Gender Roles in the African American Culture:

The Marginalization of Women in Alice Walker’s The

Color Purple and Possessing the Secret of Joy

Abstract

1
This paper tackles the marginalization of African American women in Alice
Walker’s The Color Purple and Possessing the Secret of Joy in the light of
cultural perspective. Walker represents the African American women who are
discriminated because they are black, poor, and of African origin. These two
novels deal with how African American women are marginalized because of the
restrictions that are forced upon them by society. Alice Walker uses various
characters to depict the gender inequality in both novels. In the book, Alice
Walker: The Color Purple and Other Works provides analysis on The Color
Purple and other works like Possessing the Secret of Joy. Feminism and
womanism are the two methodologies used in this paper. The findings of this
study illustrate that the two African American women in both novels transcend
their marginalization through womanism and they have new roles in the
society.

Keywords: Marginalization, Alice Walker, The Color Purple, Possessing the

Secret of Joy, Womanism, Feminism.

Table of contents
2
I. Abstract……………………………………………………………………….2
II. Introduction………………………………………………………………….4
Definition on Gender….……………………………………………………4
Introduction about Alice Walker………………………………...................4
Introduction about The Color Purple …………………………………………4
Introduction about Possessing the Secret of Joy……………………………..5
III. Feminism and Gender……………………………………………………...6
Definition on Feminism……………………………………………………6
Feminism’s relation to Gender……………………………………………..6
IV. Cultural View of African American Women ……………………………...8
The Marginalization of African American Women ……………………….8
Womanism Ended Oppression……………………………………………10
V. The Marginalization of African American Women in The Color
Purple………………………………………………………………………………….11
Narrative Techniques ……………………………………………………..11
Gender Roles and The Oppression Forced upon Women ………………..12
New Roles for Women and Men …………………………………………13
VI. The Marginalization of African American Women in Possessing the Secret
of Joy …………………………………………………………………………………15
Narrative Techniques ……………………………….……………………15
Gender Roles and The Oppression Forced upon Women ……….............16
New Roles for Women……………………………………………………17
VII. Conclusion……………………………………………………………….19
VIII. Bibliography…………………………………………………………….20

Introduction
3
 Feminism is a movement that calls for gender equality as they consider it
as a cultural construct. According to Tyson, Gender refers to “our cultural
programming as feminine or masculine”. In the past, all cultures have
traditional gender roles as they believe that man is a rational person, strong,
decisive, and protective. While they treat woman as emotional, weak, nurturing,
and submissive. This paper will tackle gender roles in the African American
culture especially the marginalization of women in Alice Walker’s The Color
Purple and Possessing the Secret of Joy.

Alice Walker was born in 1944 in Georgia, America. She is African

American novelist, short story writer, poet, and social activist. Walker suffered
from childhood trauma as one of her brothers fired a BB gun that injured
Walker’s right eye. Her parents accused her not her brothers for this accident.
This accident caused blindness in that eye. Her works demonstrate the women
who have no voice in her society particularly poor and rural black women.
These kinds of women have no right to make decisions or power to stand
against social, political and economic systems in their society. As culture of
these societies put women in that frame. Therefore, she becomes a leader in
feminism, but she ignores this term and chooses womanism because feminism
disregards the issues of women of color. Furthermore, she believes that
womanism is a theory or movement for the black race survival. This theory
tackles the experiences of black women, black culture, black myths, and
spiritual life.

The Color Purple was a novel written by Alice Walker in 1982. The
protagonist of this novel was a young black woman named Celie. She endured
lots of hardship at a young age. She was poor, uneducated, sexually molested by
her stepfather, and had two children. Besides, she got married to a man who
4
treated her as an object and separated her from her sister as he loved her sister.
However, Celie stood against all the constraints that forced upon her by the
society and culture. Walker wrote this novel as she wished to have an optimal
society in which men respect women and women respect themselves. She
formulated a frame and added inside it a group of female and male characters
who represented the gender roles of the early 20 th century. And they confronted
lots of challenges in order to create new roles for men and women and to end
the former roles that are forced upon them by culture.

Possessing the Secret of Joy was a novel written by Alice Walker in 1992.
The protagonist in this novel was a black woman also called Tashi. This
character was from one of the characters in The Color Purple. Tashi had a
passion towards her culture, so she underwent through the worst experience in
her life which was traditional female genital mutilation. She committed this by
her choice in order to feel that she belonged to her African culture.
Nevertheless, she broke all the restrictions that compelled upon her by the
society and culture. Walker focused on the most hideous social practice that was
committed by Black society. The beliefs of this black patriarchal society
brought from their culture during that time. Furthermore, Walker wanted to
show her readers how this barbaric practice of genital mutilation caused many
physical and psychological scars on women. At the end, Tashi formed new
roles for women.

