Unlike many of the various books about racism that were published during Toni Morrison’s time, Morrison’s "The Bluest Eye" is unique because of the way it explores the lingering effects of slavery, particularly self-hatred, rather than the more obvious problems of segregation. In TBE, the Black individuals are obsessed with the ideas of whiteness, and cleanliness, which they associate with while people. This excessive preoccupation stems from years of abuse and mistreatment. One of the more blatant ways this manifests itself is through the central motif of dolls. Many of the young girls idolized and fixate on dolls, particularly their qualities and features. This is because the dolls posses the stereotypical qualities that Black believe represent physical beauty and even perfection. However, not all the characters demonstrate the same attitude towards the dolls. While characters such as Pecola idolized the dolls, others such as Claudia establish a strong distaste for the doll’s and their supposed “perfection." Morrison contrasts the various attitudes towards dolls throughout her book to demonstrate the corruption of Black self-esteem and they're attitudes towards themselves. In many ways, many of the Black’s internalized ideas of white superiority stem from a history of abuse. However, these convictions cause Blacks to lose their sense of identity and deny their own race. One character describes it as so: “You looked at them and wondered why they were so uglythen you realized that is came from conviction, their conviction. It was as though some mysterious and all-knowing master had given each one of them a cloak of ugliness to wear and they had each accepted it without question” (Morrison 39). The Blacks grow up believing they are ugly and undesirable, even if no one in their life has ever told the the were so. This low self esteem and in some cases, self hatred, causes them to destructively idealize “whiteness”, which...