In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens - Alice Walker

    In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens

[alert-success] In Search of Our Mother's Gardens - Alice Walker

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        "In Search of Our Mother's Garden" is a nonfiction essay written by the feminist author Alice Walker that describes the author's perspective on black African American women and how they have been suppressed from having any creative freedom. Walker is looking for African American women's lost artistic abilities in this work because of the oppression they had prior to the dark past. Additionally, the author claims that all of the talents have been passed on to loved ones, so they have not completely disappeared. Walker bases her article on history, a synthesis of black African American women's perspectives, and the author's own experience.

Who were these Saints? These crazy, loony, pitiful women?

Some of them, without a doubt, were our mothers and grandmothers  

A poet from the early 1920s named Jean Toomer describes Black women in this way because she believes their strong spirituality makes them special.  Despite this, they are pathetically oppressed by colonizers and lack the freedom to pursue their individual skills. According to Jean, black women are pitiful because of their troubled backgrounds. The author's mother and grandmother are two of the wretched women who have lived inside a box or other designated area and are forbidden from continuing to do so.

...Phillis Wheatley, a slave, who owned not even herself?

Another illustration Phillis Wheatley, a slave woman who is also a poet, has a creative aptitude, but because of the persecution, it is hidden behind the darkness. She has been subjected to oppression and the oppressor's forced pregnancy. So if the author doesn't even possess her own body, how can she have a place to herself to foster her creativity, as Virginia Woolf feared? According to Walker, a black woman experiences the horror of a white woman since she is without any possessions, not even her own body.

There are a lot of Phillis Wheatleys in Black people's countries because they have avoided belonging to anything. They consequently do not have the time to be as innovative as others. Walker's mother and her grandma are two of the pitied individuals who are unable to recognise their inventive sides. Walker, despite her mother's troubled past, has seen her artistic side.

 I notice that it is only when my mother is working in her flowers that she is radiant, atmost to the point of being invisible.

Even though her mother has limited her creativity, she is still able to express herself through gardening, which gives her the same creative freedom as other artists. Walker therefore desires to locate the missing moms' gardens in order to benefit Black African American women.