Larsen’s Quicksand is profoundly based on the two of framework, feminism and the African American culture of the Harlem Renaissance or additionally known as the “New Negro movement in the 1920’s through the 1930’s. The framework of feminism is the gender analysis of females. It is how the personal identity of a female and influenced by the definition based off of social and cultural society. While the framework African American culture at the time of the 1920’s and 1930’s evolved around race and the oppression of racial discrimination. These two frameworks are used by Nella Larsen in order to show the fight that Helga persevered through her Journey.
The novel immediately displayed the African American culture in the opening lines. “ Helga Crane …show more content…
Feminism is seern in the “ways women are oppressed” socially and economically. In the beginning chapters Helga Crane quits her job at the “progressive” school not only because of their teachings of race, but because of how they portrayed her as a woman. Although she was just educated, if not more than the male teachers, they did not respect her as an educator. Somewhere, within her, in a deep recess, crouched discontent. She began to lose confidence in the fullness of her life, the glow began to fade from her conception of it. As the days multiplied, her need of something, something vaguely familiar, but which she could not put a name to and hold for definite examination, became almost intolerable. She went through moments of overwhelming anguish. She felt shut in, trapped.” They belittled her and her opinions and seen themselves as above her. Moving on to find another job Crane soon realizes her gender is much more of a hindrance than she believed. “Incited. That was it, the guidingprinciple of her life in Copenhagen. She was incited to make an impression, a voluptous impression. She was incited to inflame attention and admiration. She was dressed for it, subtly schooled for it. And after a little while she gave herself up wholly to the fascinating business of being seen, gaped at, desired.” She could not land a job for one of the two reasons ,not enough experience or too educated. The first reason is understandable yet the
The novel immediately displayed the African American culture in the opening lines. “ Helga Crane …show more content…
Feminism is seern in the “ways women are oppressed” socially and economically. In the beginning chapters Helga Crane quits her job at the “progressive” school not only because of their teachings of race, but because of how they portrayed her as a woman. Although she was just educated, if not more than the male teachers, they did not respect her as an educator. Somewhere, within her, in a deep recess, crouched discontent. She began to lose confidence in the fullness of her life, the glow began to fade from her conception of it. As the days multiplied, her need of something, something vaguely familiar, but which she could not put a name to and hold for definite examination, became almost intolerable. She went through moments of overwhelming anguish. She felt shut in, trapped.” They belittled her and her opinions and seen themselves as above her. Moving on to find another job Crane soon realizes her gender is much more of a hindrance than she believed. “Incited. That was it, the guidingprinciple of her life in Copenhagen. She was incited to make an impression, a voluptous impression. She was incited to inflame attention and admiration. She was dressed for it, subtly schooled for it. And after a little while she gave herself up wholly to the fascinating business of being seen, gaped at, desired.” She could not land a job for one of the two reasons ,not enough experience or too educated. The first reason is understandable yet the