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Analysis Of Another Brooklyn By Jaqueline Woodson

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Brooklyn in the 1970s was plagued by severe economic and political troubles unlike any the city's inhabitants had experienced before. This is what Brooklyn was described as by a recent PBS article, for one to be living in these conditions their life must have been shaped pretty severely. On the contrary, living in Scarsdale has brought me many opportunities that someone living in that Brooklyn setting might not have been able to obtain. August, a character in Jaqueline Woodson, Another Brooklyn, lived in this harsh time period filled with a multitude of problems. This realistic fiction novel accurately depicts the story of a young woman attempting to thrive in a place like Brooklyn. August encountered many obstacles and hardships that truly …show more content…

While August hung out with her friends they were immediately given a negative connotation because of the skin color that they had. When August and her friends would go to Sylvia’s house she seemed to display a fake personality and hide her true identity. When August and her friends ventured upon the doorstep of Sylvia’s house they were immediately questioned, “Who were our people? What did they do? How were our grades? What were our ambitions? Did we understand, her father wanted to know, the Negro problem in America” (Woodson, 102)? Throughout this quote Sylvia’s father is asking August and her friends not about their personality, but other things like family members, grades, and goals. It almost seems like he does not care about who they are as a person, but what they do. For one to be talking about the Negro problem in America, it should be obvious that this person is not African American. Sylvias family is in fact African American. For an African American to say that there is a Negro problem in America can put an affect on people. August could be affected by this because if people are putting a negative connotation on the race that she identifies as, than she could believe that her race is considered bad. This thought, that your race is inferior to others can really shape who a person is. Although there is racism present in …show more content…

As I have lived in Scarsdale throughout my lifespan, I have been shaped into the person that I am today. Scarsdale in the 2010s-2020s has shaped who I am because of the opportunities, and education that I have recieved. While visiting other countries, it is very easy to grasp how countries and settings can shape a person. One country in the same continent as another could be strikingly different. Back in 2016, my family and I took trip to Guatemala. A country in the same continent as America. Our goal while visiting Guatemala was to build homes for people who unfortunately could not afford them. When visiting the village that we were going to build for, it was obvious that it was not very clean. Looking at these living conditions made me grateful of the opportunities I have received. This trip illustrates that the opportunities that one is given can really affect who they are. Because the people living in that village did not have many opportunities, they were not shaped and aware of the same things I have grown up with. Living in Scarsdale has shaped me because I have had a higher variety of opportunities which means that I have more choices to choose from. Unlike myself, August was not given many opportunities in 1970s Brooklyn. Settings have major affects on how a person is shaped in life. Another place where I saw this affect of setting was Africa. My parents visited Africa in 2018. When asking them what they

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