Cora Unashamed

Langston Hughes saw in the Harlem Renaissance a growing acceptance of African American writers and culture, creating space for him and other artists to express their identity without fear or shame. The movement’s efforts to garner support and acceptance for the African American identity required first exposing the realities of a segregated society. “Cora Unashamed” humanizes what may otherwise seem like an abstract and trivial conversation to those on the privileged side of the equation. Hughes uses the conventions and craft of short fiction to develop themes that comment on racism and segregation in America.

Personal experiences growing up in the Midwest informed Hughes’s depictions of interracial relationships in rural America, as in the “Cora Unashamed” town of Melton. The strength of this setting lies, in part, in its economic implications. Hughes portrays Cora’s employment by the Studevants as the result of an economic trap, a set of circumstances that keep better opportunities out of her reach. The direct causes include Ma’s poor health, Pa’s alcoholism, and the lack of resources and opportunities in a town so small it has no paved streets or sewage. However, an underlying recognition that racial inequality lies at the heart of these circumstances permeates the story.

The separate realities for Black and white society created by segregation are represented in the story by the idea of two different worlds. Various dualities throughout the narrative echo this idea. The narrative voice fluctuates between two personas. One is distant and stoic, representing the resignation with which African Americans are expected to accept society’s unjust treatment. The other is animated and unconstrained, satirically pointing out the hypocrisy and superficiality rampant in white culture. Jessie is characterized by two disparate personalities, one shaped by her family and one shaped by Cora, in another duality that mirrors the idea of two worlds. The story’s thematic dichotomy between motherhood and abortion parallels the two worlds’ incongruity. There is even an aspect of duality to the story’s setting and the imagery used to portray it. At times, it’s bleak and ugly, “a nondescript collection of houses and buildings in a region of farms—one of those sad American places with sidewalks, but no paved street; electric lights, but no sewage” (3). When love shines through society’s hate, as when Cora finds love with Joe, the authorial tone toward the setting changes. “[M]eadows and orchards and sweet fields stretched away to the far horizon, at night, stars in the velvet sky” (6).

Cora and Joe’s baby symbolizes a bridge between the two worlds. When that link is severed by Josephine’s death, Jessie’s relationship with Cora grows in its wake. Their bond is buttressed by a new bridge, the Studevants’ kitchen, where Jessie can connect with Cora in a way that their segregated society rarely allows. Ultimately, though, both symbolic bridges fail to create lasting alliances across the cultural divide.

The characters in this story are less complex than those found in more contemporary literature. Literary trends and the constraints of short fiction contribute to this, but the characters’ flatness also supports the narrative’s intent. Works of social commentary prioritize the message over complex characterization, as more realistic characters, rife with inconsistencies, would muddle the message. Characters with only one or two defining traits, on the other hand, can effectively represent ideas or aspects of society warranting scrutiny. Cora represents the undeserved oppression of African Americans. Mrs. Studevant represents the racism of a segregated society. Jessie, torn between the two worlds, represents the bleak future for a society so bitterly divided.

Cora is the only character with a transformative arc. This arc develops one of the story’s themes: The Perception of Black Dependence on White Society. Cora works in a thankless job for a white family, where she is denied kindness and dignity. Her oppressive circumstances and the belief that she has no option but to tolerate them form the initial state in Cora’s character arc. Her conflict with Mrs. Studevant eventually pushes Cora to leave her position, and the reader learns she can get by without the Studevants. This resolution of Cora’s arc, symbolized by her garden, develops the thematic concept into a specific message, proclaiming the possibility of Black autonomy.

“Cora Unashamed” also explores ideas of motherhood and abortion. One of the ways the story examines the idea of motherhood is through metaphor, like when Cora is compared to a “calm and sheltering tree” for the motherly ways she protects and supports Jessie (9). Euphemism allows the narrative to introduce taboo subjects related to motherhood and abortion, like sex and exploitation, with less risk of censorship or backlash. The contrast and choice between motherhood and abortion are emphasized through situational irony.

As separate as the concepts of motherhood and abortion may seem from that of race, they also tie into Hughes’s critique of segregation by showing how abortion can be used to reinforce racial boundaries. Professor Karen Weingarten’s book Abortion in the American Imagination: Before Life and Choice, 1880-1940 points out that Jessie’s pregnancy and possible marriage to the child’s Greek father are not threatening to Mrs. Studevant because they indicate Jessie had premarital sex but because they signify “a destabilization of racial and class boundaries” (15). She points out that in Jessie’s case and on a broader cultural level, abortion became a tool for keeping middle- and upper-class white women from reproducing with Black and immigrant men (15). Thus, the narrative exploration of abortion in “Cora Unashamed” is also a critique of white society’s fear of interracial mixing.

Shame, the titular thematic concept of the story, takes on deeper meaning through a New Historicist lens. This literary theory, derived from Marxism, takes a special interest in the informal mechanisms that reinforce power hierarchies. Shame operates as one such mechanism. By creating expectations of shame for African Americans and white individuals who form relationships with them, white society fortifies its power and status. Similar expectations, like that of humility, take on the same role. Cora’s character arc documents her transition from humble to unashamed, with her final emotional state reflecting a hope for more autonomous futures for African Americans.

The realities of racism and race relations in America during Hughes’s lifetime help explain the overall bleak tone toward the white community depicted in “Cora Unashamed.” The story offers little hope that the Studevants, or the white society they represent, will ever cede their privilege and embrace racial equality. Simultaneously, the tone is hopeful for African Americans. The story’s resolution rejects Cora’s perceived dependence on her white employers and notes how she and her family can get by alone, offering a note of optimism for Black autonomy.