Religion, Race, and Nation in Toni Morrison's "Paradise" Author(S): Channette Romero Source: African American Review, Vol

Indiana State University

Creating the Beloved Community: Religion, Race, and Nation in Toni Morrison's "Paradise" Author(s): Channette Romero Source: African American Review, Vol. 39, No. 3 (Fall, 2005), pp. 415-430 Published by: St. Louis University Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40033672 Accessed: 06/01/2010 12:14

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http://www.jstor.org Creating the Beloved Community: Religion, Race, and Nation in Toni Morrison's Paradise

Paradise(1998), the third novel in Toni Morrison'shistorical trilogy that includes Beloved(1987) and Jazz(1992), Morrison Channette Romero is continues to unearthkey moments in AfricanAmerican history to Assistant Professor of African explore the complex origins of black identity and community. American Literatureat Union Like Belovedand Jazz,Paradise invokes and examines traumatic College in Schenectady, New histories.While these earliertexts contain only glimpses of strate- York. Her research focuses gies for dealing with painful pasts, Paradisepresents a fuller on ethnic American women accountof healing individual and collective historicaltrauma. writers and religion. This novel distinguishes itself from the earliertexts in this trilogy by making religion and spiritualitycentral to questions of history. By highlighting the historic importanceof Christianityfor main- streamAmerican and AfricanAmerican nationhood and community building, Paradiseopens up the possibilities it contains for healing the traumasand injusticesof this painful history. More than her previous novels, Paradiseseems written in response to the failures of the Civil Rights Movement and the Black NationalistMovement to bring about full equality and social jus- tice for all Americans,what MartinLuther King, Jr.,envisioned as the "beloved community." In Paradise,Morrison uses a multiplicityof religious beliefs to ground a new politics for post-Civil Rights America.The text per- forms what StuartHall has called an "articulation,"a contingent connection"between ideology and social forces"that reorganizes elements of culturalpractice in a "new discursive formation"that has the power to enact culturalchange (Grossberg142, 143). Hall argues that some contemporarysocial movements have effective- ly used religion to constructa useful narrative"to connect the past and the present,"to help a people articulatein new ways "wherethey came from with where they are and where they are going" (Grossberg143). Paradise attempts to enact a similar cultural transformationby using the religious and spiritualbeliefs of black women and men to rearticulate(African) American history and nation building in the hopes that this rethinkingof the past opens up the possibility of reimaginingthe future. The text extends the projectbegun in Belovedand Jazzof invoking traumatic histories,by using religion and spiritualityin innovative ways that attemptto heal the pains of this history. To enact cultural healing, the novel encouragesits readersto reimaginemore inclusive, acceptingcommunities that disrupt the violent exclusions that characterizeboth mainstreamAmerican and traditional AfricanAmerican conceptions of race,history, and nation. Paradisedoes the work of rearticulatingAfrican American conceptionsof nation building by recountingthe violent history of the citizens of Ruby, an all-blacktown in ruralOklahoma. Ruby is made up of descendents of formerslaves who sought to

African American Review, Volume 39, Number 3 © 2005 Channette Romero 415 leave behind the racialand economic Christianityworks to divide individu- oppression they experiencedduring als from each other and their world. slavery and Reconstruction.The citi- The text is criticalof normative zens of Ruby guard against further Christiantraditions for contributingto oppression by establishinga rigid, iso- the subjugationof women. Even lationist code of behavior that refuses though Ruby is a small town, it has to allow any new ideas, beliefs, or eth- three separateChristian churches. nicities to interferewith their sense of Although the text details the various racialpride and community.The male fights and "irreconcilabledifferences" citizens of the town begin to feel threat- amongst Ruby's differentChristian ened by the alternativesense of com- denominations,what unites them is munity offered when a group of their misogyny and decision to kill the women of differenteconomic, ethnic, Convent women (9). Morrisonwrites, and racialbackgrounds start to gather "[M]embersfrom all of them merged at a formerconvent 17 miles outside of solidly on the necessity of this action. Ruby. These women willingly accept Do what you have to do. Neither the into their house individuals who have Convent nor the women in it can con- been marginalizedby the rigid code of tinue" (9-10).The text makes it clear behavior in Ruby:adulterers, unmar- that gender oppression occurs not just ried pregnantwomen, alcoholics,and in Ruby's Christianchurches but is his- women fighting with their husbands or toricallyintegral to Christianity:in one other authorityfigures in the commu- scene, Gigi, one of the Convent nity. These women also work collec- women, discovers the painting of the tively to heal the violent traumasof Roman CatholicSaint Catherineof their own lives under the instructionof Siena. The painting depicts a woman a formerCatholic nun, Consolata,a on her knees, breasts on a serving plat- woman who speaks to multiple deities, ter, with a "knocked-downlook," an reads minds, and raises the dead. The "I-give-upface" (74). In this world- town leaders are outragedby the idea view, a woman is granted sainthood that these women live without men or and consideredvaluable only if she is the ChristianGod in their lives. The completely servile and disowns her novel opens with a group of men from sexuality, as symbolized by presenting Ruby barging into the convent and her breasts on a serving platter. killing the women. In the novel's cli- Morrisonalso critiquesin Paradise max, these women, including two who normativeChristianity for constructing are pronounced dead by multiple wit- dualisms that disconnectits practition- nesses in the text, escape into "another ers from each other, the world they live realm,"a spiritualdoor/window in the in, and their bodies. Lone, Ruby's sole sky. However, ratherthan remain in root worker and midwife, first express- this other realm, several of the women es this view when she brews Consolata returnto try materiallyto "rightthe a root tea to help her deal with the wrongs" of their lives. symptoms of menopause. Although the tea makes her feel better,Consolata complains that "she did not believe in that the churchand Religion and Healing magic; everything holy forbadeits claims to knowingness and its practice,"that "faith[in Christianity]is all I need" to live (244). accepting,non-institutional- Lone argues:"You need what we all ized spiritualitythat the Convent need: earth, air, water. Don't separate women practiceis juxtaposedin the God from his elements. He createdit text with the exclusions of institution- all. You stuck on dividing Him from alized religion, particularly His works. Don't unbalanceHis Christianity.Paradise suggests that world" (244).The dualisms found in