The next part of my paper will discuss feminism and gender by adding a
definition for feminism and how feminism is related to gender. It will talk about
cultural view of African American women by clarifying the marginalization of
African American women and how womanism ended oppression of black
women. Lastly, it will tackle the marginalization of African American women
in The Color Purple and Possessing the Secret of Joy by illustrating gender
5
roles and the oppression forced upon women and new roles for men and
women.
Feminism and Gender

Feminism is a movement that is emerged in the 1960s and 1970s. It relies

on the common recognition that women are oppressed by the society and
culture. Therefore, feminism becomes a theory that calls for the women’s
liberation from male subjugation. This part will discuss the definition of
feminism and feminism’s relation to gender.

According to Tyson, “Feminism studies the ways in which literature and

other cultural production reinforces or undermines the economic, political,
social, and psychological oppression of women” (Tyson 83). Feminism
differentiates the word gender and the word sex. Gender refers “to our cultural
programming as feminine or masculine” (Tyson 86). Sex refers to “our
biological constitution as female or male” (Tyson 86). Furthermore, traditional
gender roles believe that man is a rational person, strong, decisive, and
protective. While they treat woman as emotional, weak, nurturing, and
submissive. Therefore, they give the inferior positions to women, while they
give the superior positions to men because of the patriarchal society which is
created by our culture. All of these show us how patriarchal society oppress
women and how the women are marginalized and the men are at the center of
the universe. Therefore, feminism calls for women’s liberation from
marginalization.

In The Color Purple, Alice Walker reveals the oppression that the female
characters have endured from the patriarchal society such as rape, violence,
objectification, and maltreatment. In Possessing the Secret of Joy, Walker also

6
unfolds female genital mutilation, rape, infanticide, and, violence. Women have
passed by all of these hardships because of their culture that glorifies men and
subjugates women.

All in all, this part tackled the definition of feminism, feminism’s relation
to gender, and the relation of feminism and gender to both novels briefly.

7
 Cultural View of African American Women

African Americans set images for gender by defining how men and women
should behave, work, wear, speak, and perceive others. Gender roles have
impacted marital relationships, friendships, family decision making, child
rearing, personal decisions, sexual behavior, and human behavior. It also
influences the development of identity and how the people deal with their
environment. This part will demonstrate the marginalization of African
American women from a cultural perspective and how womanism ended
oppression of women.

During the years of enslavement of African Americans, the African

American people have confronted hundred years of enslavement and oppression
with the disintegration of families and hard labor forced upon women and men.
Slave woman works behind slave men in planting, weeding, picking, and doing
everything in order to satisfy their masters. In addition to this, when women
finished their masters’ work, they went to the slave quarters to care for their
own families. They have other roles to be mothers and to give birth to lots of
children. They don’t care for their children only, but also for their masters’
children. Sometimes, their masters sexually exploit them. Enslaved African
American women have no names, language, status, heritage, and religion. They
are not capable of expressing their feelings and thoughts because they are
treated as inferior objects. Besides, enslaved black women between the ages of
thirteen and sixteen live in fear of being assaulted by white or black men. They
justify this by the belief that women are objects. As their ancestors are slaves, so

8
they tolerate devastating hardships such as rape, physical and psychological
abuse, loss of education opportunity, forceful disintegration of families, and
elimination of cultural identity. From the heinous practices that is performed in
Africa is female circumcision. This barbaric social practice causes for African
American women potential health risks, but they believe that it is crucial
practice because it ensures woman’s roots to African culture. In the paper
FEMALE CIRCUMCISION: RELIGIOUS PRACTICE by Jessica A. Platt, she
says:

In rural African areas, female circumcision is traditionally performed by an

old woman of the village. In more urban African cities, the procedure may
be conducted in a hospital. The age at which female circumcision occurs
varies from just after the birth of the child, to seven 21 years of age, to
adolescence.
(Platt 6)

Western feminists believe that this practice continues to be performed in Africa

because it reinforces patriarchy and controls the sexuality of women. Moreover,
black women are at the bottom of social hierarchy because they are black first
and women second. Furthermore, there are Eurocentric standards of beauty
including characteristics like hair texture, colorism, body type, and facial
features. This forms negative effects on black women because they don’t
possess these characteristics. The culture is the reason of all of these things
because it provides harsh roles for women as it subjugates them and glorifies
men. Male dominated culture disregards the problems affect black women and
preserve their blindness through the prevalence of male-defined cultures. In the
article Diversity and the Marginalization of Black Women’s Issues by Rosemary
Crawley, she says: “In a patriarchal society, male behavior is used to describe
9
the society as a whole. The exclusion of women from all generalizing concepts
is an aspect of female subordination” (Crawley 174).

