Symbolism

Natalie, Celine, Sabrina

Colour

Food

Introduction
Names

Store

Maya Angelou uses a variety of symbols in order to enhance

her experiences within the different cultures that she is
immersed in throughout her childhood.
Clothing

Earth/Dirt

The
Baby

Singing
Plants

Christmas
Gifts

A symbol of division:
When I was described as my playmates as being shit color, he
was lauded for his velvet-black skin (Angelou 22).

COLOR

White folks couldnt be people because their feet were too

small, their skin too white and see-throughy [...] (Angelou 26).

OTher
Colors werent true either, but rather a vague assortment of
shaded pastels that indicated not so much color as faded
familiarities (Angelou 92).
I thought about colors I hated: ecru, puce, lavender, beige and
black (Angelou 182).

Why are appearances so important to

Maya?
What causes Mayas fixation on her own and
others looks?

Clothing
Easter Dress

Angelous beauty standards and her desire for transformation. She believes that
the dress will transform her into a pretty white girl. However, when the it fails to
work its magic, she is struck with the reality of her race.
I was going to look like one of the sweet little white girls who were everybodys
dream of what was right with the world [...] it looked like magic (Angelou, 2)
But Easters early morning had shown the dress to be a plain ugly cut-down from a
white womans once-was-purple throwaway [...] The age-faded color made my skin
look dirty as mud [...] (Angelou 2).
Wouldnt they be surprised when one day I woke out of my black ugly dream [...]
(Angelou, 2)

CLOTHING (CONTINUED)
Symbol changes throughout novel, with wealthier/beautiful clothing being
associated with black women rather than white women.
[...] her printed voile dresses and flowered hats were as right for her as denim
overalls for a farmer [...] She was our sides answer to the richest white woman in
town [...] When she chose to smile on me, I always wanted to thank her the action
was so graceful and inclusively benign (Angelou 93).
Her change in her perception of white girls is shown through the changes in her
description of their clothing:
The dirt of the girls cotton dresses [...] Their greasy uncolored hair hung down,
uncombed, with a grim finality. (Angelou, 31).

What themes are associated with

Earth/Dirt?
How are characters described using this
symbol?

Earth/Dirt
Dirt is associated with sin in Mayas household:
Thou shall not be dirty [...] were the two commandments of Grandmother
Henderson upon which hung our total salvation. (Angelou 27).
The appearance of the powwhite folks and their disregard for cleanliness:
The dirt of the girls cotton dressed continued on their legs, feet, arms and faces to
make them all of a piece. (Angelou 31).
She describes them as dirty as they are disrespecting her grandmother.

Earth/Dirt (Continued)
Angelou uses mud to describe her own people:
The age-faded color made my skin look as dirty as mud (Angelou, 2).
I concluded that she had looked like a mud baby, lying on the white satin of her
velvet coffin. A mud baby, molded into form by creative children on a rainy day, soon
to run back into the loose earth. (Angelou 163)
The comparisons to mud make them seem more primitive and natural when
compared to white people, who she considers inhuman.

What is the significance of names in

representing social status?
What do the variations of Mayas name
represent?

Names
Customary naming of relatives and acquaintances and a representation of their
social status:
All adults had to be addressed as Mister, Missus, Miss, Auntie, Cousin, Unk, Uncle,
Buhbah, Sister, Brother and a thousand other appellations indicating familial
relationship and the lowliness of the addressor(Angelou 28)

Stamps follows a strict social hierarchy

define relationship to church

loss of dignity without a last name
Mrs. & Mr. used to show white superiority

Represent the white mans embarrassment of calling Momma at court as Mrs. Henderson

Names
Evolution of Baileys and Mayas brother-sister relationship:
After Bailey learned definitely that I was his sister, he refused to call me
Marguerite, but rather addressed me each time as Mya Sister, and in later more
articulate years, after the need for brevity had shortened the appellation to My, it
was elaborated into Maya.(Angelou 68)
Mayas ashamed by Mommas informality and use of Sister slang and the theme
of literacy:
Why on earth did she insist on calling her Sister Flowers?...Mrs.Flowers deserved
better than to be called Sister.(Angelou 94)

Names
The loss of personal identify when white folks ignorantly replace Mayas name:
You mean Margaret, maam. Her names Margaret. Thats too long. Shes Mary from
now on(Angelou 108)
Use of colloquial/slang names:
names from Wild West Books (Hard-hitting Jimmy, Two Gun, Sweet Man, Poker
Pete)...like unhorsed cowboys(Angelou 61)

Why is food important?

