more out of life
2. she knows who she is and what she wants for her future ( no marriage)
3. she wants a career ( 13 years of all A’s) and would not give it up to be a housewife
4. she feels that marriage and children brainwashed a woman.
5. Females being known as neurotic because they were not satisfied with being a wife and mother
6. Buddy calling Esther neurotic (a person who wants two mutually exclusive things at the same time) because she wanted a career and maybe a family.
7. Esther’s illness because she could not conformed to society’s expectations and gender role even though she was not wrong for wanting more out of life than just being a housewife.

Main Point:  Career advancement

1. Mrs. Willard has married and leaves her career as a teacher.
2. Dr. Nolan being a female psychiatrist at that period of time.
3. Jay Cee being a married woman with a career being the head of the magazine.
4. Esther conflicted about her career choice but sure she does not want to get married.

Main Point: Reproductive rights

1. Against the law to have birth control pills: females were encouraged to leave work and stay home to have babies
2. Dr. Nolan telling her the defense of chastity
3. Esther is embarrassed to tell the real reason for her visit for her birth control pills by saying she is there for a fitting visit at the doctor’s office
4. Esther wanting to have the freedom men has without worrying about pregnancy.

Main Point: Sexual double standard

1. Buddy was not judged for losing his virginity
2. Esther was being that Mrs. Willard could tell by staring hard at her to determine if she was a virgin or not
3. Esther’s description of Doreen being compared to a black woman because of the misconception of black woman being sexually open.
4. Irwin having different females’ friends.

III. Conclusion

The second wave feminist brings to light a lot of things that woman were not satisfied with even though they were taught to be happy with the life they have. The wave brings to light that they were not alone in their sentiment to want more

I took me a while to come up with what I want to write in this blog which is weird because I usually know what to write, not this one and I realize that it is because of the topic. It is hard to write about race because some things, that had happened back when The Bell Jar was written, are still happening today. Some things may have changed but some remains the same. The second wave ladies thought wanted equal rights for white females while ignoring the rights of the black females. In a way, I would say they are in their own jar where they only focus on themselves and forget about the other races.

In The Bell Jar, race does not play a major role, except for a few mentions from Esther. She made a reference about the Peruvian being “ugly as the Aztecs” to describe how she was really feeling about herself. It seems that whenever she wants to describe herself that does not reflect something beautiful she would use another race like an Indian or the Chinese man. In chapter fourteen, Esther referred to one of the workers at the asylum as a “negro” like that was his name and he did not have a name. This brings us back to slavery when blacks were not even considered as a person and 3 of them would make one person. However the book completely ignores the issue of race.

I would say that Esther is aware of her privileged racial status because of her attacked on the African American worker. She feels she lost that status and to regain it she has to attack someone who she feels is beneath her. She kicked the worker with his back turn.  All through the book, Esther does not fit in what her role female and her “privileged status”.  She does not conformed to society expectations while afraid of what the world thinks of her, but she knows her place in society.

According to Laura Franks’ gender role is the qualities, mannerism, duties and cultural expectations to a specific gender. I believe she means what society’s expectations of what a woman or man should be. Those expectations vary from generations to generations and culture to culture. In the 1960’s when The Bell Jar is written, a woman’s duties are clearly defined. A woman has been expected to be married and has children; she also is expected to be a housewife, awhile the man is supposed to be the provider. Laura refuses to play gender games means that she refuses to do what society expect her as a woman  to do like getting married, have children and become a housewife  which in part is society’s definition of what a woman should be. She decides to be her own person and she mentions that the first time it was frightening because going against everything society tells you to be and how you are raised create fear, fear of the unknown. Naturally, when someone does something the first time, that person is afraid, but over time it becomes natural to the person. Laura learns to defy society’s expectations without fear. Laura could have been cast out because she did not conform to what is expected of her and she surely is aware of what is expected because she talked about the 5 components of gender. In The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, Esther defies society’s expectations and definition of what makes a woman over and over. On chapter 11 on page 133, Esther is talking to a sailor alone, back then a proper woman would not be going out without chaperone and all throughout the books, there are many examples that she goes out all the time on her own.  She also lies to the sailor about who she was. I cannot imagine that a proper woman would be telling lies about her life. I do not get the feeling that Esther even gets afraid of doing the opposite of what is expected of a woman in the book. She constantly breaks society’s roles of a woman. Esther does not what society is expecting a woman to be. Matter of fact, she thinks it would be “11 years of straight A’s” wasted to become a housewife.

Mrs. Willard is the “ideal and proper” woman by the mid-20^th century description of what a woman is. She is a housewife of a university professor and her sole purpose is to take care of her husband, son and house. Mrs. Willard does not mind being a wife who cooks breakfast and dinner for her husband and also cleans dishes and the house. She likes those things so much that she would take the time to braid a rug out of strips of wool from her husband’s old suits that in a few days would be so dirty that no one would be able to differentiate it from other rugs. Mrs. Willard was not always a housewife. Matter of fact, before her marriage to her husband, Mrs. Willard had a career as a teacher in a private school; however she soon left that career to be a housewife (Plath ). She is very traditional when it comes to male and female roles in society. On page 71 of The Bell Jar, Esther mentioned Mrs. Willard’s view when it comes to male and female virginity and how she stared hard at her on one visit  to see whether she was a virgin or not.

As I mention before Mrs. Willard is the “proper” femininity but Esther does not respect her for it. She does not value marriage like Mrs. Willard does because Esther says: “So I began to think maybe it was true that when you were married and had children it was like being brainwashed” on page 85 of The Bell Jar. What she means is that all the wives do is cleaning, cooking and staying home, they forget about the life they had before marriage. She thinks it is “a dreary and wasted life for a girl with fifteen years of straight A’s” meaning  is it is a waste of time to have gone to school and university then spend the rest of life cleaning and cooking, therefore wasting  time doing nothing worthwhile.

I can understand where Esther is coming from about her statements of marriage because back in the days that was the norm but today it is totally different; people have  a choice mostly whether they get married or not. However, I disagree with Esther about family life being a waste of time because caring and nurturing a family is not an easy task; a woman does a lot to take care of a family.

Plath , Sylvia. “The Bell Jar.” London: Harper Perennial, 1963. 71, 84-85.