Womanism is a social theory which based on black women’s history and

everyday experiences. It criticizes sexism in the Black American community
and racism in the feminist community. Womanist theory discusses that both
femininity and culture are equally important to the existence of woman. In the
first wave feminism, they want to achieve women’s suffrage in the United
States, but they believe that black women have no place in this movement
because they don’t possess certain qualities. In the second wave feminism,
black women are included in this movement. They intend to colorblind and to
ignore race and to focus on gender only. In the third wave feminism, the
concepts of intersectionality and womanism are included. In history, black
women excluded themselves from feminist movement which resulted into two
interpretations of womanism. Some womanists think that the rights of black
women are not equal to the rights of the white women. Other womanists don’t
believe that womanism is an extension to feminism until Alice Walker comes.
Alice Walker uses this term to describe Black women who seek for the
perfection. According to Walker, “womanist” theology blends women of color
with the feminist movement especially in the part of race, class, and gender
oppression.  She believes that womanism is a broad umbrella under which
feminism falls. Furthermore, she believes that womanism is a theory or
movement for the black race survival. This theory tackles the experiences of
black women, black culture, black myths, and spiritual life.

To sum up, this part illustrated the marginalization of African American

women from a cultural perspective and how womanism ended oppression of
women.

10
 The Marginalization of African American Women in The Color
Purple

The Color Purple was a novel written by Alice Walker in 1982. This novel
depicts the marginalization of African American women in the patriarchal
society. This part will discuss narrative techniques such as setting, language,
and its relation to culture. It includes also the oppression forced upon women
through culture by using female and male characters in this novel and the new
roles set for men and women.

The setting of this novel was in rural Georgia and western Africa in a small
village in the early 20th century. During that time, racism was obvious in the
society and African American women were marginalized in Georgia and
western Africa as they tolerated devastating hardships such as rape, physical
and psychological abuse, loss of education opportunity, forceful disintegration
of families, and elimination of cultural identity. Their culture during this time
was full of these hardships. We will figure out that language used in this novel
reveal African American culture especially in dialogues. Walker said: “You
better never tell nobody but God” (Walker 1). This quote is said by Celie’s
stepfather to Celie in order to hide his sexual abuse towards her. He rapes her
and commands her to be silent and not to tell anybody except god. This
illustrates that culture subjugates women and conceals men’s oppression
towards them. Celie said also “I am I have always been a good girl” (Walker 1).
She believes that she becomes a terrible person and is responsible for all
mistakes that the men have committed to her. Culture forces women to be
responsible for men’s mistakes. Moreover, Mr. Albert said: “You black, you

11
pore, you ugly you a woman. Goddamn, he says, you nothing at all” (Walker
206). This is Mr. Albert response to Celie when she decides to abandon him for
concealing the letters of her sister from her. This shows us that culture treats
black women as if they are ugly women and if they are compared to white
women, they will be nothing. Furthermore, the title of this novel has a
significance. The Color Purple refers to all the perfect things that are created by
god for men and women to enjoy. When Celie gets annoyed from her husband,
Shug demands from her to enjoy the beautiful things that god create it such as to
smell the roses and to ignore the bad things. At that incident, she decides to
leave her husband and to have her own life. In the western, purple is symbol for
elegance and independence. At the beginning of the novel, we will find that
Celie doesn’t wear purple clothes, but with Shug’s help, she becomes
independent and has her own business.