416 AFRICANAMERICAN REVIEW normativeChristian traditions between "Bodaciousblack Eves unredeemedby the materialand the spiritual,humans Mary"and "takeaim. For Ruby"(18). and nature, are replacedhere with a This supposed act of "protection"is a more balanced,connected worldview. furtherregulation, an exhibitionof Here individuals and their deity are power that proclaimsthe consequences connectedto "earth,air, water"and of challengingmale authority.This seen as existing alongside and in con- exertion of patriarchalcontrol defines junctionwith the naturalworld, not who and what is Good and Evil, which above and transcendentto it.1 This women are Mary,which are Eve. It scene implicitly critiquesthe normative divides women from each other and Christianworldview of a paradise that their bodies. Thus, the text suggests exists separatefrom the earth,where that patriarchyand normative individuals are not encouragedto con- Christianityare predicatedon these nect with the earth as eventually they dichotomies and divisions. will leave it for another,far superior Consolata'steachings attemptto place. Also implicit here is a critiqueof implement a new, more acceptingform the Christianview that humans have a of religion that focuses on the commu- stewardshipover the earth and there- nal worship of a multiplicityof beliefs. fore are necessarilysuperior to "his ele- She speaks to multiple deities and ments,"the very materialityof this combines the Catholicprecepts of ser- world.2 vice and love with the African ThroughConsolata's spiritual Americanwomanist traditionsof root growth and eventual acceptanceof working and conjuringthat she learned Lone's beliefs, Paradiseendorses a more from Lone. In addition to Catholicand connectedview of the earth. Consolata womanist traditions,Consolata also begins to teach the other women at the draws on Candomble,a religion from Convent the importanceof connecting her native Brazilthat combines the materialto the spiritual,the body Catholicismwith Africanspirit wor- to the soul. When speaking about the ship. As BrooksBouson points out, sensation of feeling bodies connected Candomblenature gods, orixas,axe to one another,she states: associatedwith the naturalelements (earth,air, water) that Consolatamust My bones on his the only true thing. So embraceto avoid the dualisms of nor- I was wondering where is the spirit 4 lost in this? It is true, like bones. It is mative Christianity(Bouson 238). good, like bones. One sweet, one bitter. Drawing on these multiple deities and Whereis it lost? Hear me, listen. Never naturalspiritualities, Consolata teaches breakthem in two. Never put one over the Convent women to connect to the the other. Eve is Mary'smother. Mary naturalworld and each other is the daughterof Eve. (263) by eating a meatless diet, allowing the rain to Not only is Consolatateaching the help cleanse them of their traumas,and other women not to separatethe body most importantly,participating in from the spirit,but also she is urging "loud dreaming"sessions (264). them not to separatewomen into cate- Reminiscentof Felice,Joe, and gories either. The text critiquesnorma- Violet, charactersin Jazzwho narrate tive Christianity'straditional separa- their pasts to each other in an effort to tion of women into Good Woman/Bad heal, Consolatateaches the women at Woman categoriesin which the sacrifi- the Convent to share their experiences cial Virgin Mary reigns over the sinful and sufferingwith each other. In both Eve.3This hierarchydisrupts the think- texts, traumatizedindividuals are ing of the Ruby men who tell them- encouragedto participatecollectively selves they are protectingthe women in healing themselves through con- of Ruby by killing the Convent women. fronting and narratingtheir pasts. In These men, convinced that "God [is] at addition, like Beloved'sBaby Suggs's their side," label the Convent women instructingthe formerslaves in the

CREATINGTHE BELOVED COMMUNITY:RELIGION, RACE, AND NATION IN TONI MORRISON'S PARADISE 417 clearingto love their flesh, the Convent Race and Community Building women are also encouragedto love, reclaim,and reconnectwith their own bodies. The "loud sessions dreaming" Morrisonuses the novel in Paradise, bring together strategiesfound to out the that Morrison'searlier texts to createa genre point power stories have for communitybuilding. holistic spiritualmethod for healing The women at the Convent learn to the women's minds and bodies: "[I]t heal themselves was never to know who said through confronting important and sharing stories of their traumatic the dream or whether it had meaning. narrationas the means of In of or because their bodies pasts, using spite ache, reconnectingto others and the natural they step easily into the dreamer'stale" world. Unlike the women in the (264).Because all of "theirbodies Convent, however, the people of Ruby ache,"there is no one voice of authori- continue to be haunted by stories of ty here. Becauseeach woman has expe- their past traumas,particularly the rienced violence, humiliation,and trau- story they relentlesslyrepeat and have ma, each gains the power to make con- symbolicallynamed The Disallowing. nections between the speaker and her After migratingwest from Louisianato own tale. The women are able to heal escape persecutionat the hands of each other collectivelyby first articulat- white Americans,"fairskinned colored ing their traumas(both verballyby men" refused to allow this group of narratingtheir experiencesand non- exslaves to enter into their all-black verballyby painting them onto their communitiesbecause of their poverty templates)and then learning to recog- and dark skin (194).These people nize and love the connectionsbetween internalizedthe shame and hatred they them. Eventually,"accusations direct- experiencedand, through storytelling, ed to the dead and gone are undone by passed on a determinationto their murmursof love" (264).The women descendents to become even more exclusive and change. They become more "sociable intolerantthan their per- secutors.The becomes the and connecting,"they appear "calm" Disallowing and have a more "adultmanner" "controlling"story of these people's (266). the that "[U]nlikesome in the lives, "story explained why people Ruby, neither the nor their descen- Convent women were no longer haunt- [ex-slaves] ed" their individual histories dents could tolerateanybody but them- by (266). selves" Not do the citizens of Loud dreaming does not demand that (13). only these women their traumas Ruby dislike additions to their commu- deny past from a or differences. it nity family who did not partici- Instead, encourages in the from them to confrontthem, pate original migration acknowledge Louisiana,they also dislike any person them, and to recognize similarities with less than a "blueblack" skin tone between their own and others' experiences. The more inclusive (195). accepting, The reactionaryisolationism of spiritualitythat Consolataadvocates "BloodRules" is in these women to overcome their Ruby's juxtaposed helps the text with the acceptanceof multiple own personal traumasand to createa ethnicitiesat the Convent. The Convent more nurturing,healing community includes AfricanAmerican women not based on the divisions and exclu- from differentcommunities and class sions of Ruby. If history is a "wound," backgrounds,Consolata from Brazil, as Nancy Petersonproposes (1), and one white woman. The text also Morrisonprovides readerswith a way sympatheticallyconnects these women to heal the traumasof history through to the oppression and traumasexperi- a spiritualitythat connects mind, body, enced by the AmericanIndian women and nature. who formerlyattended Catholicschool

