Learning the Blessings and Curses of Profanity in Alice Walker’s Color Purple

Abstract

Alice Walker's The Color Purple depicts the lives of characters who are socially impoverished by the two curses of being colored and not white; and being a woman, and not man. Being colored woman is considered a rank low in the Afro-American social order hierarchy. Celie is the protagonist, and she is depicted as a poor, unattractive, and uneducated woman with two children, who were forcefully taken from her. She was abused by a man, whom she calls Daddy. She marries a bad man who beats her physically and verbally. The book features several oppression faced by female characters Nettie, Sophia, and Squeak, and all of whom are the racial victims of gender-based abuse. These oppressed women rise up and fight back, taking control of their own destiny.