Gender roles and oppression forced upon women are so apparent in the
female and male characters. Celie is the protagonist and has endured lots of
burdens such as she has adult responsibilities when she has 13 years old. After
her mother dies, her stepfather forces her to leave school for the sake of taking
care of her siblings. He doesn’t only deprive her from taking her out of
education, but also, he rapes her and she bears two children from him. During
this period, many black women had the responsibilities of child care and
confronted also violence. These responsibilities were extremely assigned to
their gender and social class. Celie’s gender leads her to bear lots of
marginalization and all the men in her life also treat her as an object for their
own pleasure and then they get rid of her when satisfied. Furthermore, her
stepfather always tells her that she is ugly and she has the ugliest smile. He
deprives her from having an identity because of his devastating comments about
her, so she has no self-confidence. He prohibits her also from being a mother by
selling her two children to another family. After she is being oppressed by her
12
stepfather, she is married to Mr. Albert who sexually abuses her also. In
addition to this, he doesn’t love her but loves her sister and Shug and many
times he attempts to rape Nettie to an extent that her sister escapes their home.
All of these terrible things that Celie has lived create hatred towards men. When
she met Shug, she had an identity. Through, Shug, Celie decides to abandon Mr.
Albert especially when she realized from Shug that he concealed her sister’s
letters from her and she decides also to have her own business and to be an
owner of a business company. Nettie is Celie’s young sister who suffers
harassment from her stepfather and Mr. Albert. She is not passive like her sister
and decides to escape from Celie’s house. She travels with the black minister
and his wife to Africa. They have adopted Celie’s children. She is the narrator
of the story of colonization of alienated tribe called Olinka. This reveals to us
that African culture was colonized during that time. At the end of the novel, she
returns with her husband who is the widowed minister and Celie’s children who
become adults. Mr. Albert is Celie’s cruel husband who punishes her for two
things: he is not a true lover to Shug because his father refuses his marriage and
he is not married to Nettie. Therefore, he treats Celie as a slave as he sexually
abuses her and conceals Nettie’s letters from her. Furthermore, when Harpo,
who is his son, tells his father about his wife: “She does not behave, however,
like a traditional wife. When Harpo asks his father how to make her obey him,
his father says to hit her. And when he asks Celie the same question, she
answers, “Beat her”” (Walker 82). From this quote, we will realize how the
traditional wife must behave. She must obey her husbands in everything and if
she disobeys him, he must “hit” or “beat” her. This demonstrates the mentality
of males and females who are programmed by their own culture. Nevertheless,
Mr. Albert has changed his mentality at the end of the novel. After Celie
decided to stop being his victim, he had fallen into a miserable life, but his son
helped him to be better. He becomes improved, clean and hard-working men
and he decides to build a good relationship with Celie. He begins to behave as a
13
“natural man” treating the world with love and respect. At the end, they become
friends. Harpo, who is the son of Mr. Albert, has the same mentality of his
father as he raises him to treat woman as an object. When he first met Celie in
her wedding to his father, he throws stones at her head. He had lots of struggles
with Sofia because of his father’s refusal to marry her. His father is the victim
of patriarchal ideology as he doesn’t get married to the girls whom he loved.
Thus, he wants to do the same thing to his son by not marrying him to his true
love. At the end, when his father started to dispose of patriarchal ideology, he
returns back to Sofia and began to acquire a new mentality especially in treating
women in a good way. He has done all of these things by not conforming to the
traditional male roles. Shug and Sofia represent the strong black women in the
novel. As I mentioned, Shug allows for Celie to have an identity in the society.
Harpo tries to control Sofia many times through violence, but she hits him back.
When the mayor’s wife insulted her, she beat her also. At the end of the novel,
the readers realize that Walker’s main focus is to provide voice to the voiceless
black women who are marginalized because of race and gender. She wants to
teach men to treat women gently and not to treat them as objects. The readers
will find also that some characters at the beginning of the novel have the
traditional gender roles, but at the end, all of them break these traditional roles
and have new roles in the society.

All in all, this part tackled narrative techniques such as setting, language,
and its relation to culture. It includes also the oppression forced upon women
through culture by using female and male characters in this novel and the new
roles set for men and women.

14
 The Marginalization of African American Women in Possessing
the Secret of Joy

Possessing the Secret of Joy was a novel written by Alice Walker in 1992.
Alice Walker shed the light on how female genital mutilation has impacted and
damaged women physically and psychologically in this novel. This novel
introduces this practice for not only clarifying specific cultural practice, but also
as a symbol for the marginalization of African American women. This part will
tackle narrative techniques such as setting, language, and its relation to culture.
It includes also the oppression forced upon women through culture by using
female and male characters in this novel and the new roles set for women.

