Skeeter: uncomfortable driving into the neighborhood + novice in interviews.
Aibileen: never had a white guest in her house -> worries that they will be caught.
The interview does not go well. (awkward)
Slide 2 - Slide
2. Aibileen's responses 1st interview
agitated, very nervous
=> rushes to the restroom to vomit.
Slide 3 - Slide
3. Elizabeth envies her sister in California who has live-in domestic help.
(When Elizabeth was visiting her older sister, she) “hardly had to see Mae Mobley at all.”
=> Elizabeth is a selfish person and a bad mother
Slide 4 - Slide
4. metaphorical significance the hair product called Shinalator
straightens curly hair (symbolically too!)
=> result end after one washing -> won't change her forever;
She will follow her own path, to become a writer
Slide 5 - Slide
5. What idea does Aibileen come up with to help the interviews along?
Write down her comments by herself,and then read them aloud while Skeeter types them.
Slide 6 - Slide
6. Aibileen’s first story goes well, but is not finished.
white child getting his fingers cut off in a fan.
Aibileen took the boy to a black hospital and needed to lie about the boy’s race due to racial prejudice.
Slide 7 - Slide
7. Aibileen uses a metaphor to tell Skeeter that she has found a way make the interviews work.
“I know how to make the teapot stop rattling.”
=> has found a way to calm down enough to
answer Skeeter’s questions and move on with the book project.
Slide 8 - Slide
Chapter 12
Slide 9 - Slide
1. What story does Skeeter use to get her mother’s car without explaining
volunteer work at a church.
irony here: lie <-> church
The book project: a secret to everyone in Skeeter’s circle.
Slide 10 - Slide
2. Skeeter offers
to do something to help Aibileen improve her writing.
Skeeter offers to check out books from the library in town for Aibileen.
library: follows the Jim Crow laws: black people can't borrow books
Slide 11 - Slide
3. examples of the power of writing
• Aibileen’s written prayers
• Writing answers to Skeeter’s questions -> stops the teapot from rattling
• Skeeter writes with success to Elaine Stein in an effort to find her own identity as a writer.
Slide 12 - Slide
4. What does Skeeter notice about how Hilly speaks to African Americans?
raises her voice three octaves higher
Hilly also smiles as if she is speaking to a child.
Slide 13 - Slide
5. What does the text of the initiative suggest about Hilly?
99% of diseases are carried in the urine; white people can become disabled by many of the diseases supposedly carried by African Americans, and that the urine of white people can be harmful to black people.
Hilly: bigoted, non-scientific way of thinking.
Slide 14 - Slide
6. End of chapter...
Minny ends the interview and leaves because explaining her life to Skeeter is “giving me the heart palpitations.”