418 AFRICANAMERICAN REVIEW at the Convent. The referenceto the Judeo-Christianview of paradise as the one white woman in the first sentence isolation of its god's "chosenpeople" of the text- "Theyshoot the white girl from the non-righteousdrives the com- first"(3)- suggests that religion and munity building of both Haven, the indeed race itself are significant. first all-blacktown createdby these Although many criticshave speculated settlers, and Ruby. Whatbegins as eco- about which Convent woman is white, nomic autonomy and localized politi- by keeping this informationambigu- cal power becomes degeneratingisola- ous the text asks readersto believe that tionism. Creatingan all-blacktown race need not be the most salient cate- becomes less about safety in numbers gory for grouping and understanding and more about a community viewed individuals.5Not every black character as separateand special only as long as in the text acts exactly the same way. it remains raciallyand economically Similarly,the one white woman in the distinct.Reverend Misner states: Convent does not act so differently "Isolationkills generations.It has no from the other Convent women as to future"(210). Thus, the text suggests indicate dramaticcategorical differ- that a town or belief system that allows ence. The dichotomies and divisions no difference,new ideas, or new mem- privileged in Ruby based on race, class, bers is bound to destroy itself from and gender are not privileged in the within. The resentmentsagainst the Convent or in the text itself. However, rigid code of behavior establishedby to avoid simply replacingthe divisions the wealthiest patriarchsof Ruby have of patriarchyand normative built up so greatly that the town needs Christianitywith its own, the text com- an outlet for its hostility. plicates the absolute dichotomy That the women at the Convent between Ruby and the Convent. There become a convenient scapegoat is significantmovement of characters because their acceptanceof different (both male and female) in the novel ideas, behaviors, races, and ethnicities between the two spaces so that both while retainingeconomic autonomy spaces remainpermeable and change- calls into question the necessity of able in varying degrees. To avoid a Ruby's rigid code of behavior and poli- division based on gender, Paradise tics of exclusion. The women's ability assures readersthat not all of the men to come to terms with their pasts of Ruby agree with the town's leaders' exposes the failure of the citizens of decision to harm the Convent women Ruby to confronttheir own traumatic (284).Although the novel complicates histories. Silencingthese women pro- the dichotomy between Ruby and the vides an outlet for the anger that the Convent, it clearlyprivileges the nur- townspeople have for their own static turing, inclusive, communal space the lifestyle as they deny and cover over Convent that has become by the end of Ruby's limitations.These women have the text. seen the people of Ruby at their weak- Paradiseasks us to look closely at est: as adulterers,drunks, liars, would- what happens to a religion and a com- be murderersof unborn children,and munity founded on principlesof exclu- men expressing emotional needs and sion. In her interview with James sexual desires not fulfilled or endorsed Marcus,Morrison states: "Our view of by their belief system and rigid code of Paradiseis so limited:it requiresyou to behavior.Mostly, however, the town's think of yourself as the chosen peo- leaders are fearfulbecause these ple-chosen by God, that is. Which women "don'tneed men and they means that your job is to isolate your- don't need God," at least not the patri- self from other people. That'sthe archalChristian God that these men nature of Paradise:it's really defined follow (276).The Convent women by who is not there as well as who is" learn to empower themselves without (1, original italics).This distinctly needing to adhere strictlyto male

CREATINGTHE BELOVED COMMUNITY:RELIGION, RACE, AND NATION IN TONI MORRISON'S PARADISE 419 patriarchalcontrol or a rigid belief sys- used to createthis nation. Readersare tem predicatedon division and hierar- encouragedto see how little national chy. They offer an alternativeto the values have changed in 200 years, how way history, community, and individ- tied these characters(and all ual identity are constructedin Ruby, an Americans)are to an uncriticalrepeti- alternativethat allows for individual tion of originatingnarratives based on and group differencesand change. The exclusion and violence. very existence of this alternativeexpos- In an attempt to disrupt the narra- es the sterile and isolationistview of tives of progress and ManifestDestiny life and community in Ruby and with- privileged in official Americanhistory, in normativeChristian traditions. the text reinsertsmaterial, dismembered bodies back into the narrative, describingthe starving,injured, and American History and Nationhood dead bodies that suffered to construct this country.The citizens of Ruby and their ancestorsrecount these historical events as events lived and experienced novel broadens its critiqueof by their physical bodies. Slaveryis communitiesbased on the princi- rememberedas the "brutalwork" of ples of isolationism and patriarchyby field labor requiredto ensure that making Ruby a microcosmof America. "none of their women had ever worked The connectionbetween Ruby and in a whiteman's kitchen or nursed a Americais made explicit in the novel white child" (99). The migrationWest when it links the history of the citizens afterReconstruction that failed to bring of Ruby to the history of the United about equality is expressed in the con- States.Peter Widdowson discusses ditions of walking children'sfeet and how the chronology of Paradisereflects the pain in older men's knees (95, 96). key dates in Americanhistory. The creationof an all-blacktown is Chronologically,the narrativebegins rememberedas bodies that "dug the by telling the stories of freed black clay," "carriedthe hod," and "mixed slaves in 1755,just before "the found- the mortar"to erect their first structure ing moment in Americanhistory" (85). The attackson blacks in the sum- (Widdowson 316). The novel further mer of 1919 are present in the bruises alludes to the creationof the and spilled blood of an anonymous Declarationof Independence,the black woman and ElderMorgan (94). AmericanCivil War,the Emancipation The prohibitionagainst alcohol in 1920 Proclamation,Reconstruction, World is recountedin a story about Big War I, the attackson blacks (including Daddy, "one of the few able bodies" ex-soldiers)during the summer of sent to retrievesupplies when the citi- 1919,World War II, the Civil Rights zens of Haven were struckby the 1919 Movement,the VietnamWar, influenza epidemic (153, 198).World Watergate,and the assassinationsof War II is rememberedas hands that JohnF. Kennedy,Medgar Evers, learned "how to tie an army tie" and MalcolmX, MartinLuther King, Jr., "how to pack a bag" (110),Vietnam as and RobertKennedy (Widdowson 316- necks of dead high school boys that 17). The text offers an alternativeto once held dog tags and dismembered official Americanhistory here, a histo- black and white bodies that "did not lie ry that is more inclusive of remem- down; that most often flew apart"(34, bered black experience.Beginning the 112). The assassinationsof Martin chronology in 1755 and setting the LutherKing, Jr.,and RobertKennedy main action of the text in the are literallyembodied in the lines that Bicentennial,July 1976,urges readers Seneca cuts onto her arms with razor to considerhow closely tied these char- blades when she learns of the tragedies actersare to the values and exclusions (261),while Oakland'srace riots are

