Date of Award
Fall 12-2019
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
M.A.
Degree Program
English
Department
English
Major Professor
Elizabeth Steeby
Second Advisor
Elizabeth Lewis
Third Advisor
Jacinta Saffold
Abstract
Representations of natural disasters in Black Southern literature identify social location as the greatest indicator of risk vulnerability. Moreover, they can expose the precarious subjectivity of the Black female reproductive body, as addressed through characters Lulu in Richard Wright’s “Down by the Riverside,” Janie in Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, and Jesmyn Ward’s Esch in Salvage the Bones. Together, these female characters share a legacy of social marginalization and Black female resistance that is (re)shaped through their experiences with ecological catastrophe. This thesis considers these three texts together as an ongoing testimony and as a means to bear witness to a socio-historical record of disaster oppression and Black female resistance.
Recommended Citation
vincent, renee, "Weathering the Storm: Black Maternal Mortality, Resistance, and Power in Richard Wright’s “Down by The Riverside,” Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, and Jesmyn Ward’s Salvage the Bones" (2019). University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations. 2708.
https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/2708
Included in
Africana Studies Commons, American Studies Commons, Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies Commons
Rights
The University of New Orleans and its agents retain the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible this dissertation or thesis in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. The author retains all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis or dissertation.