Course Of Action

Morrison's objective in The Bluest Eye, is to show racial self-loathing by having Pecola perceive that Blue eyes will give her social acceptance and her believing (like everyone around her including her family) that she is ugly. Morrison wants the readers to make a difference in the world by noticing these circumstances and taking a stand to change them so generations will not continue to live in such a negative way. By Morrison showing these situations through the vulnerability of a young, innocent girl, the social problems in society and within families are more poignant.

Also, with having the narrator be a girl, Morrison is able to add her feminist ideas by twisting language in such a way to get what she wants to say across. By juxtaposing the lives led by the prostitutes with the life led by Pecola and her mom, you can really see the contrast in women's roles and where they stand socially. Although the prostitutes would seem to be the outcasts of society, they seem to be living the good life, one even better than Pecola's. In fact, Pecola looks up to them even if they are not the best role models. Well, who else could she turn to? Her mom is not much of a role model either. She quarrels with her husband often and is subjected to the orders of him until she stands up for herself which quickly leads to physical and verbal violence in front of the kids. To deal with these unsettling situations, Pecola's brother simply runs away, while Pecola harbors it inside internally attacking herself with increased self loathing and a longing for beauty because being beautiful would give her a higher social standing. In one spectrum you have the prostitutes who can do whatever they please and seem to be free living the good life while the normal family is deteriorating with bad relationships including a lazy, drunk husband with a wife who wants to free herself from the orders of her husband. Also Pecola's mom would rather work as a housekeeper in a rich, white family's house than in her own. In the white's house she can use all the nice things and pretend to live the life that she wants. This may seem nice, but it just feeds her racial self-loathing which escalates her hatred which she carries out in her own home on her husband and children forever effecting generations to come. Morrison enhances the effect of these circumstances by effectively manipulating language to get the results she wants.

One of the tools Morrison uses is the use of dialect and the slang that the African Americans use in the southern United States. This helps the readers (probably mostly white Americans) to better picture in their minds the people that deal with these circumstances and enlighten their minds to the determination to take action to help dissipate these situations in their society.