In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neal Hurston uses language as a tool to show the progression of the story. Throughout the novel, Hurston uses a narrative style divided between poetic literary prose and the vernacular of Southern blacks. This style emphasizes Janie's change from an immature girl to a mature woman, as she struggles to find her voice among the lively crowd of her already noisy life. As Janie grows older and wiser, the narrative and Janie's own voice change to parallel her changes. Language and its control are the source of Janie's identity and empowerment. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The first chapters of Their Eyes Were Watching God establish the structure for the use of language in later chapters. The story begins in the third person, as a narrator describes Janie Starks' arrival in Eatonville. Here the style is full of metaphors, colorful language, and other literary devices. Before Janie says a word, we hear the voices of gossipers on the porch, foreshadowing Janie's later interactions: “A mood come to life. Words that walk without masters” (Hurston 4). As Janie begins to tell her story, the narrative style shifts to long series of monologues and dialogues, in the colloquial voice of Southern African Americans. The complicated web of narrative shifts is representative of Janie's complicated quest to find her voice. The two styles are not completely disjoined from each other, however, as the third-person omniscient narrator often refers to events or thoughts known only to Janie. Indeed, the narrator is a character in his own right, as he seems to enjoy telling stories as much as all the other characters, and has a personality of his own, with the only linguistic difference being the absence of black dialect. This is evidenced in various colloquialisms peppered throughout the poetic prose, such as in the second paragraph of the first chapter, where the narrator's use of "now" at the beginning of the sentence serves as a conversation filler: "Now, women forget all those things they don't want to remember, and they remember everything they don't want to forget” (1). The various characters in the novel use language to manipulate those around them and to exert their will on others, although not always entirely intentional. Jody Sparks is the first of these characters to use speech and language, or more appropriately the lack thereof, in her efforts to mold Janie into her ideal woman. Jody never accepts Janie for who she is and actually stunts her emotional growth and intellectual while they are married. The first example of this occurs when Jody is elected mayor of Eatonville. All the citizens demand that Janie give a speech on Jody's behalf, but Jody refuses to allow her to speak, saying that she has not. never married for the purpose of making speeches and that "she is a woman and her place is at home" (40). By not allowing Janie to speak in front of the crowd, Jody does not allow her to express her identity, and instead forces an identity on her. For Jody, language and speech are the tools she uses to control. For the people of Eatonville, language and speech are the ties that bind everyone together and nurture relationships. In the novel's sixth chapter, this is exemplified by Janie's desire to listen to the various conversations of the town's inhabitants. She longs for an identity of her own and a community where she is free to explore herself and others. She can't make it to Eatonville because of her husband's tight hold on her. Janie learns for herself in chapter six that she was initially attractedby Jody's power, but it is her power that is limiting her. Observing the townspeople and their daily conversations, she realizes that there is a colorful world beyond the walls of Jody set up for her. She begins to understand that he is keeping her away from this world of conversation when he "pushes her inside the store to sell something," while he remains outside to indulge whenever the townspeople gather on the porch to share stories (51). . As Jody's body deteriorates, he draws attention away from his aging exterior by directing insults at Janie, yet another example of his use of language as a tool to control her. Now that Jody is physically incapable of exercising her power over anyone, she must rely on this tool to preserve the power imbalance she has over Janie. By insulting Janie's appearance, she is attempting to recreate the world she lives in to look less like the one she is obviously dying in. Here, in chapters seven and eight, Janie takes a stand for the first time against her husband's cruelty by speaking out in her own defense, when previously she was too scared or unable to speak. She reacts verbally against Jody, returning the insults he has directed at her and telling him to his face that she is a woman through and through, which is more than she can say for him, thus robbing him "of his illusion of irresistible masculinity that all men appreciate” (75). Now that Jody's voice has been silenced by Janie, her only rebuttal is violence, because she can no longer present herself as the pillar of her community. Janie finally finds her voice and is able to free herself from Jody's rhetorical grip. It is no coincidence that Jody dies when Janie's words are finally released. Jody's death marks the beginning of a new phase in Janie's development, as well as the entry of a new love interest in Tea Cake. Tea Cake is different from Jody in that he treats Janie as if they are both on the same level, rather than one superior to the other. At their first meeting, the two talk at length and also play checkers, a game that puts the players on equal footing and a game that Jody has never allowed her to play. Their first conversation contrasts Janie's first interaction with Jody in that instead of being fascinated and overwhelmed by sweet talk, Janie and Tea Cake both actively participate in flirting with each other. The narrator interjects by describing the interactions between Jody and Janie after their first meeting, saying simply that "every day after that they managed to... talk," while the conversations between Janie and Tea Cake are documented for several pages, suggesting the nature of two reports (28). Previously, when Janie was still in Eatonville with Jody, her desire to join the community in conversation was an emotional response to being intellectually stifled by her husband. This is in contrast to Janie's feelings towards the community later on, when she and Tea Cake begin dating. Janie's relationship with Tea Cake is more intimate than she has previously experienced and therefore has no need for other forms of human contact. The Eatonville community resents their relationship because of this; takes them out of the equation, so to speak. Janie is now able to fend off the little gossips that pervade the whole town because she is more confident in herself. Janie's growth as an individual is further explored in her conversation with Pheoby in chapter twelve. In the dialogue between the two, Janie articulates complex ideas and can express emotions that she couldn't express before being with Tea Cake. Instead of outright saying that she hates her grandmother, as she did in chapter nine, Janie is now able to reason that Nanny's point of view was the result of her harsh upbringing as a slave. AND.