Julia Alvarez: The Voice of the Mirabal Sisters Numerous accounts of families affected by oppressive dictatorships exist all around the world. Julia Alvarez, an author whose father was involved in a resistance group to such a regime, is a prime example of one of those stories. After leaving her childhood home of the Dominican Republic, Alvarez struggled to adapt her lifestyle to match that of an average American. During this time period, Alvarez recalled her experience under an authoritarian government and combined it with her impressive storytelling skills to create a fictional documentation of another family just like her’s.
Marian Faux is an author deeply engaged in writing about the basic personal matters of modern times. Her previous book, Childless by Choice, discussed the advantages and disadvantages of bearing children, and the effects that the legalization of abortion had on premature mothers. Yet, she channelled her visions of abortion into another book, Roe v Wade: The Untold Story of the Landmark Supreme Court Decision That Made Abortion Legal, where she not only, in depth, told the complete process of the Supreme Court case “Roe v Wade”, but also analyzed the worldwide aftermath of the decision, and the changes it brought in society. Prior to this effort, Faux attempted to summarize the subject of abortion into one book, in which, she claimed that “Abortion
The story “Ede and Unku” by Grete Weiskopf describes a boy whose father’s values are tied to that of the NSDAP party, and exposes how discriminatory this party is through the eyes of a gypsy girl, Unku. Moreover, the story justifies communist values when Unku takes from the wealthy to support her poor family who cannot afford other food. This ideal is exemplified when Unku states: “Yes, that’s so-the fish- they’re swimming in the water and should belong to everyone… These things should belong to everyone, and everyone who works should get enough to eat. That’s true enough” (“Weimar Germany and the Rise of Hitler” 25).
Although the world has managed to bring significant changes toward women’s empowerment, there is still more to do. It’s important to see that Rafael’s actions and attitude do not come from his own intentional choices, rather he acts this way due to the generational transmission of this ideal from father. To stop this cycle, change must come from the root which means men need to be better educated about the negative impact of machoism. They ought to understand the role of the women, the freedom a child needs and the consequence of machismo. Henriquez’s goal with her book is to portray the reality of these unknown Americans.
It is quite evident that tyrannical governments often deprive its citizens of their inviolable rights as humans. While some struggle to grasp the gravity of this suppression, Julia Alvarez’s In the Time of the Butterflies provides a way of better comprehending the corruption behind the denial of these entitlements such as freedom of expression, liberty, and no discrimination. In this story, Alvarez intertwines the real life tragedy of the Mirabal sisters with fictional writing to fully connect the reader to the evilness of dictatorships. Her use of characterization and admiring descriptions of the Mirabals lead to her readers being emotionally connected to each sister, prompting a better response to her message.
Loose Women, is a collection of poetry written by Sandra Cisneros. A wonderful collection of words that speak to the beauty, disgusting, painful, extraordinary things about love, sexuality, women, bodies. Throughout the novel Cisneros revels in sort of “bad girl” image: however the overall persona is that of a passionate, sexual woman who’s had her share of both joy and disappointment. We all know Sandra Cisneros roots come from Mexico and is from Mexican American immigrant family and the culture for her is very different. I can relate to Cisneros’ culture different, since I am from Indian and in India women are considered to be the goddess from ancient time, however they are not being treated like goddess.
The work is not yet complete, and is evident by looking at the domination of women throughout the centuries, specifically the 19th and 20th century, which was the height of the women’s rights movement. By analyzing two literary works from two different eras, “The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman in the late 19th century and “Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers” written by Adrienne Rich in the mid-20th century, one can conclude that while there have been improvements to women’s rights, there is still discrimination prevalent. Although set in two different time periods, the main
Moralez, A. Grief Among Individuals with Developmental Disabilities. In UNM.edu. Retrieved from http://coc.unm.edu/common/manual/Grief.pdf The article addresses the issues surrounding the grieving process of people with intellectual disabilities (ID). It defines grief, the stages of grief, and the tasks required to have a healthy grieving process.