The setting of this novel was between America and African villages from
the 1920s to the late of 1980s. In the 20th century, old women performed the
female circumcision to young women in African villages in order to have the
feelings that they have belonged to African culture. African culture commits
this horrifying social practice in order to control women’s sexuality. Some
young women died because of this terrible practice. Moreover, African
American women are passive for not defending their own sexual organ and they
remain silent. They don’t have the ability to express their grief over women’s
dead bodies. In this novel, Walker’s language demonstrates the submission of
African American women to African culture. Tashi said: “I sat astride the
donkey in the pose of a chief, a warrior” (Walker 21). The words ‘chief’ and
‘warrior’ represent Tashi’s love for her tribe to an extent that she will be warrior
in order to defend her tribe in which men controls and women subordinates
them. This unfolds the African culture during that time. Tashi said also: “Who

15
am I, Tashi, renamed in America ‘Evelyn, Johnson?” (Walker 26). Tashi
belongs to two culture which are African and American culture. This shows us
that African American women are not sure of their true identities. Tashi loses
her sense of identity as she doesn’t recognize where she belongs to. This leads
her to pass by female genital mutilation as it is the only way that will lead her to
feel that she has belonged to African culture. Besides, African American
women have a passion towards their own culture more than American culture.
Walker said: “Completely woman. Completely Africa. Completely Olinka”
(Walker 63). She said this about Tashi as she will feel that she is African
woman by committing female genitial mutilation. The title of this novel is
changed from Possessing the Secret of Joy to “RESISTANCE IS THE SECRET
OF JOY!” (Walker 279). Tsunga M’Lissa, who is the old woman, performs this
terrible practice to implement tribe rituals. At the beginning, she possesses the
secret of joy which is to circumcise young women. At the end, when Tashi
murders her and at her execution, several women call for resisting the secret of
joy which is practiced upon them and millions of other women. This means that
African women starts to defend their rights and not to be marginalized.

Gender roles and the oppression forced upon women are so apparent in the
female and male characters. Tashi is the protagonist and is the African
American woman who lives between two cultures. At the beginning of the
novel, she lives in the US with her American husband Adam after she comes
from her African tribe called Olinka. Tashi has a passion towards her culture, so
she undergoes through the worst experience in her life which is traditional
female genital mutilation. She commits this by her choice in order to feel that
she belongs to her African culture. Although, she knows well that her sister died
because of this practice. She remembered also when she cried over her dead
sister and the chief of the tribe’s reaction towards her. The Chief of the tribe
said: “what little girl, Pastor? There is no little crying girl here” (Walker 8). He
16
conceals the fact that women should be circumcised in his tribe, but there are
lots of consequences to this fact as some of them die as it happens to Tashi’s
sister. They are not afraid of committing this heinous practice, but they force
women to not express their grief over the dead girls. This shows us that they
suppress their feelings also. During that time, culture didn’t only marginalize
African women, but also, they wanted them to remain silent and not to express
what the patriarchal society has committed towards them. After she has
committed this terrible practice, it causes psychological and physical effects on
her. She decides to murder M’ Lissa who performs circumcisions to young girls
of the tribe. She is the reason of the death of her sister. In the African culture,
there is an old woman who performs this practice to the girls in the villages.
Men impose women to perform circumcision without recognizing its negative
psychological and physical effects and women agree on doing this. This
clarifies that men impose his patriarchal ideology on women and women
subordinates him without any resistance. However, Tashi resists her African
culture by killing Tsunga in order to free women from pain and suffering. As
we know that she is lived between African and American culture. When she was
in the court, she said: “the crime they say I committed would make no sense in
America. It barely makes sense here” (Walker 54). In Africa, they believe that
she has committed a crime by killing Tsunga and should be executed for it, but
in America and Tashi’s mind, it is not a crime because she frees the girls from
pain and suffering and lets them to enjoy their lives. Furthermore, she talked
also in the court about her son’s suffering from the negative effects of this
barbaric practice: “Benny, my radiant baby, the image of Adam was retarded.
Some small but vital part of his brain crushed by our ordeal” (Walker 58). At
the end of the novel, she confesses of the murder and is executed by the
Africans. She said: “no more and satisfied” (Walker 264). This means that she
raises women’s awareness towards this bad practice after she was ignorant and
encouraged women to perform it as she fought Olivia who was against
17
circumcision. Therefore, they become conscious of the negative psychological
and physical effects of circumcision. Adam is Tashi’s husband and Celie’s son
in The Color Purple. He is a supportive husband, but when Tashi becomes
depressed after her terrible experience, he has an affair with Lissete and they
have a son called Pierre. This reveals that men are not capable of enduring the
women’s depression, although his wife has afforded lots of hardships and she
never leaves him. However, when he realized that this affair indulges Tashi in
more frustration, so he stands beside her and defends her in the court because he
knows well the negative effects on the women’s body and psyche and he warns
her many times from not doing it. Pierre is the son of Adam and Lisette. He
opposes circumcision and believes: “connection between mutilation and
enslavement that is the root of the domination of women in the world” (Walker
131). Furthermore, he tells Tashi that African people insult each other by
saying: “son of an uncircumcised mother” rather than “son of a bitch” (Walker
261). This reflects the effects of patriarchal ideologies on African minds who
follows it unconsciously and how African culture insults the woman who is
uncircumcised. At the end of the novel, the readers realize that Walker’s main
concern is to raise women’s awareness in order to avoid circumcision as it has a
negative impact on women’s body and psyche. The readers will find also that
some characters at the beginning of the novel have the traditional gender roles,
but at the end, all of them break these traditional roles and have new roles in the
society especially women.

