Title: Race and Difference Theme in How it Feels to be Colored Me | LitCharts
Headings: Race and Difference
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Race and Difference Quotes in How it Feels to be Colored Me

Content: I found it out in certain ways,” she writes. Hurston goes from not identifying with a racial category to identifying with one completely, showing that race is no less “real” just because it is based in social perception. Even as she considers her identity as a black woman, with time, Hurston gains the power to minimize or refuse the concept of race. She frames this using the metaphor of the bag, the most crucial aspect of which is not its appearance but what it carries. She analogizes the varied contents of a bag to aspects of a personality, both positive and negative: “ A first-water diamond, an empty spool, bits of broken glass.” Hurston’s point is that the exterior of a bag doesn’t affect what it contains, and in this way she uses the metaphor to combat popular conceptions of race as something that determines one’s intelligence, talent, or identity. Later in her life, Hurston also learns to lean into her African-American identity, even when this identity is maligned or mocked by both black and white acquaintances. As a child, the forced awareness of herself as “colored,” a little girl “warranted not to rub or run,” makes her visible as a target of racial discrimination and control. As an adult, she begins to view this racial visibility as a distinction.