420 AFRICANAMERICAN REVIEW present in the image of a young boy Morrisonexposes the ways that this catchingblood in his hands afterbeing ideal is "inevitablyintertwined with a shot by police (170).Official American violent marginalizationof its non- history diminishes or erases complete- exceptionalistother" (Dalsgard 236, ly these bodies in its ideal narrativesof 237). The constructionof an ideal com- progress.When Gigi reads the newspa- munity or nation based on separate- per afterliving through the Oakland ness and distinction demands that race riots, she learns of "Overa hun- there be those who will be viewed as dred injured"but "no mention of gun- inferiorand, consequently,either fire or a shot kid" (170).Maimed and oppressed within the community or murderedblack bodies are either not violently excluded from it. deemed "news"important enough to In her portrayalof Ruby, Morrison reportor, if reported,then only as nec- depicts an AfricanAmerican communi- essary casualtiesin constructingan ty predicatedon principlesof separate- exceptional,superior nation. Paradise ness and superiority.Even though attemptsto reinsertthese bodies back Ruby is a town where a "sleeping into a national history, to re-member woman could always rise from her them, and to suggest that they were bed" and walk around town safe in the sacrificedand erased for a concept of middle of the night because "Nothing nationhood. for ninety miles around thought she The text critiquesthe way that was prey" (8), the text critiquesthe sac- AfricanAmerican communities contin- rifices and exclusions that were made ue these exclusions and violent mar- to ensure this apparentsafety. ginalizations.Building on the well- Although this all-blacktown was origi- known idea that mainstreamAmerican nally established to protect fully concepts of nationhood are predicated AfricanAmericans' civil rights, the on the idea of "Americanexceptional- town leaders wind up killing and ism," KatrineDalsgard argues that the oppressing women, deliberatelysetting black national community continues high interestrates that divide town many of these exclusions. Dalsgard membersby socioeconomicclass, and recountshow, based on the early per- punishing individuals without "blue secutions and later financialsuccesses black"skin. ReverendMisner states, of Puritanlife, Americanstend to see "Theythink they have outfoxed the Americaas "endowed with a special whiteman when in fact they imitate moral responsibility"that puts it in a him. They think they are protecting "superiorposition in relationto the their wives and children,when in fact rest of the world" (Dalsgard234). they are maiming them. And when the Dalsgard argues, however, that maimed children ask for help, they Morrisonis not merely critiquingoffi- look elsewhere for the cause" (306). cial Americandiscourse in Paradise,but Paradiseurges a scrutiny of the African pointing to the ways that ideas of Americanconcepts of belief and Americanexceptionalism are present nation. in AfricanAmerican discourse as well. In addition, Paradiselocates the ori- She states that Morrisondoes not gin of principles of exclusion in the cre- "assumethe position of a black out- ation of the black national community sider,"suggesting that "if only African during the "Exoduster"Movement, the Americanswere allowed full and equal historicblack migrationout of the participationin the Americannation, South in 1879.Newly freed African the nation would indeed be in a posi- Americansmigrated in large numbers tion to redeem its paradisiacal to Kansas,and later Oklahoma, promise"(236). Instead, "takingas her because of the failures of startingpoint the idea that the African Reconstructionto bring full equality, Americancommunity lives its own political rights, and safety to African version of the exceptionalistnarrative," Americans.6The Exodustershoped

CREATINGTHE BELOVED COMMUNITY:RELIGION, RACE, AND NATION IN TONI MORRISON'S PARADISE 421 that leaving the South and establishing oppressing AfricanAmerican women more than 60 all-blacktowns would and other peoples they considered guaranteethem safety, land, education, marginal(148-49). Although originally and full access to voting. The language framed in opposition to mainstream of the BiblicalExodus story- in which Americanprinciples of exclusion, vio- the Judeo-ChristianGod frees his lence, and oppression of the non- chosen people (the Hebrews) from exceptionalist"Other," the black slavery- was used to createa sense national community'ssense of "peo- of commonality plehood is sym- amongst the settlers bolically predicat- rooted in a shared Morrison uses a multiplicity ed on similar history of slavery of religious beliefs as a principles. and the desire for a basis for new for The future free from politics Exodusters'all- oppression. Eddie post-Civil Rights America. black towns his- Glaude argues that toricallyrepeat the appropriationof Exodus symbol- these symbolic exclusions and oppres- ism in 19th-centuryAmerica by sions. Although rarelymentioned in AfricanAmericans provided a vocabu- Morrisoncriticism, Norman Crockett's lary and narrativeto imagine and artic- historicalaccount of TheBlack Towns ulate the idea of a black national com- (1979)seems to have heavily influ- munity that stood in opposition to enced the fictionalportrayal of Ruby in mainstreamAmerican constructions of Paradise.7In a passage markedlysimi- nationhood (62). Glaude argues that lar to an opening passage in Paradise, the word "nation"in the political Crockettdescribes the all-blacktowns rhetoricof 19th-centuryAfrican as "a social paradisewith freedom to Americanswas "not used to indicate walk the streets"for "ten miles in any something that actuallyexisted in the direction"without fear of persecution world" but instead to designate a "set or harm (Crockett185).8 However, of common experiencesand relations such safety and sense of well-being are in an effort to combatAmerican predicatedon internaldivisions based racism"(62). Although the black on class, skin color, and gender. national community was constructed Crockettdescribes how, like the in opposition to the exclusions of main- Morgansin Paradise,the wealthiest streamAmerican constructions of individual in these all-blacktowns, "in nationhood, its appropriationof the most cases the banker,"held consider- BiblicalExodus narrativebrought with able power over the finances,morals, it a "rearticulationof the ideology of and behaviors of the other town mem- chosenness"(Glaude 81). Feministthe- bers and even over the Christian ologian Delores Williams exposes the churches,whose ministers,like exclusiveness and violence promoted ReverendsMisner and Pulliam in by the idea of "chosenness"in the Paradise,were often perceived to be BiblicalExodus story. She argues that fighting amongst themselves (51, 56, although AfricanAmericans focus on 57, 65, 67). Becausemany of these the liberationof the Hebrew slaves to towns were settled by a few large fami- indicate the ChristianGod's dedication lies, social status was determinedby to freedom, the Bible shows Hebrews one's relationthrough blood or mar- keeping slaves in accordancewith their riage to the most prominentfamilies god's will (21). Williams asserts that (Crockett49, 64). These towns were, in the accountsof Hebrews in the words of one black town symbolic " resident," the Bible oppressing women and other 'hellbent on keeping whites out' non-"chosen"races led to the collusion and even persecutedindividuals with- of black Christianchurches with the in their communitieswith light skin AfricanAmerican community in color (Crockett47, 69). Like Pat Best in

