Book Analysis: Red Scarf Girl

A Cloud of Oppression Experiencing the torment of a label is difficult, especially if it is given to your whole family. In the memoir Red Scarf Girl, set in the time of the Cultural Revolution, being within the upper middle class was frowned upon and proletarians were seen as the leaders of society. The label of black class status tainted the bourgeoisie, including the Jiang family, with torture, ridicule, and incrimination by others influenced by the governmentally coercive ways of Communism. Political oppression was visible everywhere within China, affecting neighborhoods, families and even children. Subjugation may have been on a small scale, such as temporarily shutting down a nostalgic children's bookstore due to its name supporting

Ji Li Jiang was accused of exploitation by Du Hai and Yin Lan-lan due to the fact that her family has a housekeeper, takes pedicabs, and had “‘serious problems with her class standing’” (70). Daily, Ji Li and her younger sister and brother are victimized by their peers at school, due to the fact that their family was originally supported by a landlord, a career considered cruel to the working class. The Jiangs are put in the political spotlight consistently to illustrate the perspective of those who were affected by the bigotry of Maoism. Additionally, the destruction of unique thoughts was present in Ji Li’s struggle to blend in with the proletarian class. She consistently felt pressured to disown her own family and alter the lifestyle so familiar to her. At school, Ji Li was even encouraged to turn against her own father, later leading Ji Li to wonder if she should love her family. The attempts at destroying the sense of pride held for one’s family in order to embrace new ideologies truly showed toxicity of the cause Chairman Mao created. The wellbeing of those under the rule of Mao Ze-dong was at extreme risk, due to the conniving actions of those around