Self-Assertion a Corollary of Suppression and Racial Discrimination in Alice Walker’s The Color Purple

Abstract

This research attempts to explore the self-identity by undergoing both suppression and racial discrimination in Alice Walker’s The Color Purple.  It contends to reveal the destruction of mental stability in black women through black male dominance and white people exploitation. The terms suppression and racial discrimination are discussed under the concept of Alice Walker ‘Womanism’ and Frantz Fanon ‘The Fact of blackness’. Psychological violence and oppression destroys the self, and at the same time gives strength and realization of one’s own capabilities. The logical outcome of this research is to portray how exploitation and suppression brings out the potential of an individual to survive and resist towards the social injustices. The domination of men over women, and female bearing the consequences, struggling to survive, and discovering their own self remains the main theme of this research.