422 AFRICANAMERICAN REVIEW Paradise,one light-skinnedExoduster where the spiritualintermingles with described a dark- the material.The text allows the reader purposely selecting" skinned wife so his children 'would- to see the "sparkle"of this discarded n't have to all that mess. . . . "trash"while the "end- go" through acknowledging It was hell!' (Crockett69). Crockett less work" that will be requiredto argues that these all-blacktowns ulti- make it anew. This paradiseis different mately destroyed themselves from from the normativeChristian heaven within because the isolation from because the rest experiencedhere is whites made "black-towncitizens temporary,transitory. This "paradise" rigidly hostile and defensive,"ripe for involves "endlesswork" to be done not internalresentment and division (185). on some transcendentplane, removed In its portrayalof Ruby, Paradisesug- from the earth,but instead "down gests that until it comes to terms with here" in building more benign commu- its traumaticpast, a community creat- nities (318). ed in opposition is destined to repeat The idea of work is essential to exclusions similarto those of the com- understandingthe text's view of munity it is reactingagainst. The por- beloved communities.Although the trayalof the "peace"that the women at final page of the novel tells us that the Convent are able to achieve by Consolatahas remainedresting with acknowledgingtheir past traumassug- the mythical figure Piedade, the other gests a belief that more enabling identi- Convent women have alreadybegun ties and communitiescan be construct- the "endless work" necessary for creat- ed around spiritualconnections and ing and sustaining a paradise.This affiliations,rather than on divisions "work"is differentfor each of them, predicatedon race and gender. yet involves materiallyappearing before their still living family members. It is significantthat each appears Morrison's Paradise after death not perfect,but flawed, still carryingthe externalwounds, scars, and shaved heads from their experiences at the convent. What they no constructsa more ideal longer seem to be carryingis the inter- Paradiseview of communitynot predicat- nal resentmentand pain they experi- ed on Biblicaltraditions of exceptional, enced prior to their "loud dreaming" isolated communities.The text views sessions. By connectingthese women "paradise"not as the transcendent back to their families, the text makes it realm of normativeChristian tradi- clear that these women are not denying tions, but as more flexible, inclusive their personal histories;simply, their communitieson earth.To avoid the past pain no longer has the degenerat- exceptionalismit critiques,Paradise ing effect it once had. Paradisesuggests provides multiple ways for creating that the individual and communal these paradisiacalcommunities. The acknowledgementof past histories and final page of the text provides one view the recognitionof others' similar trau- of paradisethrough its representation mas frees humans to move on, to focus of what lies beyond the spiritualdoor/ on the endless work of healing and window in the sky. Although not communitybuilding. specificallygeographically located, this However, the text has left the paradiseis "down here" on earth, specifics of this "moving on" decidedly made up of naturalwater and sand but ambiguous. It is unclearwhether it will also "sea trash"where "Discardedbot- involve armed struggle with the tle caps sparklenear a broken sandal" weapons that some of the Convent and a "dead radio plays the quiet surf" women are carryingafter their deaths. (318).This paradiseis recycled from Thereis no final closure here, either the broken and the discarded,a place with the Convent women and their

CREATINGTHE BELOVED COMMUNITY:RELIGION, RACE, AND NATION IN TONI MORRISON'S PARADISE 423 families or with the novel's view of from the violent, destructivetenden- what creatingbeloved communities cies of their nations and communities. entails. Instead,we have individuals Lone offers yet anotherview of attemptingto come to terms with their how gods relate to building more sus- own individual histories alongside taining communities.She describesher temporary,fleeting moments of con- deity as "a liberatingGod. A teacher nection with others. Workis required who taught you how to learn, to see for not only of the characters,but of the yourself. His signs were clear,abun- readersas well. It is up to the readers dantly so, if you stopped steeping in to determinehow these actions relate vanity's sour juice and paid attention to the possibility of creatingmore per- to His world" (273).Her idea of god meable, inclusive communitiesand teaches individuals to see and interpret how this version of paradise relates to the signs of their salvation for them- the other methods of achieving par- selves. Zechariah,the originalpatriarch adise found in the text. of this community of exiles, holds a ReverendMisner offers another similarview of his god. He states, "He example of how to constructan alter- is not going to do your work for you, native paradisehere on earth when he so step lively" (98). The "He"to whom decides to not give up on Ruby. He Zechariahrefers is ambiguous. believes that "therewas no betterbattle Although Zechariahis a Christianwho to fight, no better place to be than names this "He""God," he also fol- among these outrageouslybeautiful, lows the instructionsand thundering flawed and proud people" (306).He footsteps of a mythical "walkingman" recognizes that since several of the (97-98).The text is ambiguous about townspeople collectively confronted whether this "walkingman" is the the town's leaders' actions, Ruby will same as the mythical figures who change and become more inclusive and appear generationslater, one in over- that at least one member of the com- alls to a Ruby woman, Dovey (90-92), munity, Deacon Morgan,has sought anotherwearing a cowboy hat, mir- his help in doing so. Misner's idea of rored sunglasses, and green vest to paradise,while differentfrom the Consolata(251-52). Though Morrisonis abstractone that includes Piedade in describingmultiple belief systems and the final page of the text, also revolves ideas of gods and paradisein this text, around the idea of work. Misner the principlethat ties them all together believes that Jesus Christ'ssacrifice on is the idea that because deities are just the cross changed the relationship as immanent as humans, it is up to between god and humans from "CEO humans to think, work, and provide and supplicantto one on one" in which the means for saving themselves and humans are pulled "frombackstage to the earth. the spotlight, from mutteringin the It is significantthat the text's view wings to the principalrole in the story of paradise does not transcendhistory. of their lives" (146).In this view of par- In BelovedMorrison articulates the dev- adise, it is up to humans to play the astating consequencesof a communi- "principalrole" in their own lives, to ty's trying to "pass on," or deny, its learn to "respect- freely, not in fear- collective history before coming to one's self and one another"(146). terms with it. Paradiseincludes many Learningto respect and empower one- versions and methods for creatingand self and the world is crucialsince "not sustainingbeloved communities.Some only is God interestedin you; He is of these methods are abstractand you" (147, original italics).As in the mythical,such as the mythical return more abstractparadise involving of Consolataand Piedade in the con- Piedade, it is individuals who offer sal- clusion. However, some of the novel's vation to themselves, who must work views of paradise are directlylocated to save themselves and their world within history, such as Reverend

