Chap 1 and 2 Their eyes were watching God.

In the opening chapter, Janie is returning home from a long journey (we don’t yet know from where). How do townspeople react to her? Compare and contrast this experience to the one she recounts about growing up playing with the Washburn children in Chapter 2.

They towns people act really disrespectful to Janie. Janie looks all dirty and nasty after she comes back from the Everglades with Tea Cake. The people start to make assumptions of what had happened to her. Some say that her man had left her and taken her money. When the town’s people had questioned her she didn’t answer any of their questions. This experience is similar because when she was a child she was criticized for hanging and playing with white people. They are always criticizing her.

Booker T Washington

Booker T Washington lived between 1856- 1915.
He was a writer, educator, and leader that formed the social and political agenda for African Americans. When he was young he was freed from slavery and when he got older he was appointed to lead a teachers’ college for blacks.
After this position he rose into a role as a national spokesman for African Americans.
Washington played a tremendous role in creating the atmosphere which took African Americans into the Harlem Renaissance era by inventing, writing and leadind African Americans.