as they work to understand them.

For example, early in the book, a character says,

Humph! Y’all let her worry yuh. You ain’t like me. Ah ain’t got her to study ’bout. If she ain’t got manners enough to stop and let folks know how she been makin’ out, let her g’wan!

A reader who isn't familiar with that dialect will have to slow down to understand that "g'wan" means "go on" and that the terms "study 'bout" means that she can't think about her—she has other things to worry about. This helps a reader take the time to understand the characters. Once a reader has picked up on the dialect, it still creates a better picture of who each person is.

Zora Neale Hurston wrote only one novel but was both a writer and an anthropologist by trade. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, she put her skills of observation to brilliant effect by creating realistic dialogue to accompany the setting and characters. The dialect, just like that present in another American classic about class and race, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, helps create empathy for the characters.

Their Eyes Were Watching God is a simple story, but it has a profound effect on the reader because it portrays people—especially women—realistically. Although there is heroism and tragedy, the story retains a down-to-earth feel through its details. The two details that set it apart are setting and dialogue.

The dialogue in this story is true to the characters, using realistic tones for the characters without sacrificing honest, relatable narrative tone. The contrast between the book's dialogue and the third-person narration makes characters' conversations more deeply tied to their circumstances. The author wants readers to see how black people in the south really talked, to depict their full humanity.

In The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the character of Jim is also humanized through his dialogue, showing him to be uneducated but a resourceful survivor. He relies on folk wisdom but uses common sense and shows himself to be intelligent. He, too, is a realistic character, and his use of language tied to his time and place.

Hurston's book is still revolutionary because it shows how life was, without judging the circumstances or characters. The novelist tells the story of an independent black woman as she rises above a series of bad circumstances in several marriages. Although the central character, Janie, speaks like everyone else, the narration gives the effect of making some of the more sophisticated insights seem to be part of Janie.

Hurston uses a dialect that was particular to African American communities in Florida in the early twentieth century. This dialect has its own cadence, rhythm, and colloquialisms (words and phrases that aren't literary but are used in conversation). The language reflects a particular community at a particular time.

Hurston, a very well-educated woman who certainly knew how to write and speak in 'standard' English, refused to adjust her characters to the conventional standard; instead, she demanded that her readers adjust to the language of this community. In doing so, she forces readers to acknowledge the elasticity of the English language and understand that there is more than one voice that is capable of telling a story.

Hurston had plenty of detractors in the black literary world, including Richard Wright and Alain Locke, who was particularly averse to her use of language. Hurston responded that Locke knew nothing about black people. The distaste for Hurston's best-known novel reflects snobbery in the black literary community and a possible wish to distance itself from less educated, rural black people. Hurston did not share in this snobbery and provincialism, and she wasn't interested in writing stories that would be acceptable to white audiences. Therefore, her use of this dialect also reflects her value of authenticity.

Huston's use of dialect is important in helping us to understand and these characters and the novel as a whole. Because so much of the novel is concerned with Janie "finding her voice," it is essential that as readers we hear that voice in our minds, that we too "find her voice."

Hurston's background as a folklorist and anthropologist is also critically important in this regard. Not only is Hurston capturing the experiences of her main character, she is also weaving in historical information regarding her hometown of Eatonville and much of the life and folklore of the emerging African American culture.

In short, without the dialects the novel would not hold the power that it does. Part of "magic" that makes this story work so well is the authenticity with which it is told.

Zora Neale Hurston's use of vernacular dialect helps us better understand the characters and their communities in Their Eyes Were Watching God. Let's look at how this works and what the use of the vernacular does for a story like this.

First, the vernacular gives us a better sense of the story's setting and characters. This novel takes place in the South, so Hurston gives us a taste of how people in that region talk. Furthermore, most of the characters in the novel are black, and their speech reflects the typical way people of that race spoke during the era in which the story is set. This is realistic. If all the characters spoke like modern, educated northerners, the setting and characters would be completely compromised.

Further, the dialect shows us how the characters think and respond to the world around them. Their speech reflects their thoughts, and these people understand each other well. This is normal speech for them, easy and clear, even though it may seem strange to us. Look, for instance at the conversation between Pearl, Lulu, and Pheoby in the first chapter. These women speak to each other in their own language, so to speak. Hurston allows us a glimpse into their world by giving us that language. If they spoke just like we do, we would have projected ourselves onto them. Rather, they are “other,” and we experience them as other. We get a chance to enter into their world.

Finally, let's think for a moment about how speech can be something of a weapon. Look again at the conversation in the first chapter. The women have definite opinions about Janie, and they are harsh toward her in their words.