424 AFRICANAMERICAN REVIEW Misner'scontinual attempts to connect Participatory Reading and Politics the citizens of Ruby to the struggles going on in black communitiesall over the country.At the end of the text we are almost assured that the of createmore inclusive communi- days the charactersin the novel Ruby'sisolationism and removal from ties, are over: Best will must learn to see themselves as part of history "Roger get a collective and work his gas station and the connecting history, against roads will be laid. Outsiderswill come exclusive nationalisms.This expecta- tion is of readersof Paradiseas and go, come and go, and some will required want a sandwich and a can of 3.2 beer. well. In "Rootedness:The Ancestor as Morrisonstates: "I have So who knows, maybe there will be a Foundation," diner too. K. D. and Stewardwill to provide the places and spaces so that the reader can alreadybe discussing TV"(306). Even participate.Because if readershad not received this assur- it is the affective and participatoryrela- between the artist ance that Ruby will soon be located tionship or the and the within history, the text itself is located speaker audience that is of pri- in US history. mary importance"(341). This participa- Paradisepoints to the necessity of a tory relationshipbetween writer and complex dialecticalrelation with histo- audience demands readers'involve- ry, a relationthat requiresat once an ment. Morrisonargues that her novels immediate,intense connectionwith the "trydeliberately to make you stand up historicaland the materialand a mean- and make you feel something pro- ingful connectionwith the spiritual foundly in the same way that a Black and the mythical.Thus, the text does preacherrequires his congregationto not privilege either method for creating speak, to join him in the sermon, to beloved communitiesover the other. It behave in a certainway, to stand up suggests the importanceof holding and to weep and to cry and to accede both of these methods open as a means or to change and to modify- to expand of creatingan earthlyparadise, of on the sermon that is being delivered" keeping one eye firmly rooted to the ("Rootedness"341). Morrisonwants local/material/historicaland another readersof Paradiseto be outraged at the looking beyond to the spiritual/mythi- death of the Convent women. cal/imaginative.It is importantto view Although we learn of the raid on the neither of these methods as transcen- first page of the text, Morrisonspends dent. Even when looking beyond to the the rest of the novel convincing her spiritual,the novel includes the "sea readersof the raid's injustice.Once her trash"and personal traumasof moder- readersfeel this outrage,Morrison, like nity. The text suggests that creatingan a "Blackpreacher," encourages them earthlyparadise is possible as long as "to change and to modify- to expand individuals recognize the necessity of on the sermon that is being delivered," working both within and without a to be invested in and act on social sense of collective history. The innova- issues. As in the "loud dreaming"ses- tive way that Morrisonrepresents reli- sions, the text encouragesits readersto gion in the text as both historicallyand "step easily into the dreamer'stale" culturallylocatable, as well as timeless (264),to recognize both the similarities and abstract,helps to hold open this and differencesbetween their own dialectic.By grounding religious belief individual histories and those of the in the materialearth and bodies of cross-culturalcharacters. Paradise AfricanAmericans and others margin- attemptsto bring about material alized by official Americanhistory and change by encouragingits readersto nation building, Morrisonperforms a view themselves as part of a collective powerful rearticulationof the past in history of oppression and resistance an effort to enact future social change. that extends beyond the boundariesof

CREATINGTHE BELOVED COMMUNITY:RELIGION, RACE, AND NATION IN TONI MORRISON'S PARADISE 425 the novel, the ethnic community, and sivity, and exceptionalism.Although the nation-state.This method suggests Paradisebegins by being firmly rooted that viewing and seeing oneself as part within the AfricanAmerican commu- of a cross-culturaland cross-national nity and Christianbelief systems with collective history will bring about which Morrisonseems most familiar, social transformationand new imagin- by its end it has been transformed; ings of community.However, Morrisonhas constructedmultiple Morrisonis carefulnot to substitute types of belief systems and faith com- herself for the divine voice of authority munities to move beyond the excep- by offering a specific blueprintfor tionalist discourses of mainstream social change. Instead,she argues that Americansociety and the African in there should be "something [a Americancommunity. Although her novel] that opens the door and points works deal almost the in it that early exclusively way. Something suggests with the problems,concerns, and what the conflicts are, what the prob- desires of the AfricanAmerican com- lems are. But it need not solve those munity, Paradisebroadens its scope to problemsbecause it is not a case study, constructan inclusive sense of commu- it is not a recipe"("Rootedness" 341). nity, an earthlyparadise made up of Ratherthan privileging the directives individuals from a of of a divine this method variety racial, author(ity), ethnic, national, and geographicback- empowers individuals to take greater grounds. responsibilityin recognizing and resolving the problems in their communities. Paradisedoes not advocate A Post-Civil America free, floating identities,but historically Rights and culturallylocatable subjects capa- ble of working within cross-national alliances.Rather than denying cultural that the alliancesthat the text suggests contempo- differences, Americans,like the descen- advocates individuals to rary encourage dents of the Exodustersin Ruby, con- recognize and acceptboth differences tinue to follow the same flawed values and similarities.9 and ideas of in Once readers communitybuilding acknowledge their the that will historicaland cultural hope eventually they differences, about the ideal envisioned Morrisonurges, they should think bring Utopia the that are con- in the concept of Americanexception- through ways they alism and later in the Civil nected, to to a more flexi- repeated try imagine Movement. ble, sense of Rights However, because cooperative community of the idealism and exclusion inherent ratherthan a paradisebased on normative Christianideas of exclusion and in these values, they can never enact She states: "Iwanted this real culturaltransformation. Reverend superiority. Misner book to move towards the possibility argues: of reimaginingParadise. The thing is, if Since the murder of Martin Luther Paradisehad everybody in it, then King, new commandments had been there would be no Paradiseat all- sworn, laws introducedbut most of it that's because we think of it in terms of was decorative:statues, street names, seclusion. But if we understood the speeches. It was as though something valuable had been pawned and the planetto be that place, then this is all claim ticket lost. That was what there is. So why not make it that way?" Destry, Roy, Little Mirth and the rest (Marcus4, original italics) were looking for. Maybe the fist Reimaginingparadise as the cre- painter was looking for it too. In any case, if they couldn't find the ticket, ation of more inclusive communities break into the on this they might pawnshop. planet, now, asks readersto Question was, who pawned it in the forego notions of transcendence,exclu- first place and why. (117)

