U.S. Department of State

The U.S. Department of State is mentioned as a point of contact in the effort to find out what happened to Celie’s sister and her family after they are reported missing. Its brief appearance connects a private family crisis to government offices, but the account records no useful response from the department.

Institutional Reference

The passage refers to the U.S. Department of State as the State Department. It does not describe the agency’s organization or broader work; its significance here is limited to its place in a search for news about the missing family. The U.S. Department of Defense is mentioned alongside it, also without producing information.

Search for the Missing Family

According to Mr. ____’s account, Shug Avery and Germaine went directly to the U.S. Department of State after learning that Celie’s sister and her family were missing. They were trying to discover what had happened, but the effort yielded nothing at the department, just as it yielded nothing at the U.S. Department of Defense. The episode presents the government offices as avenues the searchers pursued, not as sources of resolution.

Limits and Significance

The account places the unsuccessful inquiry against the scale of a major war: one lost ship seems insignificant amid everything else happening. It also conveys the narrator’s understanding that Black people count for little to those institutions. The U.S. Department of State’s narrative role is therefore spare but pointed: the family’s disappearance reaches official offices, yet the attempt to obtain news ends without an answer.