Author’s Intention Review of Related Theories

16 marriage between African American and white people. African American cannot get any kind of property by buying or inheritance either. African American ―could not engage in litigation or enter into civil contracts; they could not testify against whites in cour t, nor could they sit on juries‖ Stampp, 1956; Starobin, 1970, p.7, as cited in Aguirre Turner, 2011, p.115. Since 1865, the biggest population of slaves lived and worked on farms and plantation in Southern America; North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Arkansas and Texas. While it was time for Northern America to end slavery, the Southern refused to follow the decision. African American in Southern were still discriminated based on racist laws called Jim Crow South African History Online. The discrimination affected many fundamental aspects of life: housing, political, economical, and educational discrimination. When African Americans experience housing discrimination, they were isolated from white American areas. While all the business is growing in the city, African American lives far outside from it. According to Aguirre and Turner 2011, ―90 percent of all African Americans remained in the South, 75 percent living under oppressive conditions in rural areas .‖ p.126. As the consequence, not only they could not get employment, but also lost the access of good schools, public facilities and services. They were not allowed to vote either South African History Online. Even though their presence among white American was objectionable, a lot of African Americans were still working for white families. The racial discrimination against African American is higher than any other races in United 17 States because their skin color is more identifiable. It makes them the easiest targets of discrimination, especially when they socialize with white Americans as their employers in inner city Aguirre Turner, 2011, p.147. Along with the the African Americans population escalates in the inner city; the segregation level also escalates quickly. Armstrong 2012 mentions racial segregation as ―a form of institutional racism ‖ p. 33 because of the separation by law and action in daily activities including the use of public facilities and transportation. This statement is supported by Calmore 1993 as cited in Aguirre and Turner 2011: Segregation of African Americans means that this minority is concentrated in inner cities and in city public housing. The result is that African Americans have 1 reduced access to jobs because many companies have moved to the suburbs, 2 reduced capacity to go to good schools because many inner-city schools are underfunded, overcrowded, and plagued with problems ranging from drugs and crime to high dropout rates and 3 reduced ability to live and grow up outside the sphere of rampant crime, drug use, and gang activity p.107. Segregation is violating African American ‘s civil rights. Civil rights are the law of protection and freedoms given by nations to all citizens within their territorial area. When African American ‘s civil rights are not being granted, they form Civil Rights Movement to receive equality. Armstrong 2012 describes The Civil Rights Movement as: an effort by blacks and whites in the mid-1950s to late 1960s to achieve civil rights equal for blacks as those of whites, including equal opportunity in employment, housing, and education, as well as the right to vote, the right of equal access to public facilities, and the right to be free of racial discrimination p 32. Civil Rights Movement hit the highest point in the 1950s-1960s Aguirre Turner, 2011, p.112 and encouraged more people to fight for their rights, including women. 18

2. Women’s Role in Southern American Society

A lot of women stood up for their rights during Civil Rights Movement. They concerned to their freedom in taking care of their own families. Irons 1998, as cited in Armstrong 2012 identifies that there are three types of women participation varied by race in the Civil Rights Movement: ―1 high risk activism, 2 low-risk activism, and 3 activist mothering and women‘s work‖ p.38. High-risk activist deals with dangerous matters; legal, social, physical and financial. African –American women dominated the number of high-risk activism because ―they had more to gain by participating and thereby more willing to risk more‖. Many of white American women were also involved in Mississippi movement as low-risk activists. Low- risk activist is ―open to white middle-class women who could have engaged in high-risk activism, but would have been in jeopardy losing their economic, social, and political status in Mississippi society‖. Since women have different skills than men, their concern also different. They usually more focus on domestic specialty. Activist mothering or women‘s work were referred to them whose ―skills relating to maternalism, nurturance and domesticity‖ Armstrong, 2012, p.38-41. Gladney 1994, p.6 in Marshall 1999, p. 1 gives explanation that ―in fact, the roles of the southern black woman and the southern white woman are equally important and oppressive‖. The typical African American women in the South are working as a cook, housekeeper, maid, or all of those occupations wrapped into one person working for one white family. Marshall 1999 even describes southern African American women as ―the cornerstone of the southern, 19 domestic life‖. Consequently, they are completing dual jobs; taking care of white family and their own family. African American maid represents ―comfort and ease not only to a child in conflict, but also to children who view their white mothers as overbearing and unavailable ‖ p.2. White mother is responsible of advising her own children about what is right and wrong. Subsequently, Marshall adds that the white Southern American women have an ―equally important role‖ because they are responsible for keeping the ―Southern Tradition‖ which consists of the do and do not do list of behavior among Southern women p.1. The Southern Tradition causes American white women to be alienated from their children because it makes the children feel uncomfortable with such discipline and propriety. Therefore, the children are more comfortable and relaxed around their ―non-authoritative figure‖ maids. The African American maids are obviously ―better in domestic and nurturing role than the white mother who is busy protectin g Southern Tradition‖. They are ―easy, permissive, and less afraid of simple earthy biological need s and manifestations‖ Marshall, 1999, p.2. On the other hand, the white women are more concerned about their social image and tend to avoid conversation topics related to some sensitive subjects such as sex and race. Smith 1994 in Marshall 1999, p.2 utters that ―southern white women know there is something evil in their society, and because they did not believe things could change or that they should though they could not have told you why they had to shut their minds against knowledge of what exist ed.‖ This case is a reality which is found in the novel as well.