426 AFRICANAMERICAN REVIEW Misnerargues that the changes when Civil Rights became Black made to post-Civil Rights Americaare Power, we frequently chose exoticism "decorative"and that unless over reality.The old verities that made merely being black and alive in this country these issues are addressed eventually the most dynamic existence imagin- the anger over the continualinequality able-so much of what was satisfying, of rights will lead to the armed conflict challenging and simply more interest- the black fist ing-were being driven under- representedby upraised ground-by blacks. ... In trying to painted on the Oven. This passage rais- cure the cancerof slavery and its con- es the centralquestions of the text: sequences, some healthy as well as what was compromisedand lost dur- malignant cells were destroyed. ing the Civil Rights Movement, and ("Rediscovering"14) who was responsiblefor this loss? The Although she acknowledges the pain text claims that it is (African) and traumaof this complex history- Americansthemselves who are respon- "Thepoint here is not to soak in some sible for continuing to condone warm bath of nostalgia about the good inequalitybecause their concepts of old days- therewere none!"- Morrison community and nation building are seeks to "recognizeand rescue those predicatedon Biblicalexclusions qualities of resistance,excellence and based, that is, on superiorityand integritythat were so much a part of exceptionalism.Implicit in the discus- our past and so useful to us and to the sion of the "fistpainter," and in the generationsof blacks now growing up" text's critiqueof "8 Rocks,"is a rejec- ("Rediscovering"14, original italics). tion of the BlackNationalist move- She suggests that full knowledge of the ment. Paradisesuggests that neither pain and joy of the lived black experi- Civil Rights repetitionof mainstream ence will provide useful, less-reac- ideologies of exclusion nor Black tionary strategiesof resistancefor con- Nationalistseparatism are effective temporaryAfrican Americans. In means of enacting racialhealing and Paradise,Morrison continues the pro- building more enabling communities. ject she began in 1974to circumvent Morrisonfirst expressed this cri- the limitationsof both the Civil Rights tique of the Civil Rights Movement Movement and BlackNationalist more than two decades earlierin her Movementby invoking and examining 1974 New YorkTimes article traumaticAfrican American histories. "RediscoveringBlack History." This She shows contemporaryreaders a articlecritiques both the Civil Rights richer,less-reactionary African Movement and BlackNationalist Americanpast that held a "wide-spirit- Movement for separatingAfrican ed celebrationof life and our infinite Americansfrom each other and their toleranceof differences"("Rediscovering" past. She claims that both movements 22). Paradisesuggests that recovering were createdin an "absolutefit of this history and tolerancefor difference reactingto white values," leading them will help bring about culturaltransfor- into reactionarypolitics that devalued mation. AfricanAmerican lived experienceas In an interview with Carolyn "uneducated"in favor of either mid- Denard, Morrisonstates that in writing dle-class white values or romanticized Paradiseshe wants "to suggest some- notions of Africanbeauty that focused thing about negotiation that is applica- on physical appearancerather than ble for the 90s" (Denard 11). What she "intelligence"and "spiritualhealth" suggests is that the divisions and ("Rediscovering"14). Morrisoncon- "splits"within mainstreamAmerican tends, and AfricanAmerican communities the of this In the and drive during founding country, legitimate necessary Reconstruction,the Civil for better jobs and housing, we aban- Rights doned the past and a lot of the truth Movement, and BlackNationalist and sustenancethat went with it. And Movement have simply been "recon-

CREATINGTHE BELOVED COMMUNITY:RELIGION, RACE, AND NATION IN TONI MORRISON'S PARADISE 427 figured"in "muchmore complicated" affiliationsas a way to collectively heal ways in the contemporaryAmerican the traumasof this history. political agenda (Denard II).10 The text presents the possibility Morrisonimplies that any social that Ruby can be profoundly changed changes will be merely "decorative"as now that its membershave learned to long as post-Civil Rights American identify with the excluded "Others" political discourse and laws continue and have collectively participatedin to be "seeded in Paradise,"an idea that confrontingpower. The implicationis necessitatesmarginalization and vio- that America,the macrocosmof Ruby, lent exclusion of the non-exceptionalist can also change its view of itself and its "Other"(Denard 11). relationto the world as long as its Paradiseexposes the necessity of members in the "endless the and our of participate rethinking past concepts work" requiredto createand sustain "nation"to createmore enabling future more communities.Reverend communities.These more inclusive enabling Misnertells us how "exquisitely communitiesare permeableand not as human was the wish for tied to the borders that permanent geopolitical happiness, and how thin human imagi- to define "America."By currentlyhelp nation became trying to achieve it" making Consolata,a Brazilianwoman, and her belief in Piedade centralto the (306).Instead of trying to devise the text redefines "America" increasinglynarrow ideas of construct- narrative, and the novel to include the experiencesof individu- ing achieving paradise, als from both North and South asks its readersto expand their imagi- America.The text's focus on cross- nations ratherthan contractthem, to focus on connectionsbetween individ- national alliances and expansive defini- tion of "America"demands that read- uals and their world, ratherthan on ers abandonnotions of Americanisola- what separatesthem. Paradisereveals tionism and exceptionalism.Rejecting the power that religious and spiritual traditionalideas of communitybuild- beliefs have in constructinghuman ing will requirethat Americansrecog- communitiesand worldviews, but also nize and confrontthe costly sacrifices the possibilities that they containto and violent exclusions that were made generate social change and new imag- for America'sconcept of nationhood. inings of connectionsamong disparate Paradiseoffers non-hegemonicspiritual peoples.

