Talk:Alice Walker

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[edit] article draft

march 9, 1944 - ) Alice Walker Author, activist Alice Walker, best known perhaps as the author of The Color Purple, was the eighth child of Georgia sharecroppers. After a childhood accident blinded her in one eye, she went on to become valedictorian of her local school, and attend Spelman College and Sarah Lawrence College on scholarships, graduating in 1965. She volunteered in the voter registration drives of the 1960s in Georgia, and went to work after college in the Welfare Department in New York City. She married in 1967 (and divorced in 1976); her first book of poems came out in 1968 and her first novel just after her daughter's birth in 1970. Her early poems, novels and short stories dealt with themes familiar to readers of her later works: rape, violence, isolation, troubled relationships, multi-generational perspectives, sexism and racism. When The Color Purple came out in 1982, Walker became known to an even wider audience. Her Pulitzer Prize and the movie by Steven Spielberg brought both fame and controversy. She was widely criticized for negative portrayals of men in The Color Purple, though many critics admitted that the movie presented more simplistic negative pictures than the book's more nuanced portrayals. Walker also published a biography of the poet, Langston Hughes, and worked to recover and publicize the nearly-lost works of writer Zora Neale Hurston. She's credited with introducing the word "womanist" for African American feminism. In 1989 and 1992, in two books, The Temple of My Familiar and Possessing the Secret of Joy, Walker took on the issue of female circumcision in Africa, which brought further controversy: was Walker a cultural imperialist to criticize a different culture? Her works are known for their portrayals of the African American woman's life. She depicts vividly the sexism, racism and poverty that make that life often a struggle. But she also portrays as part of that life, the strengths of family, community, self-worth, and spirituality. Many of her novels depict women in other periods of history than our own. Just as with non-fiction women's history writing, such portrayals give a sense of the differences and similarities of women's condition today and in that other time. She continues not only to write, but to be active in environmental, feminist/womanist causes, and issues of economic justice. Womanist is to feminist as purple is to lavender." -- Alice Walker

Alice Walker was born on February 9, 1944, in Eatonton, Georgia, the eighth and last child of Willie Lee and Minnie Lou Grant Walker, who were sharecroppers. When Alice Walker was eight years old, she lost sight of one eye when one of her older brothers shot her with a BB gun by accident. In high school, Alice Walker was valedictorian of her class, and that achievement, coupled with a "rehabilitation scholarship" made it possible for her to go to Spelman, a college for black women in Atlanta, Georgia. After spending two years at Spelman, she transferred to Sarah Lawrence College in New York, and during her junior year traveled to Africa as an exchange student. She received her bachelor of arts degree from Sarah Lawrence College in 1965. After finishing college, Walker lived for a short time in New York, then from the mid 1960s to the mid 1970s, she lived in Tougaloo, Mississippi, during which time she had a daughter, Rebecca, in 1969. Alice Walker was active in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960's, and in the 1990's she is still an involved activist. She has spoken for the women's movement, the anti-apartheid movement, for the anti-nuclear movement, and against female genital mutilation. Alice Walker started her own publishing company, Wild Trees Press, in 1984. She currently resides in Northern California with her dog, Marley. She received the Pulitzer Prize in 1983 for The Color Purple. Among her numerous awards and honors are the Lillian Smith Award from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rosenthal Award from the National Institute of Arts & Letters, a nomination for the National Book Award, a Radcliffe Institute Fellowship, a Merrill Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Front Page Award for Best Magazine Criticism from the Newswoman's Club of New York. She also has received the Townsend Prize and a Lyndhurst Prize.

In the main article, it says she won an O. Henry award in the 80's for an article not published until 2004. Is such a thing possible?

[edit] Discussion page?

Isn't this the discussion page? The above seems to be synopsis of the article. Should it be deleted?SmokeyTheCat 15:31, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

I think so, this is the discussion page after all. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.134.13.97 (talk) 23:38, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ethnicity in the LEAD sentence

Per wp:mosbio, I have removed African. Do we have any sources that claim/state that Walker is notable due to her ethnicity as pointed out in a reccent edit summary? Reading the article, it looks like Walker is of mixed ethnicity, which, imho, is even more reason to describe her as an American and then go into detailed ethnic backround further into the article. Thnaks! --Tom 18:03, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree, and I've removed it as well. I believe that the guideline is that nationality rather than ethnicity belongs in the lead. I've also found a reliable source for her mixed ethnicity. María (críticame) 15:21, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Novels

I have created entries for The Third Life of Grange Copeland and Meridian (novel). I would like the latter to be simply listed as Meridian but then it directs to the Meridian disambiguation page. Could some admin sort this out for me please? Thanks in advance.  SmokeyTheCat  •TALK• 15:38, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

The article Meridian (novel) is correctly named. Please see the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (books); because "Meridian" is a popular word, and many articles include the word in their title, a disambiguation page is needed in order to collect all of the "Meridian" articles together in one place in case an individual is not sure which "Meridian" article they are looking for. María (críticame) 22:57, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Photo

What happened to the photo of the subject?  SmokeyTheCat  •TALK• 22:44, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

By subject, do you mean Walker? I don't remember there being a photograph on the article when I began editing it, but it's possible that it was removed/deleted because of copyright issues. There's nothing at the Commons available, I know. María (críticame) 22:54, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
A photo is provided. Miranda 23:51, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Short Stories

I think her short stories have been largely overlooked, which is understandable due to "The Color Purple" overshadowing any other works she has written. I added in an entry about one short story, Everyday Use, and sourced the info to a textbook. I don't know if I sourced it right on the references section though. And in regards to referencing her as American, rather than African or African American, I don't know...a bit trivial perhaps? If you don't want African on the page, I'll take it off. Mike518raptor 03:45, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Although I agree that her short story publications are important, your lengthy addition would better belong at the article for Everyday Use. Undue weight should not be given to any work in particular since this article is a biography of the individual and her accomplishments; not of her works in great detail. I cut your addition down to size, and strongly suggest you move some of the material, which is very interesting, to the "Everyday Use" article. María (críticame) 14:04, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
I agree that her short story collections deserve more of a mention. When I get my hands on them again I will add them as entries.  SmokeyTheCat  •TALK• 22:58, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Alice Walker not born in Eatonton GA

In a CSPAN BookTV interview this morning Alice Walker said she was born in "Putnam County GA and moved to Eatonton GA at the age of thirteen" Merlin1935 (talk) 13:23, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Womanist

I added in the introduction that Walker prefers the word Womanist to feminist. Any objections?  SmokeyTheCat  •TALK• 22:57, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

I am wondering, since she prefers and uses womanist, why we do not delete feminist altogether?Persnickety (talk) 13:23, 10 June 2008 (UTC)