Motherhood in Toni Morrison’s Sula and A Mercy: Rethinking (M)Othering

Auteurs

  • Natália Fontes de Oliveira Universidade Federal do Mato Grosso do Sul

DOI :

https://doi.org/10.17851/2317-2096.25.3.67-84

Mots-clés :

Motherhood, black mothers, Sula, A Mercy, Toni Morrison

Résumé

Motherhood tends to elicit strong feelings in women as well as a passionate rhetoric in our cultural discourse. Daughters have extensively been the focus of studies about mother-daughter bonds. Surprisingly, much less attention has been given to mother figures. By tracing the theme of motherhood in Sula (1973) and A Mercy (2009), I investigate how Toni Morrison rewrites the experiences of black mothers during slavery and its aftermath in the United States. Drawing mainly on feminist and black feminist theories, I explore, through literary analysis, how motherhood assumes various forms in both novels. The comparative analysis of Sula and A Mercy challenges distorted views commonly associated with the black mother and extends notions of mothering beyond biological determinants.

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Biographie de l'auteur

Natália Fontes de Oliveira, Universidade Federal do Mato Grosso do Sul

Docente do Departamento de Letras da Universidade Federal de Mato Grosso do Sul (UFMS). Atua nas áreas de Línguas e Literaturas Estrangeiras Modernas com pesquisas temáticas envolvendo estudos de gênero, raça e diáspora.

Références

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Publiée

2016-04-28

Comment citer

Oliveira, N. F. de. (2016). Motherhood in Toni Morrison’s Sula and A Mercy: Rethinking (M)Othering. Aletria: Revista De Estudos De Literatura, 25(3), 67–84. https://doi.org/10.17851/2317-2096.25.3.67-84