Notes 1 . This worldview has a long tradition in black women's writing. As Smith argues in her landmark 1977 essay "Toward a Black Feminist Criticism," one of the "common approaches" found in literature by black women writers, including Zora Neale Hurston, Margaret Walker, Alice Walker, and Toni Morrison, is the way they "incorporate the traditional Black female activities of root working, herbal medicine, conjure, and midwifery into the fabric of their stories" (174). The "traditional Black female activities" in these writers' texts, and others by Gloria Naylor, Paule Marshall, Toni Cade Bambara, and Gayl Jones, accompany powerful beliefs in healing by combining natural and spiritual remedies. 2. This normative Christian belief in transcendence and stewardship over the earth has been cri- tiqued by a number of eco-critics and eco-feminists. Cf. White, Ruether, and Keller. 3. Consolata's teachings about the importance of not separating the body or sexuality from the spiritual are expressed literally in the decor of the Convent. Although the former nuns tried to remove from the Convent all traces of explicit sexuality leftover from the building's previous owner, a rich embezzler, curls of naked nymphs' hair are still visible beneath images of Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary (4). Moreover, candleholders as female torsos, nipple-tipped doorknobs, water facets and ash- trays shaped into male and female genitalia, and paintings and sculptures of nudes intermingle with images of Jesus Christ and the Christian cross in the Convent (72). 4. Bouson sees Candomble as the sole spiritual force guiding Paradise (209, 214). He points out that the text began after Morrison heard a false rumor while in Brazil about a convent of black nuns who were killed by a group of men because they were suspected of practicing Candomble (238).

428 AFRICANAMERICAN REVIEW Besides various Candomble practices, Paradise also references several other religious beliefs and practices. Attempts to limit Morrison's more expansive view of religion to one particular religious belief system would detract from the novel's representation of a multiplicity of enabling beliefs and ways of organizing community. 5. In Paradise, Morrison extends a project she began experimenting with in her short story, "Recitatif," in which she disrupts readerly expectations of race. In "Recitatif," as in Paradise, Morrison never clearly specifies the race of each character, teaching readers instead to focus on how women from different racial backgrounds try to survive mutually traumatic pasts. 6. For more information on the Exoduster Movement, see Glaude, Painter, and Richardson. 7. One notable exception is Peterson's Against Amnesia (91), which makes passing reference to Crockett without showing how indebted many of the plot points in Paradise are to his historical account of black towns. 8. See Paradise 8-9. 9. Unlike Gilroy's argument in Against Race, Morrison does not envision a "postracial" Utopia (Gilroy 42). Although both Gilroy and Morrison present versions of cross-cultural and cross-national alliances, Paradise advocates creating these alliances by confronting race and its role within history, religion, and nation-building. Gilroy's renunciation of race is tied to his view of history: "There is absolutely no question of choosing now to try and forget what it took so long to remember, or of simply setting the past and its traumas aside" because of a transnational "recognition of past sufferings and their projection in public sites of memory" (335). Morrison's project in her historical trilogy, espe- cially in Paradise, differs from Gilroy's by exposing the necessity of consistently addressing an official history that would like to set these "traumas aside" by erasing or diminishing the racialized bodies that suffered and died to create the American nation. 10. This critique of post-Civil Rights America is repeated in Morrison's latest novel, Love (2003). Through the figure of Christine, an activist in the Civil Rights Movement and Black Nationalist Movement, the novel presents the complexity of these movements' ability both to empower African Americans and to reinstitute injustice through internalized racism and the oppression, objectification, and rape of women. Love, like Paradise, suggests that these movements failed to end injustice because they repeated the divisive and violent values of mainstream America. Speaking of the failures of these movements, Christine says that "it's like we started out being sold, got free of it, then sold ourselves to the highest bidder" (Love 185). In this way, the novel implicates the African American community in continuing its own oppression by absorbing the values of mainstream America.

Bouson, J. Brooks. Quiet As it's Kept: Shame, Trauma, and Race in the Novels of Toni Morrison. Works Albany: SUNY P, 2000. Cited Crockett, Norman L. The Black Towns. Lawrence: Regents P of Kansas, 1979. Dalsgard, Katrine. "The One All-Black Town Worth the Pain: (African) American Exceptionalism, Historical Narration, and the Critique of Nationhood in Toni Morrison's Paradise." African American Review 35 (2001): 233-48. Denard, Carolyn. "Blacks, Modernism, and the American South: An Interview With Toni Morrison." Studies in the Literary Imagination 31 .2 (1998): 1-14. Gilroy, Paul. Against Race: Imagining Political Culture beyond the Color Line. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2000. Glaude, Eddie S., Jr. Exodus! Religion, Race, and Nation in Early Nineteenth-Century Black America. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2000. Grossberg, Lawrence. "On Postmodernism and Articulation: An Interview with Stuart Hall. Stuart Hall: Critical Dialogues in Cultural Studies. Eds. David Morley and Kuan-Hsing Chen. London: Routledge, 1996. 131-50. Keller, Catherine. "Eschatology, Ecology, and a Green Ecumenacy." Ecotheologyl (1997): 84-99. Marcus, James. "This Side of Paradise." Interview with Toni Morrison. 1998. Amazon. 27 Sept. 2005 Morrison, Toni. Love. New York: Random House, 2003. - . Paradise. New York: Penguin, 1997. - . "Recitatif." Confirmation: An Anthology of African American Women. Eds. Amiri and Amina Baraka. New York: Quill, 1983. 243-61. - . "Rediscovering Black History." New York Times Magazine 11 Aug. 1974: 14-24. - . "Rootedness: The Ancestor as Foundation." Black Women Writers (1950-1980): A Critical Evaluation. Ed. Mari Evans. New York: Anchor P. 1984. 339-45.

CREATINGTHE BELOVED COMMUNITY:RELIGION, RACE, AND NATION IN TONI MORRISON'S PARADISE 429 Painter, Nell Irvin.Exodusters: Black Migration to Kansas after Reconstruction. New York: Knopf, 1977. Peterson, Nancy. Against Amnesia: Contemporary Women Writers and the Crises of Historical Memory. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 2001. Richardson, Heather Cox. The Death of Reconstruction: Race, Labor, and Politics in the Post-Civil War North, 1865-1901. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2001. Ruether, Rosemary Radford. Sexism and God-Talk: Toward a Feminist Theology. Boston: Beacon P, 1983. Smith, Barbara. "Towarda Black Feminist Criticism."The New Feminist Criticism: Essays on Women, Literature, and Theory. Ed. Elaine Showalter. New York: Pantheon, 1985. 168-85. White, Lynn, Jr. "The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis." 1969. The Ecocriticism Reader: Landmarks in LiteraryEcology. Eds. Cheryl Glotfelty and Harold Fromm. Athens: U of Georgia P, 1996.3-14. Widdowson, Peter. "The American Dream Refashioned: History, Politics and Gender in Toni Morrison's Paradise." Journal of American Studies 35.2 (2001): 313-35. Williams, Delores S. Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge ofWomanist God-Talk. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1993.

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