Background on Alice Walker - Walker's childhood, education, and crusade for African American women / Barbara T. Christian - Alice Walker's childhood sense of betrayal / Evelyn C. White - Feeling like an outsider / Maria Lauret - The Color Purple and women's issues - From being dominated to taking charge / Donna Haisty Winchell - Being deprived of a mother's bond / Charles L. Proudfit - The myth of the rape and silencing of Philomela informs The Color Purple / Martha J. Cutter - Walker revises traditional gender roles / Mae G. Henderson - Trading male literary traditions for female oral ones / Valerie Babb - Walker's relationship with the African American male / Philip M. Royster - Folk art as a means to female survival / Keith E. Byerman - Male cruelty leads to positive changes / Henry O. Dixon - Centering on women but ignoring race and economics / bell hooks - The Color Purple is a disservice to black women / Trudier Harris - Contemporary perspectives on women's issues - Women achieve social change through folk art / Anne Constable - Domestic violence retains cultural momentum worldwide / Sonya Weakley - Conflicting feminist ideologies among black women / Patricia Hill Collins - A black celebrity decides to make her sexual orientation known / Ari Karpel.