Title: How It Feels to Be Colored Me Themes | GradeSaver
Headings: How It Feels to Be Colored Me Themes
How It Feels to Be Colored Me
by Zora Neale Hurston
How It Feels to Be Colored Me Themes
Race as a Social Construct
Performance
Racialized Public Spaces
Rejection of Victimhood

Content: Rather than feeling her race as something essential encoded into her biology, Hurston notices her race in contexts where, for social reasons, her skin color sets her apart. Performance
Performance is another of the essay's major themes. The theme first appears when Hurston details how her childhood involved sitting on her gatepost to watch "the show" of white tourists passing through her all-Black town. While she sees herself as a spectator of the exotic white tourists, she also becomes the entertainer, singing and dancing for them. The white tourists give her dimes, believing she must be performing for money, but in truth she is just being herself, happy to express the joy that so often prompts locals to "deplore" her. The same dynamic of being watched and judged arises later when Hurston speaks of the additional scrutiny she knows she faces as a Black woman pursuing her ambition as an artist, writing that "it is thrilling to think—to know that for any act of mine, I shall get twice as much praise or twice as much blame. It is quite exciting to hold the center of the national stage, with the spectators not knowing whether to laugh or to weep." Ultimately, Hurston views the pressures of performance as empowering, relishing the added attention. Racialized Public Spaces
From early in the essay, Hurston shares anecdotes set in racialized public spaces. She begins with the road that goes through her all-Black Eatonville community.