Juniors – Summer 2012
Questions on Toni Morrison’s Nobel Speech
Background
This speech was delivered by Toni Morrison at the Nobel Prize awards in 1993, the year she
became a Nobel laureate for literature. The speech tells the story of an old, wise, blind Black
woman and the children who try to trick her and wind up learning a great deal. The story itself is
an extended metaphor about language.
Directions
Read the excerpt of Toni Morrison’s Nobel Speech and answer the following questions for your
first assignment when you return to school in the Fall.
Look up words you don’t know and write a definition. Be prepared for a vocabulary test on
these words.
Summarize the point of the speech. What is the main idea/thesis?
Questions:
1. According to Morrison, what does the bird in the children’s hands represent?
2. What does the old woman mean when she says of the bird:
“I don’ t know whether the bird you are holding is dead or alive, but what I do know is that it is
in your hands. It is in your hands”? Why do you think she repeats – “It is in your hands.” How
has this phrase become a metaphor? What is it a metaphor for?
3. How does the statement: “In her country children have bitten their tongues off and use bullets
instead to iterate the voice of speechlessness,of disabled and disabling language, of language
adults have abandoned altogether as a device for grappling with meaning, providing guidance, or
expressing love…” relate to how the adults in The Bluest Eye communicate with the children in
the novel? How might Cholly relate to this idea?
4. What do you think Morrison means when she writes:
“Sexist language, racist language, theistic language – all are typical of the policing languages of
mastery, and cannot and do not permit new knowledge or encourage the mutual exchange of
ideas.” Identify and record at least two examples of sexist and racist language each from the
novel – note who uses the language and when it is used. Why might the user choose this
language? How might the use have mastery? What does the phrase “language of mastery”
mean?
5. Re-read the paragraph that begins with “The conventional wisdom of the Tower of Babel
story is that the collapse was a misfortune… complicated,demanding, yes, but a view of heaven
is life, not heaven as post-life.”
How does Morrison’s point about achieving heaven as life through diversity and acceptance of
difference relate to the story of Pecola in The Bluest Eye?
6. Morrison uses language to combat sexism and racism through writing The Bluest Eye. How
does she wage this battle. Provide examples.