Sexuality and American Culture

Toni Morrison’s novel Sula demonstrates Foucault’s idea on the affirmation of self in several levels, even if that was not her intention. In order to feel superior in some way, both the white and black people in Medallion separate themselves from undesirable outsiders. The most obvious way is in the separation of the valley land where the white people live and “the Bottom:” the hilly land of Medallion’s black population. Though those black people have a land of their own that is above the white people’s land, their hilly land is still inferior to valley land in many other respects. The land up at the hills is infertile and subjected to harsh weather conditions, while valley land, the black people say, is sheltered from these same conditions and provides more crops. According to the novel, the reason why the black community lives in the Bottom is because the white farmer tricked his black slave into taking the hilly land and kept all the good fertile land. The fact that the white man was able to trick the black man shows how intelligent the former is compared to the latter, another way to separate whites as the superior species.

That did not mean that blacks in Medallion did not have their own standards. When facing a threat against their way of life, the people of the Bottom band together and ostracize the rebel in the community. This is what happens shortly after Sula returns to Medallion in Part Two. Sula does not mold to the conventions of other black women: settled down with children and subservient to men. Instead, she is a proud woman who, like her mother and grandmother, is not ashamed of showing her sexuality. However, the difference between her and her ancestors is that Eva and Hannah were married, then lost their husbands before becoming more sexual beings, while Sula was never tied down and yet had sex with just about any man, married or not, and both black and white according to rumors. Not only that, she also willingly put her grandmother Eva into a nursing home, which the community opposes because Eva is still family and was not that senile. As a result, the people of the Bottom see her as evil, and anything malicious that happens is somehow her fault. A side effect of viewing Sula in this light is that the people of the Bottom have become better people to prove to themselves and to other people that they are much better than that roach Sula. It is only after Sula’s death that the morals of the community fall apart again. Without something or someone to prove themselves to, the people of the Bottom see no point in trying and go back to the way things were before Sula returned.