Thesis: Women throughout most genocidal research and history are written as victims to the patriarchal society, victims to the men who waged in war, murder, and the cohered planed killings in genocide. In the Holocaust specifically, women are portrayed in history as the victims of Soviet rape, reconstructing the destroyed Germany and the revivers in the shadows of the Nazi regime. Wendy Lower, in Hitler’s Furies, attempts to debunk this “sympathetic” idea that “rubble” women were only victims to the Nazi society and genocide, and shows that in fact many women from various backgrounds, and job titles were perpetrators of genocide as well. Her thesis is to show that women can be as vindictive, malice and cruel as their men counterparts, and often times used their femininity to escape blame, retributions, to get away with their crimes without punishment. From nurse Annettte Schücking who heard the desperate tales of soldiers mass killings, to wives like Vera Wohlauf who played their role alongside their powerful SS husbands, to secretaries like Liesel Willhaus that typed the orders to kill thousand, the mobilization of women to Ukraine and Poland in pursue of Leiblingraum left few blameless.
From the Suffragette movement of the early 20th century to modern day Women’s Marches, it is evident that women have continuously fought against the expectations and limitations placed on them by society. Throughout William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying, female characters also grapple with gender standards, and either abide by or reject them. Characters such as Dewey Dell and Cora Tull follow female expectations since Dewey Dell allows men to control her and Cora fulfills the expected role of being a caretaker for her husband and children. Addie Bundren meanwhile does not obey societal expectations, which is apparent since she has her own desires and rejects the homemaker role given to women during this time.
An urban legend, as defined by the Merriam –Webster dictionary, is an often a lurid story that is based on hearsay and widely circulated as true. According to Nicholas DiFonzo, a renowned author and psychology professor, urban legends are “narratives about strange, funny, or horrible events that could have happened, the details of which change to fit particular locales and time periods, and which frequently contain a moral lesson.” The stories are entertaining, include cultural references, and convey people’s anxieties about certain topics. While some consider urban legends as myths with a possibility of truth in it, these tales evolve to suit the common themes of the time.
There are multiple stages of grief and healing. The stages have no order, so one person may not be at the same stage as another when dealing with the same situation. The same thing applies to the stages of healing. In the novel “Ordinary People” by Judith Guest, the Jarrett family, Conrad, Calvin, and Beth are all in different stages of grief due to the loss of Buck and other reasons varying from character to character. The two main characters Conrad and Calvin move from stages of grief to stages of healing by recognizing why their grieving.
Undoubtedly , WW1 was the first utmost military conflict in the modern times that has evoked variety of literary responses which reflect the sociopolitical and psychological background of that time and are considered as vital part of the historical and cultural memory of WW1 . War poetry has provided us with variety of images of the war and the battlefield by men who have experienced the reality of war face-to-face. On the other hand, women knew from the beginning that the war was going to be a great tragedy not only for men who were enlisted in the army , but also for women on the homefront who battled against the fear and horror aroused by WW1 . Women 's voices of agony, anger and anguish have emerged from the shadows of marginalization during WW1 to express their anti-war attitude. Women 's poetry of WW1 mirrors the 'new ' roles that women took during WW1 and shows the connection between men in the battlefield and
In “Only Daughter” by Sandra Cisneros, she describes a series of events throughout her life that all relate to her relationship with her father. Cisneros begins her story by talking about how she was seen as “only a daughter”. She then transitions to talking about her education and her father’s opinion on what it is for and worth. Cisneros then ends it with a conclusion between her and her father which involved one of her stories. Throughout the story, Cisneros talks about what she believed her father thought about her and her career choices, and they turn out to be a bit different than what she thought.
Because of war, these women had to give up their social identities as women in order to become soldiers. However, after the war is over, they return home and cannot idly stand by as they did before because they now have the minds of soldiers from war. Their lives are forever changed and once your identity undergoes a change, it is difficult to revert back. The woman’s tone and diction reveal a clear distinction between her past self and present self. As she describes her past she is “seized with terror” even though it is her own past that she recalls.