Mules and Men

Nonfiction | Anthology/Varied Collection | Adult | Published in 1935

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Preface-Introduction

Part 1, Chapters 1-3

Part 1, Chapters 4-10

Part 2, Chapters 1-7

Appendix-Afterword

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

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Discussion Questions

Preface-IntroductionChapter Summaries & Analyses

Preface Summary

The original preface to Mules and Men was written by Franz Boas, Hurston’s anthropology professor and mentor at Barnard College of Columbia University (more information about Boas can be found in the “Key Figures” section of this guide). His brief introduction discusses how Hurston’s ethnographic research offers new insight into the lives of Black Americans living in the South, through Hurston’s use of cultural relativism: the anthropological notion that no one culture is superior or inferior to others.

Foreword Summary

This additional foreword was added to the book in 1990 and is written by Arnold Rampersad, an author and professor of English at Stanford University. He discusses Hurston’s difficulties in researching and publishing Mules and Men—namely, her challenges in eliciting information from strangers and compiling it into a cohesive work. Rampersad also details how it affected her later publications, especially her most famous work, 1937’s Their Eyes Were Watching God. He goes on to contextualize Hurston’s decision to conduct her research in the American South. Rampersad writes that this book’s intimacy and authenticity are directly linked to Hurston’s negotiation of her own Blackness, an identity muddled by her complex past. Ultimately, he argues that this work remains valid today, and even if Hurston’s methods were unscientific or even if she falsified some of the content, it remains one of the 20th century’s most honest interpretations of the lives of Southern Black communities.

Introduction Summary

This short introduction was written by Hurston and serves primarily to situate the reader in the world of the stories to follow. She discusses why she chose to begin her research in her hometown of Eatonville, Florida. It is a place already familiar to her, so the people will be more likely to share themselves authentically. She also introduces some of the cornerstones of Black folklore, such as the character tropes Jack or John, who is most often the protagonist of folklore stories, and “Ole Massa,” a phonetic spelling of the dialectal pronunciation of “Old Master,” referring to slave masters.

As Hurston approaches Eatonville, she recalls her own community’s folklore story about how God allocated souls to humans after their creation. These folklore tales are often called “lies” by members of the communities Hurston visits. Hurston concludes her introduction by thanking her benefactor, Charlotte Osgood Mason (more information about her can be found in the “Key Figures” section of this guide) for funding her research.

Preface-Introduction Analysis

The three sections that introduce this work, all authored by different people, offer contextualizing information before readers begin the main part of the book. Because this book is an eclectic collection of folklore and cultural research, it aims to deeply immerse the reader into the world of Black-majority communities in the Deep South. This immersion, however, can be difficult for readers who are unfamiliar with these cultures and their traditions, so these introductions provide background information that helps readers understand the purpose of this book.

Boas’s preface is significant because it rejects scientific racism, the prevailing anthropological theory about race at the beginning of the 20th century. Scientific racism is the false classification of people of color (POC) as lesser than white people due to inherent biological defects associated with their race. Boas and Hurston were instead major proponents in theories of cultural relativism, which is the notion that all cultures, races, people, or ethnicities are equally valid and cannot be quantified as greater or lesser than one another. Cultural relativism is still an accepted theoretical approach used in anthropology and other fields.

Rampersad’s Foreword is the longest introduction of the three. His assessment of the work as a deeply personal journey taken by Hurston to negotiate her own Blackness violates the original intention of the book as stated by Hurston in many ways: She claims in her own introduction that she is collecting Black folklore, but Rampersad argues that she is, above all else, reconnecting to her roots in the Black South and projecting herself into the stories she collected. Despite this rift between Hurston’s presentation of the work and Rampersad’s more modern interpretation, his foreword is essential to modern readers in contextualizing the book as both a personal story about Hurston and a reflection of a broader culture.

Hurston’s introduction is starkly different from the other two because she immediately shifts readers into the world of her research. As she simultaneously reflects about Black folklore as she knows it, introduces her research, and details her arrival in Eatonville, she illustrates the same writing style that is to follow. Her style is deeply nuanced, combining the realistic retelling of events and her own perceptions of the world around her. For Hurston, recording Black folklore was both personal and broadly applicable in anthropology because of the racism prevalent in academia.