Food
Community
[passengers] felt sorry for the poor little motherless darlings and plied us with cold
fried chicken and potato salad. (pg5)
You see, I had planned to invite you for cookie and lemonade so we could have this
little chat. (pg99)
During the killing season, after the first frost, all neighbours helped each other to
slaughter hogs. (pg24)
Through food we learned that there were other people in the world. (pg207)

Culture in Stamps

Food

They would understand why I had never picked up a Southern accent...why I had
to be forced to eat pigs tails and snouts (pg2)
Our playmates families exchanged their unwanted food for sugar, coal oil, spices,
potted meat, Vienna sausages, peanut butter, soda crackers [...] (pg51)
The amount and variety of foods would have found approval on the menu of a
Roman epicure. (pg138)

fried chicken, hard-boiled eggs, homemade pickles, baked country hams

[...] the whites had refrigerators [...] (pg24)

Food

Food

Culture in St. Louis & San Francisco

St. Louis also introduced me to thin-sliced ham (I thought it
a delicacy), jelly beans and peanuts mixed, lettuce on
sandwich bread, Victrolas and family loyalty. (pg62)
I was going to California. To oranges and sunshine and
movie stars [...] (pg201)
Occasionally we were taken to Chinese restaurants or
Italian pizza parlours. We were introduced to Hungarian
goulash and Irish stew. (pg207)

What impact does literature have on

Maya and Bailey?

Books

Connection to Bailey and Escape from Reality

[...] and my soul would escape gracefully. Bailey was to have my books [...] (pg248)
Bailey stood in the doorway, a figure of obedience, but I knew his mind was on Tom
Sawyer and Jim as mine would have been on Jane Eyre and Mr. Rochester [...]
(pg156)
Bailey came home and brought me a spun-silver bracelet from South America,
Thomas Wolfes Look Homeward, Angel, and a slew of new dirty jokes. (pg286)
During these years in Stamps, I met and fell in love with William Shakespeare. He
was my first white love. (pg13)

Knowledge
Characters as symbols of Mayas quest for knowledge:
Mrs. Flowers
I wouldnt miss Mrs. Flowers, for she had given me her secret
word which called forth a djinn who was to serve me all my
life: books. (pg200)
Miss Kirwin
After the first two weeks in her class, I, along with all the
other excited students, read the San Francisco papers, Time
magazine and everything else available to me. (pg216)

Plants & Setting

Rural: nature imagery
I often sat under the chinaberry tree in his yard, surrounded by the bitter aroma of
its fruit and lulled by the drone of lies that fed on the berries.(Angelou 21)
[...] merged with the sickening smell of woolen black clothes worn in summer
weather and green leaves wilting over yellow flowers. (Angelou 162).
Urban: artificial nature
St. Louis was a new kind of hot and a new kind of dirty...crowded together sootcovered buildings(Angelou 59)
[...] the house clean with the orderliness of a coffin. Artificial flowers reposed waxily
in glass vases. (Angelou 227)

Singing
Represent past and present black livelihood through singing:
[...] troubadours [...] leaned across its benches and sang their sad songs of The
Brazos while they played juice harps and cigar-box guitars(Angelou, 6)
[...] I was to confront the stereotyped picture of gay song-singing cotton pickers
with such inordinate rage(Angelou, 8)
Symbol of pride
Symbol of expression, associated with religious and church activities
In church, when she was called upon to sing, she seemed to pull out plugs from
behind her jaws and the huge, almost rough sound would pour over the listeners and
throb in the air. (Angelou, 47).

Other
The Christmas Gifts

Usually symbolizes giving and love vs. Baileys & Mayas reaction of rejection

Then came that terrible Christmas with its awful presents when our father, with the
vanity I found typical, sent his photograph (Angelou 53)
The gifts opened the door to questions that neither of us wanted to ask(Angelou,52)
They realize their parents are alive and that they were rejected
Tea cup set
Contrasts Vivian Baxters rich lifestyle and Mayas life in the poor South
Doll: white with rosy cheeks and blond hair
Represents Mayas unattainable standard of beauty
Rips the doll apart

Other
The Baby

Motherhood & love

Just as gratefulness was confused in my mind with love, so possession became mixed
up with motherhood. I had a baby (Angelou 288)
Lack of Mayas mother in her life
Momma (Annie Henderson) as the motherly-figure and guardian
Momma never directly says she loves her granddaughter
Maya can become the mother she never had
A chance to give her love to her baby

Discussion Questions
Do the symbols differ based on the setting: Stamps,
Arkansas, St. Louis or San Francisco?
Which symbol do you think is the most important to
communicating the themes in the novel and why?

Conclusion