show before and we are happy to invite you back. thanks for being here on the velshi banned book club. there is so much of sura in their eyes were watching god. tea cake, inspired by one of zora s partners. dr. perry, i want to ask you. much of the book takes place in eaton berg, florida, where zora was raised. you ve studied the south and you know it well. is this an example of writings writing what they know about, or how much do you find this to be autobiographical? certainly, it s her writing what she knows about. you have to remember that sort of a strength as an anthropologist to what he knows about is pretty extensive. she was writing against a backdrop of, a period when people thought that southern black rural culture was in decline. it was dying out. and part of her objective was to show, know it s vibrant. it s. rich is complex. so, she captures that. she has these vivid characters
best gambler in the world. janie just wants to have a light filled with beauty and love and play and the light and joy. and to have that portraits set against the ugliness, in many ways, of the jim crow south is really, really potent. it still resonates, right? it s a fundamentally human desire to have a beautiful life. even under the circumstances. it is the universality of this book. dr. amani perry is a director of african american studies at princeton university. ibram x kendi it s the founding director of the boston university center for anti racist research. i m not done with them. i will say this more where that came from. i m going to continue the conversation with imani perry and ibram x kendi, and in a few days, you will be able to stream the extended cut of this on peacock. that s it for me. thank you, for catch me back here 10 am eastern on velshi.
you are going to read a very differently than if you are reading it from your own experience, from your own life, from your own values. i think zora wrote for black people. but there were other risks novelist at the time who, in many ways, wrote for white people. they wrote characters who were either exceptional or characters who were living under the foot of white racism. and they did that because they wanted to expose white racism or demonstrate black excellence, thought zora thought it was important to demonstrate the complexity of black people, the imperfections of black people. that is actually what makes black eagle human. dr. perry, there their eyes were watching god has got three narrators in. it s janie, freebie, and i hurston herself at hearts. tell me about the significance of. that there s a call and response style in the book. sure. there is actually a conversation that is happening.
what they really want to avoid is engaging in the pages of the book. it s a conversation about race, about sexual identity, about female agency. their eyes were watching god packs a one-two punch that explores both the reality of like this in america and female sexuality. it spurs important conversations, conversations that can and do contribute to the empowerment of young women who are reading this book in their english classes. right after the break, i m joined by friends of the show, dr. amani perry, director of african american studies at princeton houston, who has written extensively about zora neale hurston, and ibram x kendi, founding director of the boston university center for anti racist research. he has produced six children s adaptations of hurston s writing. you are watching velshi. watching velshi. [ tires squeal, crash ] when owning a small business gets real, progressive gets you right back to living the dream. now, where were we? [ cheering ] type 2 diabetes? now, wher