Zora Neale Hurston (1891-1960)

Contributing Editor: Robert Hemenway

Classroom Issues and Strategies

While there are no particular difficulties in teaching Hurston, some students find the dialect hard to understand. To address this problem, I usually read several passages aloud to help students get a "feel" for the voices. Once they've heard Hurston read aloud, they can create her characters' speech in their minds so that it is understandable.

Major Themes, Historical Perspectives, and Personal Issues

Women's issues

Race issues

Interface between oral and written literature

Significant Form, Style, or Artistic Conventions

Short story structure

Representations of an oral culture

Original Audience

Always a complex issue when postulating the audience of a black writer.

Comparisons, Contrasts, Connections

Langston Hughes

Alice Walker