Breadwinner Essay

This week I chose the book The Breadwinner by Deborah Ellis. This was the first time I have read this book, although I remember hearing about it, I could never get myself to read this story based on the difficult subject. This is a story about a girl named Parvana who lives in Afghanistan during a time of war. This book exceeded my expectations because I thought that this book would be predictable, but it was not. Similar to A Long Walk to Water this book made me feel appreciative and thankful for living in a country like America. This book put into perspective that my “bad days” are nothing compared to Parvana’s bad days. This book was very eye opening to me because of how little knowledge I have regarding the Middle East, Afghanistan in particular.

20). I most certainly agree with this statement and believe that it holds true to The Breadwinner. I feel as though this story gave me more insight on culture and practices that I never knew about. Children need to understand that other countries may do things differently, but there is nothing wrong with that. Having students read stories about cultures and countries will provide them with greater insight and broaden their understanding of the world around them. By discussing books similar to The Breadwinner readers are able to explore cultural stereotypes and how little they truly know about a culture. I found this to personally be true for me. Pamela Jewett also argues that, “the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the whole story” (Jewett 2001, pg. 20). This is a very powerful quote and emphasizes the importance of stereotypes in the world, but also stereotypes in literature. Reading a wide variety of literature form different countries and cultures is so critical to break