Comparing Dignity in A Lesson Before Dying, Jane Pittman, and Of Love a

Dignity in Southern Society in A Lesson Before Dying, Autobiography of Jane Pittman, and Of Love and Dust      Ã‚  Ã‚   The ante-bellum Southern social system put blacks in a low economic and social class and limited their pursuit of happiness.   The aristocracy firmly held blacks in emotional and spiritual slavery. Cajuns, Creoles and poor whites maintained a low status in society, which frustrated them because they felt they should be superior to blacks and equal to whites. Racism was a base of southern society and a hope to improve life and gain respect.      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Ernest J. Gaines grew up in Southern Louisiana and his aunt Augusteen Jefferson taught him "the art of living with dignity" (Current 201).   In The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, the main character, Jane, narrates her life that spans from the Civil War to the 1960's.   She portrays the lives of black people fighting against the stigma of social inferiority in order to live out their dreams.   Of Love and Dust depicts rebellious radical characters striving for new standards of equality in the reformation of a small traditional community.   A Lesson Before Dying shows Grant Wiggins's and Jefferson's personal battles toward reforming themselves, and their community's battle to earn self-respect.   Living in subordination compromises freedoms of socio-economic mobility.   Gaines's characters rebel by fighting against suppression to achieve deserved rights and privileges. They achieve dignity through the struggle to hold onto the honor won fro m   society. . Ernest J. Gaines describes people surviving within the social system at the same time as they overcome it to find dignity and freedom from prejudices.    Living in subordination compromises freedoms of soci... ... Yearbook, 1994. New York: Gale, 1995. Estes, David C. ed. Critical Reflections on the Fiction of Ernest J. Gaines. Athens: University of Georgia, 1994, 1-29, 89-123, 139-157, 250-264. Gaines, Ernest J. The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. New York: Bantam, 1971. _____. A Lesson Before Dying. New York: Vintage, 1993. _____.   Of Love and Dust. New York: Vintage, 1967. Graham, Judith, ed. "Ernest J. Gaines." Current Biography Yearbook   1994. New York: H. Wilson, 1994, 200-204. Larson, Charles R. "End as a Man." Chigago Tribune.   May 9 1993, 5.   Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism Yearbook, 1994. New York: Gale, 1995. Senna, Carl. "Dying like a Man: A Novel about Race and Dignity in   the South." The New York Times Book Review. August 8 1993, 21.   Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism Yearbook, 1994.   New York: Gale, 1995.