1. Mahaffey, Paul Douglas. “The Adolescent Complexities of Race, Gender, and Class in Toni Morrison’s ‘The Bluest Eye.’” Race, Gender & Class, vol. 11, no. 4, 2004, pp. 155–165. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/43496824. Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.

• In this article it talks about TBE and how race, gender, and class is a constant affects black females. Since it destroys ones path to adulthood. Mentioning why Pecola makes the decisions she does through out this novel. It talks about how much these topics can mess someone up once they are older. The constant rejection of a young black female constantly makes Pecola life be so scarring.

2. Tahir, Ary Syamanad. “Gender violence in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye and Alice Walker’s The Color Purple.” Journal of Language and Literature Education, no. 11, 2014, p. 1+. Gale Academic OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A394999607/AONE?u=cuny_hunter&sid=AONE&xid=dbc6dff0. Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.

•  In this article it talks about the clearness in which gender determined the position of people all over the world. It affects even more on a female that is colored. This paper mentions its judgement of the topics of gender identity, violence, and etc.  It talks about how socially constructed these are and how it plays out in the novel TBE.

3. Roye, Susmita. “TONI MORRISON’S DISRUPTED GIRLS AND THEIR DISTURBED GIRLHOODS: ‘The Bluest Eye’ and ‘A Mercy.’” Callaloo, vol. 35, no. 1, 2012, pp. 212–227., www.jstor.org/stable/41412505. Accessed 16 Nov. 2020.

• This article focuses on violence and how it destroys Pecola.It shows the different type of racism that is going around her black community.

4.Morrison, Toni. The Bluest Eye. New York ; Toronto: Penguin Books, 1994.

•  The novel that is being used through this whole research paper.

5. Nurhayati, Ari. “Intersecting Oppression of Gender and Race in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye and God Help The Child.” Litera (Yogyakarta) 18.3 (2019): 382–400. Web.

• This article brings up the su=ituation in which the world face about white domination. It brings up the intersecting oppression of both race and gender. This article gets into details of how black women deal with this oppression. It also mentions the standard of beauty base on a white woman.

6. Putnam, Amanda. “Mothering violence: ferocious female resistance in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye, Sula, Beloved, and A Mercy.” Black Women, Gender & Families, vol. 5, no. 2, 2011, p. 25+. Gale Academic OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A343258245/AONE?u=cuny_hunter&sid=AONE&xid=2ce78189. Accessed 24 Nov. 2020.

• Focuses on the black female characters in Toni Morrison novels and how they are potrayed. It mentions how Toni Morrison when writing about black female in the novels they are are often portrayed as scarred oppressive environments around them. How they are also racially exploited and sexually violated. For example Pecola through out the dove TBE.

7. Bump, Jerome. “Racism and appearance in the Bluest Eye: a template for an ethical emotive criticism.” College Literature, vol. 37, no. 2, 2010, p. 147+. Gale Academic OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A226716030/AONE?u=cuny_hunter&sid=AONE&xid=9059cb7f. Accessed 24 Nov. 2020.

•  This article focuses more on the emotions in which Morrison brings in the novel. Especially talks about the environmental experiences happening with race in TBE.

Claudia Rankine does this unique way of interacting with her readers. Claudia Rankine interacts with her readers by providing videos that go with these different situations. Claudia Rankine combine still and moving images from documented, and televised surveillance. This is a way in which Claudia Rankine interacted with her readers because it demonstrated clear acts of racism that are constructed into our everyday life. It shows the acts of what people went through and are based on individual experience. This not only shows how these situations reflects on how people are but also as citizens. Rankine talks about the ongoing situations of modern racism that is face daily. 

Reading the text and viewing it as a film is very different. For example while reading about the situation of February 26, 2012 / In Memory of Trayvon Martin, you rapidly read through it. You feel the pain on how frustrating this was. However seeing it in a film is very much different. Hearing Rankine read the text while the video is playing feels different. The reader gets into it and it really makes the reader feel every pain of it. Adding the still pictures such as black face is very underwhelming as one can’t believe how much damage people do to one another.

