The Welcome Table

The Welcome Table: A Historical Approach

The Welcome Table: A Historical Approach

Literature allows us to observe another individual’s life experiences through imagination. I chose to analyze “The Welcome Table” by Alice Walker for just that reason, I was able to step into the past and envision just a small preview of what many African American women had to endure. Like most of Alice Walkers literacy work “The Welcome Table” focuses on the life an African American woman (Clugston, 2010). Throughout this short story Walker demonstrates her passion for literacy in African American life and culture. This particular short story describes an elderly African American woman’s last day on earth as she faces racism, sexism and cruel judgment from many Christian churchgoers. In this short story we are able to view the historical struggles that many African American women have faced, especially during a time when the Civil Rights movement was starting to increase in momentum. I will analysis “ The Welcome Table” using a historical approach as it strengthens the meaning and emotion behind this short story.

Alice Walker was born was born in 1944 in Eatonton, Georgia where she attended a racially segregated High school (“Chronology of Alice Walker’s Life”, 2012). This aspect of her life may contribute to the fact that this story is told in third-person omniscient point of view. Walker intended to keep herself out of this short story, although she may have experienced some form of racial discrimination in her lifetime she also wanted the reader(s) to experience the feelings of the white people during this time period as well. Whites in the South did not want to associate with blacks in any fashion, especially in public places like church for example. This is demonstrated in “The Welcome Table” as the women church members insist that their husbands throw the poor, elderly black woman out the backdoor. The text states that after she was thrown back outside the church...