Representation of Marginalization in the Life Writing of African American Women Writers

The process of imperialism and colonialism was established on the covert idea of economic and political exploitation of the underdeveloped eastern cultures by the dominant west. With the process of decolonization, the marginalized and the poor have been given a centre space alongwith the reversal of the order where those who were the object for centuries, suddenly refuse to be subjected to misrepresentation and domination, and begin to constitute their own discourses. Literature serves as a medium of honest self expression and platform to express the true self for women. American society has triply disempowered and disenfranchised African American women on the basis of race, gender and class. Many African American women writers attempt to break down traditional structures and dislocate narrative strategies in order to re-examine subject identity and to demonstrate the complexity of female experience. By writing about their lives the marginalized are valorized and their oppression turns into empowerment. Life writing helps females to explore subjectivity and to assume authorship of their own life. The account of the life of African American women writers chronicles their frequent encounters with racism, sexism and classism as they describe the people, events and personal qualities that helped them to survive the devastating effects of their environment.