An Exploration of Nature and Woman in the novel The Color Purple: An Eco-feminist Study

Abstract

Eco-feminism is an admixture of a political and philosophical theory and as a movement which juxtaposes the concern of nature with woman as both are suffering from male dominated society. Nature and woman both can be the best companion for a man if he treats them well. This is what eco-feminism wants to teach to the patriarchal society of the world. And this is also the key consideration of Alice Walker in her masterpiece novel The Color Purple (1982). This novel provided to Alice Walker a distinguished place in the canon of black female writers in modern America. Throughout the novel Walker displays her eco-feminist consciousness to fabricate a harmonious society where everyone and everything i. e. human and nature, man and woman, human and animals can co-existent peacefully; as an Eden garden where Adam and Eve can live peacefully without a Satan like social evils. The novel contains vivid imageries of nature and pathetic condition of women and also the exploitation of both the nature and woman in the male dominated society. The paper will explore the relation between nature and woman how they are equally suppressed in the male dominated society. The paper will go after the psychological impact of colonizer on the colonized people and also the all time pervaded theme racism in the Black Literature. And the paper will also analyze Alice Walker as an eco-feminist and ecowomanist writer in the novel The Color Purple.