Celie's experiences seem to support the idea that anyone can achieve the American Dream. Celie is a young black girl who was born in the American South in the first half of the twentieth century, prior even to the beginning of the Civil Rights era. Black people had few real rights and privileges, black girls even fewer, and uneducated black girls who live in rural areas fewer still. Celie is raped by her stepfather, the man who she believes to be her real father, and her mother dies when she and her sister, Nettie, are still young. Her babies are taken away by her stepfather, who sells them to another local couple who cannot have children of their own. Celie is then offered by her "Pa" to Mr. ___ in place of Nettie, who he really wants to marry, and Celie is then assaulted, in every possible way, by him.

She has little to nothing of her own and a very few resources. However, she does have some skills. She works hard, and once she learns to believe in herself, she begins to make pants. These pants are so comfortable—and they come in all kinds of fun and crazy patterns—that she starts a business, Folkspants Unlimited. She ends up being self-sufficient, self-supporting, and self-employed: she achieves success and happiness, and she becomes financially independent. The book would seem to convey the idea that anyone, even a person who begins life with incredible hardship, can achieve the American Dream.