Magazine & Journal Editor’s Edition Summer
2010 | 45
of systems of oppression. The ideas that black women could be hated by their black men, the yearning and need for intimacy, the injustice of rights and property, and finally, the turning of heads when she is seen downtrodden as Sofia demonstrated in her character so well. The idea that she was made to pay her dues after the fact her injustices afforded her a life of imprisonment without her dignity as a woman, she was silenced that day, when she let go, as mad, angry black, but why? “Won’t you have a seat? I ast, pushing him up a chair.” (Walker, pp. 56) I found that small conversations as such are what create this dynamic language of culture and diversity. In feminism the binaries that shape and shift us fall in lines of language, communication and intelligence. I find that in this novel, Walker shaped Sofia with complexity, brilliance, and without a shadow of doubt, it was that moment, the reader experienced the raw emotion that changed our lives forever, that moment of insanity. What if we realized our power? What if? (Seely, pp. 9) I think that race is a complex issue in feminism because we continue to ignore the standpoint of black women. I think when black women lament they find themselves punished. I know that Celie in Walker’s novel found her salvation. At the end of her life, between her peers she found property, integrity, selfesteem, freedom, education, and her way home. I do not understand why Walker chose to give this novel a happy ending because it made a righteous pathway into the patriarchal society as though if we all hang in there we too will be approved. It justifies the need for the abuse, the imprisonment and chaos in misogyny. I challenge this part in my response because it is deemed worthy for black women to accept their role. In this book, it appeared as though we accepted our role as though everything will work itself out in due season if we survive. I find that problematic because it gives people the privilege to continue their abuse until their lives are done. I find that the accountability is lost. The responsibility becomes a Samaritan hidden treasure, and we are bound to the fallacies of black rituals of a God that we claim saves us by