Andrew Bae
Period 2
Iannuzzo
4/27/14
Zeal Neale Hurston: Behind the Scenes Zora Neale Hurston is an African American other from a small city in Florida, filled with wildlife and gardenias. Hurston is faced with two different perspectives of the world and uses that to help further describe her childhood to the readers. In Zora Neale Hurston’s passage Dust Tracks on a Road, she uses diction, her mother’s point of view of the world and her father’s view of the world to help illustrate her own childhood to the reader. Hurston uses specific word choice and diction to enrich the reader’s perception of her childhood. Hurston being from Florida was often around forestry and foliage however once she had moved to New York it was quite the opposite, what was bountiful is now rare and what was unusual then is now plentiful, for “there were plenty of oranges, grapefruit, tangerine, guavas and other fruits in our yard.” All these different fruits were available to her so easily and plentiful however “[she] treasured the apple… apples were something rare. They came from way up north.” She uses specific word choice by saying plenty of oranges, implying and abundance almost an unnecessarily large amount of oranges, grapefruits and other fruits however when it came to an apple, it was like a treasure to her, rare because it had come from way up north. Differentiating herself from the north made it more realistic to the reader that the apple was rare and that something from way up north like that is no doubt, hard to obtain. In Florida “[she] had oranges, tangerines and grapefruit to use as hand grenades on the neighbor’s children.” Hurston once against exemplifies her abundance of fruits excluding apples once again, so much that she could throw them at other people and not worry about dinner that day. Her word choice of hand grenades enriches the readers, much as a solider would prepare many hand grenades for a war, Hurston had much ammunition in her fruit armory for the occasionally neighborhood kid to be assaulted with. “Any left-over boiled eggs could always be used for missiles.” Continuing the theme of an arsenal of food, Hurston uses military vocabulary to show off her excess food could be used for assaulting others, rather than its purpose of being eaten, further showing that putting for on the table for the family was not an issue at all, however “[she was] very happy whenever Papa went to Orlando and brought back something delicious like stew-beef.” Hurston would not use stew-beef to assault the neighborhood kids, but treasured it much like the apple because it had come from outside of her sphere, over in the distant city of Orlando. She distances herself from Orlando once again to further support the rarity of stew-beef and how she had treasured it that much more due to its rarity. Hurston uses military language, city names and geographical locations to help the readers feel more connected to her childhood, having an abundance of fruit to supply her fruit armory and using location to differentiate between rare and common, when it came to food such as the northern American delicacy of apples and the Orlando specialty of stew-beef. Hurston uses her mother’s perspective of her to aid the reader into understanding her childhood better. Hurston had been raised by her mother and father, with very differing viewpoints of the world, different perspectives and trains of thought. Hurston’s mother was adamant about the kids playing at home because she did not want them to be a “no-count Negroes and poor white trash.” For she had self-respect and distanced herself from other Negroes because she felt she was above them and raised her kids to be above them. Her mother believed that her kids should “’jump at de sun.’ [She] might not land on the sun, but at least we would get off the ground.“ Hurston’s mother believed that her children should reach and soar for their dreams rather than be locked up and silenced much like her generations past, to live above her mother and it live well. Hurston’s mother was steadfast in the belief that all good traits, or seemingly good traits are from the mother’s side and all bad ones came from the father’s. For her mother was evangelizing the “universal female gospel that all good traits and learnings come from the mother’s side.” Hurston’s mother is a woman who wants the best for her children, distancing them from what she considered low class and no-counts; she spread and advocated the women’s gospel that all good things came from the mother. Using her mother’s perspective of the world and how Hurston was taught to view the world enriches the reader’s experience and gives an inside look into Hurston’s childhood. The polar opposite mindset and perspective of the world from Hurston’s father gives the reader and almost behind the scenes viewpoint to peer into Hurston’s childhood, enriching them and helping them understand it better. Hurston’s father was quite the opposite of her mother, wanting Hurston to be safe and to be a quiet young lady. He was very inflexible about Hurston’s reactions to talk back and to question people, saying that it would get her killed someday and that is not what he had worked for. “Papa did not feel so hopeful. Let well enough alone. It did not do for Negroes to have too much spirit.” Papa felt that if a Negro had too much spirit it would get them killed and that they should not jump for the sun like her mother suggest due to the dangerous world around them, opposite from Mama, he feared the world and people in it. Papa wanted Hurston to be a “mealy–mouth rag doll” because otherwise Papa had “predicted dire things for [her].” Papa once again showed that he fears the world especially for Hurston because she was so quick to talk back and to give people sass. Hurston’s father feared that the white folk would not stand it and have her killed. Hurston’s father firmly believed that if a Negro was out of line and speaking their mind and having an attitude, undoubtedly “posses with ropes and guns were going to drag [her] out sooner or later on account of that stiff neck [she] toted.” Once again unlike her mother, her father feared deeply that if the Negros had too much spirit posses of white men would come to lynch her. Hurston’s father was the polar opposite of Mama and feared the white men, failing to draw a boundary between the lower class Negros and themselves. Living in Florida, Hurston had an abundance of fruit and perspectives of the world, filled with oranges and positivity, tangerines and fear. Hurston from an early age was forced to choose between setting a distinction from the lower class Negroes or fearing the white man and subsiding with them. Dust Tracks on a Road, helps the readers understand Hurston’s background and her reasoning behind her choices in her life, explains her writing process and what she feels near and dear to her heart. Hurston uses diction for the abundance and rarity of certain fruits and foods, differing perspectives of her mother and father to help the reader digest and understand her childhood and background, from the way she was taught to think to what she ate on a regular basis.