ABSTRACT
The key to understanding a positive Africana man-woman relationship is described in Toni Morrison’s Beloved in the assessment of the relationship of a male character named Sixo and his woman, the Thirty-Mile Woman. Beginning with Morrison’s first novel, The Bluest Eye, we see the Africana womanist as she begins to evolve in the character of the child narrator, Claudia, who embodies authenticity. Demonstrating the collective male-female struggle and companionship, Morrison focuses on the relationship between Sethe and Paul D, which is based upon a shared history and mutual respect. The common plight of both Sethe and Paul D is a case in point of the oneness of Africana men and women in the sense of a common history and a common struggle for survival, one that far exceeds the commonality of the feminist struggle of women in general against female subjugation.
