ipl-logo

Otsuka The Children

1184 Words5 Pages

“The Children” by Julie Otsuka is the story in the life of a picture brides and their children as they live their lives in J- town California. The story starts out with the picture bride describing her early days in America, working in the fields as the children laid in baskets while the men worked and ignore their families. As life goes on the picture bride describes how the children begin to grow and begin to make up their own games and learn from life. Eventually as time went on, the children begin to age and assimilate into their new culture. From changing their names to forgetting how to speak Japanese and so on. Eventually the children even begin to dream what they want to do with their lives. Some want to become doctor’s others want …show more content…

That they can achieve whatever they want and do whatever their hearts desires. It’s not until they arrive and assimilate to a new culture that they realize there’s more needed to achieve certain dreams. Some dreams need people to be a certain class or race in order to achieve them. Something that immigrants like the picture bride in “The Children” didn’t know about until it was too late. Which is why the picture bride in the “The Children” is motivated to not tell her children the truth and to let them continue to dream (Otsuka 738). So that the children can be happy a bit more longer before they face the truth about what they can and can’t do in society like how she and all the other Japanese immigrants had to face when coming to …show more content…

Based on research from Picture Brides by Stephenie Foster states that “Despite what they were led to believe, picture brides did not have an easy life. Many of the women …worked in jobs that were similar to those of men, and those jobs included irrigating crops, weeding plantations… (Foster 1702). By knowing the history and situation these women found themselves in at the time makes it easier to understand why the decision the mothers took made sense. When they came to this land they expected a better life than the one they had Japan only to find out it was all a lie. All there hopes and dreams were shattered and were forced to face the truth. this was awful for the mothers that they didn’t want their own children to face the truth in this way not yet anyway which why they made the decision to stay silent and let them dream

Show More
Related
182 Words | 1 Pages

In the chapter Takaki describes how the Japanese 's oversea to America because of the Bearing of the burden taxation. ' 'A lot of farmers suffered severe economic hardships during the 1880 's ' ' (Takaki 231), that caused a lot of the famers to unable to pay their taxes. Due to the Bearing of the Burden taxation several of the famers lost their lands that caused starving many parts of the country. Then, the Takaki describes the picture brides in America, which is how women is a ' 'picture bride system was based om the established custom of arraigned marriage ' ' (Takaki 234).

Read More
1186 Words | 5 Pages

``The woman warrior`` written by Maxine Hong Kingston is a collection of memoirs. It has a hybrid form: it is a myth, fiction, as well as autobiography. ``The woman warrior`` is a book about finding and discovering yourself in the circumstances of a Chinese family and an American upbringing, always fluctuating between the two worlds, wondering about your true self. In ``A Song for a Barbarian Reed Pipe`` a very important theme is the Identity Plot.

Read More
808 Words | 4 Pages

Most women were expected to work on the farms or in the household and to raise children. When industry came to the country, it provided women the opportunity to seek new environments. However, women’s tough transition did not come with welcome arms by the country. “If you don’t think there’s a difference (between women wearing slacks and skirts), put on a Consolidated uniform and try getting service at your favorite store, make a reservation, or get information at the post office,” (Bowman Reid, 67). This quote explains that some women were refused service for wearing slacks and working in factories.

Read More
823 Words | 4 Pages

They found it crucial to continue their beliefs and traditions. They believed they were effective and kept them content. Some examples of these traditions were the Naming Ceremony, tribal dances, and their Dreaming Journey. Along with all this, the quote talks about telling their grandchildren the ways of their people. This is because it was one of their culture’s customs.

Read More
992 Words | 4 Pages

Through this movie, it is important to take notice of how gender, education, class and traditional culture can influence a person’s journey to achieve the American dream. First, it can be seen that

Read More
379 Words | 2 Pages

Satisfying the American Dream’s devotion to the possibility that “anyone, no matter how lowly his origins, could rise and become a success””(Poulter, 1). This quote spoken by Rebecca Poulter also describes

Read More
561 Words | 3 Pages

Some believe that it entails to the security of their lives. Not just financially but also to the intangible rewards like the rights to equality and freedom. Do these people come to find what they're looking for? Not all of them. This dream is sought by many but found by some.

Read More
910 Words | 4 Pages

Beneatha’s main focus is to become a doctor and she does not want a marriage getting in the way of her dream. She wants to live her life with independence and be her own person without anyone compromising that. The American Dream is very similar to that by saying that people should have an equal opportunity to do things on their own and be independent. Another example is, “I have never asked anyone around here to do anything for me!” (Hansberry19).

Read More
1542 Words | 7 Pages

The Russian girl states, “Here I was with so much richness in me, but my mind was not wanted without the language. And my body, unskilled, untrained, was not even wanted in the factory. Only one of two chances was left open to me: the kitchen, or minding babies” (Yezierska). The Russian immigrant’s experience shows that in order to be successful in America one must adapt to its customs and practices. Eddy Isango the author of an online article titled Obstacles to the American Dream, quotes an immigrant named Laurent Kondohoma, “I’m here to learn English because the language is the biggest obstacle on my way to achieve my dream in America”, Kondohoma reveals that in order to attain the American dream one must learn the language of the dominate culture.

Read More
1177 Words | 5 Pages

Mother knows best. And yet so many daughters in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club feel slighted by what the matriarchal figures in their lives have in mind for them, or rather, what they believe their mothers have in mind for them. A perfect storm of expectation, true and false, about love, about success, about being Chinese. The souring of mother-daughter relationships in The Joy Luck Club stem from unrealistic or ill conceived expectations that both parties hold for the other.

Read More
1369 Words | 6 Pages

For a nine-year-old who wants nothing more than to make her mother proud this was exciting. In the beginning, we can see her excitement and desire, “in the beginning I was just as excited as my mother, maybe even more so.” (Tan). However, as we follow the story we see her excitement quickly fade to sorrow and anger. The high expectations immigrant families place on their children is still a very relevant social issue and can be witnessed throughout the United States.

Read More
876 Words | 4 Pages

“It was my father who taught us that an immigrant must work twice as hard as anybody else, that he must never give up.” This quote by Zinedine Zidane shows how hard The Americans Dream is to immigrants. This essay will explain a little about immigrants coming to the United States looking to achieve the American Dream and their struggles and accomplishments. Also this essay will talk about two speeches from the mid-1900’s for both Martin Luther King Jr. and President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Immigrants have many ups and downs through their live in America.

Read More
1699 Words | 7 Pages

Dreams are hard to attain without discrimination, but with discrimination it is even harder to do, for this reason women had a hard time of achieving their dream, “While some women surely found some satisfaction in their domestic roles and knew their work to be both hard and necessary, many were aware that domestic labor was not only undervalued by their fellow Americans but also would never lead to success and stature”(Loranger). This quote proves that with discrimination against gender it was hard to attain the American Dream because even while doing work

Read More
935 Words | 4 Pages

Immigrants were coming into the country knowing nothing but their own culture and the idea of obtaining a

Read More
1020 Words | 5 Pages

They feel and become left out when they are with their community’s group of friends. In addition, some older children who came to the United States have a hard time learning a new culture because it was a culture shock to them. There are two major things that become problems in their journey to adopt a new culture; barrier to language and living their lifestyle. While adapting new culture, they have a difficult journey because of the bully, discrimination, and racism that they encounter. Some of these situations that Chin refugees face can be related to how Faith faces her problems with cultures and

Read More

More about Otsuka The Children

Related Topics

Open Document