Gloria Naylor, "The Women of Brewster Place"

            Gloria Naylor exposes the depth of class difference in America, focusing not simply on constructions of rich and poor, but also the intertwined issues of race, gender, and sexuality. The narratives of the seven women on Brewster Place become then microcosms for the forms of oppression present elsewhere in America. Through the eyes of each woman, we begin to understand the intersectionality of difference—how race, class, gender, and sexuality are intrinsically tied to one another—creating more divide and disparity. Naylor’s focus on characters who inhabit the margins of society demonstrates the exclusive nature of dominant culture.

            As Nicole quotes in her position paper, the women of Brewster Place “came because they had no choice and would remain for the same reason” (4). Their marginal state becomes the reason that they cling to the street “with a desperate acceptance” (4). As each woman finds herself in a place of economic powerlessness—as well as a racial, gender, or sexuality minority—she realizes she lacks a sense of belonging.

Mattie Michael’s life is shaped by loss. When she becomes pregnant and flees from her home, Mattie quickly recognizes that, as a black female, she has limited agency. Unable to support her child, Basil, as a single mother, Mattie seeks the help of an older woman. Eventually, she suffers the loss of both her child and her mentor, arriving in Brewster Place as a testament to all she cannot accomplish or control. As a racial minority, a mother out of wedlock, and a woman, Mattie has no socioeconomic authority and is excluded from a role of power accessible to others.

Cora Lee illustrates the degraded place of poor women in society. As a child, she obsesses over baby dolls; as we see her in Brewster Place, Cora Lee is unmarried with a handful of children from a number of different fathers. Her inability to provide for her children and simultaneously work for economic stability forces her to maintain her current social class. Nicole’s statement of Mattie’s place and subjugation correlating to both her race and gender is also true for Cora Lee, for “as a black man, she would never have experienced how the female phenomenon of childbirth is a physical manifestation of women’s oppression.” It is simply the fact that Cora Lee must care for all her children—representative of her social class and gender minority—that most stresses the negative position she inhabits.

Lorraine and Theresa, the two lesbians on Brewster Place, demonstrate how sexuality as a form of difference is equally excluding as class, gender, and race. Although the two women fit the ideals held by their neighbors—domesticity, friendliness, and economic stability—they are constantly viewed as a threat to Brewster Place, purely because of their non-normative sexuality. Lorraine is especially perceptive of and sensitive to the prejudices expressed by the other inhabitants of the neighborhood, recognizing her lack of “belonging” and trying to resolve her experiences of exclusion.

Gloria Naylor uses the characters of the seven women to deepen an understanding of social class issues as not merely an isolated variable, but as tied and shaped by a number of forms of oppression. The women experience poverty and marginality in terms of their race, gender, and sexuality as well. The women were "confronted with the difference that had been thrust into their predictable world, they reached into their imagination and, using an ancient pattern, weaved themselves a reason for its existence"(132). Exclusion, as seen in “The Women of Brewster Place,” stems from both socioeconomic class and the pressures of dominant culture. Identity, then, is a formula from the intersectionality of forms of difference.