This particular film does this thing in which it showcases the first scenes to be filtered with very warm colors, like colors that represent calmness. It then slowly transitions itself to a more blue filter and it makes you feel sad. Rankine choose this type of interaction with the readers because it makes the reader feel the emotions that is coming with this text. For example in this situation the beginning of the text opens up by saying “My brothers are notorious. They have not been to prison. They have been imprisoned. The prison is not a place you enter. It is no place. My brothers are notorious”(Rankine, Claudia. Citizen. Graywolf Press. Kindle Edition). Rankie starts off by talking about her brothers, she mentions how they are like everyone else they are regular people too. Her brothers don’t belong in prison, her brothers are fighting through life. In this scene in the film the lights are in the warmer yellows/oranges. When it starts to get more in the bluer side Rankine mentions words like raining, break, and good bye. “…Down. It was raining. It stopped raining. It is raining down. He won’t hang up. He’s there, he’s there but he’s hung up though he is there. Good-bye, I say. I break the good-bye”(Rankine, Claudia. Citizen . Graywolf Press. Kindle Edition.). All these words symbolizes sadness. The rain is always so gloomy, and goodbyes are always sad. Both rain and goodbyes go with the color blue, since sadness always is describe to be so blue. This made the text be read with more emotions and it made the text be more visual as you can see the feelings in which the text is going through.

1. Mahaffey, Paul Douglas. “The Adolescent Complexities of Race, Gender, and Class in Toni Morrison’s ‘The Bluest Eye.’” Race, Gender & Class, vol. 11, no. 4, 2004, pp. 155–165. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/43496824. Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.
2. Tahir, Ary Syamanad. “Gender violence in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye and Alice Walker’s The Color Purple.” Journal of Language and Literature Education, no. 11, 2014, p. 1+. Gale Academic OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A394999607/AONE?u=cuny_hunter&sid=AONE&xid=dbc6dff0. Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.
3. Roye, Susmita. “TONI MORRISON’S DISRUPTED GIRLS AND THEIR DISTURBED GIRLHOODS: ‘The Bluest Eye’ and ‘A Mercy.’” Callaloo, vol. 35, no. 1, 2012, pp. 212–227., www.jstor.org/stable/41412505. Accessed 16 Nov. 2020.
4. Andersen, Richard. Toni Morrison. London: Marshall Cavendish, 2006.
5. Morrison, Toni. The Bluest Eye. New York ; Toronto: Penguin Books, 1994.

While doing some research in the hunter library I tried stick to JSTOR database, however found some other interesting database. I started searching by inputing “Bluest Eye” and then adding specific words such as gender, violence, and etc. I believe that these 3 specific journals I choose would add and help towards my research paper.

What is a the greatest ultimatum for the children in the book The Bluest Eyes? Racism or sexism?

In the beginning of the book Citizen Rankine inaugurate the style she will use during her entire book. Rankie uses secondary person and her writing style is poetic through out this book. So why does Rankie insert images in the book? 

Images are very significant as they can have a different meaning to every person. Rankie uses images in her book as a tool for her to capture a broader meaning to her text. The use of images in Citizen is meant to relate both  images and text together. By using images Rankie magnifies and highlights moment of her words as it complements her lyrics writing.

The very first in text image we see is a photo street sign that reads “Jim Crow Rd.” This images highlights the racism that is happening during that moment of the text. As the sign rd connects to “Jim Crow Laws,”. Jim Crow Laws targeted the black population. Not only that but it also draws the conclusion of the modern  racism that is happening in the book since it’s a road sign. For example “You never really speak for the time she makes her request and later when she tells you you smell good and have features more like a white person. You assume she thinks she is thanking you for letting her cheat and feels better cheating from an almost white person (Rankine, Claudia. Citizen. Graywolf Press.)”. This shows some racist remarks as it illustrates how the girl who is trying to cheat justifies herself as it’s okay that she is because the girl is of a lighter complexion than  other people of color. She also “compliments” the girl by trying to say how good she smells and how pretty she is for being a person of color. However the situation also shows a much more modern way to be racist as she doesn’t say it in a rude way and comes off as harsh. The girl simply says it in a normal tone of voice as it was a compliment she is giving. This reflects the image as many modern people might not see it as racist at all and don’t see a problem with it. You can also see more modern racism happening when an Rankie inserts an image of a photo of a wearable fabric sculpture, and a photograph of tennis player Caroline Wozniacki making fun of Serena Williams. This also shows how many people have forgotten that stuff like this is an act of racism.

I also wanted to bring up the cover I know it is representing the case of Trayvon Martin, but I wanted to relate it to a part of the book when Rankie brings up Zora Neale Hurston’s. She mentions the article “How it Feels to be Colored Me” and mentions a line in which it says “I feel most colored when I am thrown against a sharp white background”. I just found it ironic how Rankie also included a white background and the lettering and image of the book was black. This has so much meaning as it relates to what Zora Hurston.

Rankie uses images as a way to represent her text and add more to it. Rankie draws more attention to what is happening in society as well as she shows images of modern racism.