How it feels to be colored me By Zora Neale Hurtson (Text TOW#6)

      Published in The World Tomorrow in 1928, Zora’s essay, How it feels to be colored me, stands incongruous to its surroundings. At a time when racial segregation and racial identities were emphasized heavily, Zora portrayed to her audience an African-American girl accepting and embracing the melting-pot American society. Such an idea of human uniformity may be a shock to many at the time period, especially since the essay is published in a popular American magazine consumed by people of all races, but it fits perfectly for Zora, as an anthropologist and human rights activist.

Through her description of an American African-American girl accepting the shared culture of America, Zora attempted to convince her readers, the American public, that similarity people share is much more important that their differences, such as color. As she appeals to her audience, Zora emphasizes upon the value of individuals, and cautions the readers not to categorize anyone simply based on race and color.

 What makes Zora’s essay successful and impactful to her audience is the fitting use of imagery and analogy. She remarked “When I set my hat at a certain angle and saunter down Seventh Avenue, feeling as snooty as the lions in front of the Forty Second street… the cosmic Zora emerges” (Oates117). The actions and feelings of Zora, how she sauntered down Seventh Avenue and felt as snooty as the lions, gave Zora a human face for readers to connect to. Zora, in this description, is enjoying life and ignorant of the racial problems in the world. She gave the audience an impression that she is Zora, an individual belonging to neither race nor time. In later paragraphs, Zora also presented her audience an imagery of bags, “white, red and yellow” (Oates 117) and how the bags can be “all be dumped into a single heap and refilled without altering the contents greatly” (Oates 117). Likely many readers are more insensitive to “bags” instead of “race” at the time. Zora, instead of talking directly about race, chose to talk about different color bags so that she can connect to all parts of the American public, and let all of them at least ponder about the similarities shared by human beings.

Bags are universal. They can be dumped and refilled without changing much; Zora asserts, so are human.