Unnamed Jefferson Townspeople 3

One of the narrative devices that Faulkner regularly deploys is using the larger population of Jefferson as a kind of chorus to provide commentary on the characters or events of a specific story. In almost every instance it seems fair to say that the "townspeople" he uses this way are implicitly the white people, but it seems more accurate to create a separate "Character=Jefferson Townspeople" for each text in which the device occurs. The narrator of "Hair" refers to the people of Jefferson several times, usually in connection with rumors and gossip about Susan Reed. The people who "cast the usual aspersions" on Susan's origins are, according to the narrator, "women mostly" (131). The men who frequent the barbershop believe Susan was one of "the bad ones" (135); out of respect for Hawkshaw's feelings, however, they don't talk about her in front of him.