De+Reason+Niggers+is+Working+So+Hard

This image is striking in the way it portrays "hard work." The three women in the photo don't appear to be dressed for such work, but the line in which they walk seems to indicate that there are many of them, and that they're walking a considerable distance. In relating such an image to __Mules And Men__, I'd draw a comparison to the story in chapter four titled [|"De Reason Niggers is Working So Hard"]. In that story, Hurston writes a mythology for the heavy, burdensome workload that black Americans have endured. The black man in the story is certain that the bigger bundle of the two will contain something more desirable than the smaller bundle, but he's left with the tools of labor, while the white man is gifted by God with the tools of storytelling. In this sense, the white man is able to control both his own destiny and the black man's destiny. The ability to write, to record a history, cannot be underestimated. The image above depicts women rather than men, but these women are having to carry significant weight across significant distances. In the story, the white man and black man are about five miles away from the bundles they receive, and while the black man is able to run faster to receive the bundle he chose, his punishment for greed is a life spent laboring. The story seems to insinuate that God favors the white man, because God already knows the outcome of the story, and the white man comes out on top. The image above does not insinuate any kind of hierarchy, or that labor is a punishment of any kind, but it does insinuate the same kind of value of labor from the story.



//Man With Load 1936//

This drawing reminds me of the story “De Reason Niggers Is Working So Hard.” In the story in //Mules and Men,// there was the black man and the white man. God had left two bundles for them; a big and small one. The black man beat the white man to the biggest one, which also brought with it the most work. In this drawing, you can see the physical strain in the man’s muscles. His hands show the tension from carrying the heavy load and the way that his back is hunched over shows how the bundle he has inherited is a burden. The landscape is dry and barren and there are black shadows in the background. It makes for a solemn scene. It looks as if there is nothing around him for miles except the dry weeds at his feet and the heavy load on his back. To me, this piece exemplifies the African-American experience, or at least a part of it. The man is on this grueling journey and no one could know what his experience is like unless they experienced it for themselves. The only people who would share the experience would be black people. This also holds true for the stories written in this book. We can read them as we can look at this drawing. We can maybe imagine what meanings they hold but they won’t mean the same as they do to the people that tell them and the people that live the stories.