To conclude, this part clarified narrative techniques such as setting,

language, and its relation to culture. It includes also the oppression forced upon
women through culture by using female and male characters in this novel and
the new roles set for women.

18
 Conclusion

In conclusion, this paper tackled gender roles in the African American

culture especially the marginalization of women in Alice Walker’s The Color
Purple and Possessing the Secret of Joy. The first part included definition on
gender, introduction about Alice Walker and both novels. The second part was
on feminism and gender which provided us with definition on feminism and
feminism’s relation to gender. The third part discussed cultural view of African
American women particularly the marginalization of African American women
and how womanism ended oppression of women. Finally, the last two parts
presented the marginalization of African American women in The Color Purple
and Possessing the Secret of Joy. These two parts pinpointed on narrative
techniques, gender roles and oppression forced upon women, and new roles for
men and women. I added in my paper also lots of quotations from many
sources. I reached to the purpose of why Alice Walker uses marginalized
African American women in her novels. In The Color Purple, she uses them to
provide voice to the voiceless black women who are marginalized because of
race and gender. She wants to teach men to treat women gently and not to treat
them as objects. In Possessing the Secret of Joy, she uses them to illustrate the
marginalization of African American women and to raise women’s awareness in
order to avoid circumcision as it has a negative impact on women’s body and
psyche. In both novels, the readers will find also that some characters at the
beginning of the novel have the traditional gender roles, but at the end, all of
them break these traditional roles and have new roles in the society.

19
 Bibliography

Books:

Walker, Alice. The Color Purple. H.B. Jovanovich, 1982.

Walker, Alice. Possessing the Secret of Joy. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1992. 

Tyson, Lois. Critical Theory Today, 1998.

Donnelly, Mary. Alice Walker: The Color Purple and Other Works. Marshall
Cavendish Benchmark, 2010. 

Articles and Research Papers:

Abrams, Jasmine. Blurring the Lines of Traditional Gender Roles: Beliefs of

African American Women, May 2012, pp. 1–91., DOI:
https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu. 

Crawley, Rosemary. “Policy Futures in Education.” Diversity and the

Marginalization of Black Women’s Issues, vol. 4, no. 2, 2006, pp. 172–184.,
doi:10.2304/pfie.2006.4.2.172. 

Davis, Ashlee. “African American Femininity: An Investigation of the

Hegemonic and Unique Culturally Specific Norms Defining Womanhood.” July
2017, pp. 1–117., DOI: https://Fetd.ohiolink.edu. 

Platt, Jessica. FEMALE CIRCUMCISION: RELIGIOUS PRACTICE. 1998, pp.

1–30., DOI: https://www.ohchr.org. 

Mohammed, Dlnya. “International Journal of Humanities and Cultural

Studies.” Gender and Sexuality in Alice Walker’s Color Purple, vol. 4, no. 1,
June 2017, pp. 114–123., DOI: https://www.ijhcs.com. 

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Majid, Basma. “Smart Moves Journal Ijellh.” Feminism in Alice Walker’s
Possessing the Secret of Joy, vol. 8, no. 5, May 2020, pp. 10–22., DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24113/ijellh.v8i5.10577. 

Sedehi, Kamelia Talebian, and Rosli Talif. “Speaking Characters in Possessing

the Secret of Joy.” 3L: The Southeast Asian Journal of English Language
Studies, vol. 20, no. 02, 2014, pp. 55–66., doi:10.17576/3l-2014-2002-05. 

21