ipl-logo

Toni Morrison Home Trauma

420 Words2 Pages

Trauma is a main theme in Toni Morrison’s novel, Home. The novel explores trauma and how it can have lasting effects on African Americans, particularly those who served in the war. The novel follows Frank Money, a Korean War veteran, and his sister, Cee, to show the impact of PTSD and generational trauma. Through Frank, we see how PTSD can affect an individual. Frank suffers from nightmares, flashbacks, and emotional detachment. Frank also suffers from alcoholism, which he uses as a coping mechanism. *Alcohol quote.* Through Frank, Morrison shows how people in traumatic events can process those events by dissociating. In the first part of the book, Frank describes how a fellow soldier shot a Korean girl in the face *Korean Girl quote*. However, when Frank begins to heal in the final part of the book, he admits that he was the one who shot her. *Korean Girl quote*. …show more content…

Morrison portrays generational trauma using Lenore, Frank and Cee’s grandmother. Lenore, being an older African American woman, has standards that she believes her family should live up to because society has instilled the belief in her. When she learns that Cee was born on the road rather than in a house or a hospital, she immediately believes that Cee is dirty and sinful. *Quote about cee being born on the road.* This belief causes Lenore to emotionally abuse Cee. She constantly lets the girl know that she is dirty and useless, and Salem, her grandfather, allows it to happen. Cee’s parents can’t protect her either because they have to work two jobs. So, Frank steps up as Cee’s only protector, leading to him getting abused by Lenore as well. Their unhappy home life led Frank and Cee to run away in search of appreciation and love. For Frank, it was the military. For Cee, it was any man that would make her feel

Show More
Related
971 Words | 4 Pages

Additionally, Frank is also the father of three daughters, two sons, Seepeetza, Missy, Dorthy, Jimmy and Benjamin, making him a father of five. After being a soldier for several years, Frank has come to rely on

Read More
556 Words | 3 Pages

Now this man's family was huge and my family is huge so that's how i relate to him. His family supported slavery so when the Civil War happened, Frank went and signed up for the Confederate soldier he was only 18 years old. His way of killing was a newer way it was called guerrilla warfare. He would surprise his enemy’s, coming out of nowhere and killing them, I don’t know if that's just me but that is awesome.

Read More
562 Words | 3 Pages

Frank committed a large scale crime, and was sent to a higher security prison. When Frank arrived, he learned the Penitentiary was unforgiving and broke spirits. “His lips were colorless, his fine teeth looked yellowish. He glanced at Alexandra sullenly, blinked as if he had come from a dark place, and one eyebrow twitched continuously” (Cather 103) Frank was portrayed as the antagonist in the entire book, except readers will sympathize for Frank

Read More
1291 Words | 6 Pages

Prejudice is a predominant theme in Toni Morrison’s “Recitatif”. A short story that follows the lives of Twyla and Roberta, two girls of different races who met in a state home. This piece has been the subject of much discussion, particularly about race, but also about class and disability. Prejudice has deeply impacted and shaped the main characters’ lives. “Recitatif” addresses the characters’ prejudice in a variety of ways, but also forces the audience to consider their own prejudice through Morrison’s use of stereotypical descriptions.

Read More
689 Words | 3 Pages

He buys a book by Thomas E. Ricks called Making the Corps; it’s a day by day account of the Marine basic training which he follows daily. Frank thought was “Did he have it in him to become a Marine?”(554) He knew that his son’s idea of a good time was to sit in front of the fireplace and rereading his favorite books. Franks worst fear would be that his son would fail and not accomplish his dream of becoming a Marine. That fear was short lived and his son had graduated from basic training and became a Marine.

Read More
934 Words | 4 Pages

At this point of the memoir, Frank is confused about how he should act towards his father because he remembers the time that his father actually acted like a father and not a drunk (Shannon). In chapter eight, Frank compares his father to the Holy Trinity by describing the three different people he sees in his father. He separates his father from being a “parental figure” for him and being an alcoholic. Frank appreciates the good times that he spent with his father and cherishes their memories together but he knows that his father is too irresponsible to count on for anything (Gale).

Read More
800 Words | 4 Pages

As young children this stuck with them for a while. According to Dr. primm PTSD isn't just from war. In this case that is correct. Frank money is affected throughout the book because of what he seen that day. After franks gets in the fight he feels wild and joyful.

Read More
957 Words | 4 Pages

Billy is often portrayed in Slaughterhouse-Five as a soldier who is affected by Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), as he has problems expressing his emotions as well as coming to terms with his life after war and reality. PTSD affects Billy's life so greatly in the novel that it shows the reader that the war does not end after the fighting stops, but that there is an aftermath that continues to affect the soldier. In Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy’s life serves as an example of the negative and damaging effects of war on people as individuals, such as misinterpretation of time, disconnection from the world, and inability to feel

Read More
1504 Words | 7 Pages

The novel focuses on coping with the death and horror of war. It also speaks volumes about the true nature of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and the never-ending struggle of dealing with it. In the

Read More
638 Words | 3 Pages

As young adults in today’s society, individuals have grown up seeing diversity and a strong community aspect. The world has changed tremendously and has become more tolerable for people of different backgrounds, races, and sexual orientations. Morrison was born Chole Ardelia Wofford in Lorni, Ohio. Morrison is a well-established American novelist, editor, professor, and Nobel Peace Prize winner. She has reimagined her own past, as well as the ones of African American decent, especially woman.

Read More
922 Words | 4 Pages

The cultural issue of trauma is a central theme in both Shirley Jackson's 1959 novel, The Haunting of Hill House, and Mike Flanagan's 2018 Netflix adaptation. The theme of trauma is represented in both versions through the exploration of the psychological impact of past traumas on the characters' lives. In both the novel and the adaptation, the characters are haunted by the past, unable to escape the trauma they have experienced. The theme of trauma is presented in a different way in each version, but the message remains the same: past traumas can have a lasting impact on individuals and their families. Jackson uses specific literary techniques to demonstrate the theme of trauma in the novel.

Read More
1091 Words | 5 Pages

Finally we end up at Frank, The man of the book, the legend. Frank is the brother of Wes, the son of Julian, the favorite." As soon as Uncle Frank arrived, his tie loosened and his sleeves rolled up, I felt sorry for my father. It was the way I always felt when the two of them were together. Brothers naturally invite comparison, and when comparisons were made between those two, my father was bound to suffer"(35-36) as of now one must have to think that Frank is a great guy, doctor and better than his handsome father.

Read More
1200 Words | 5 Pages

She enhances her theme through the manipulation of plot and the use of women as her central character. Morrison proves the notion that women are effective character in depicting theme that deal with the social issue of craving material wealth. Also the role of the social class in the story is the issue of class separation and struggle, though they may appear at first glance to be unimportant, but they are in fact the central points around which the story revolves. Class differences affect the ways in which the characters interact with one another. Nowhere in the story "Recitatif" is this more apparent than in the meeting between Roberta and Twyla's mothers at the orphanage.

Read More
1356 Words | 6 Pages

In order to do so, I will use quotations extracted from Morrison´s work and other secondary resources, and I will focus on the main characters of the novel that stand as representations of their social dimension. Toni Morrison uses the personal lives of the

Read More
1970 Words | 8 Pages

Slaves faced extreme brutality and Morrison focuses on rape and sexual assault as the most terrifying form of abuse. It is because of this abuse that Morrison’s characters are trapped in their pasts, unable to move on from the psychological damages that they have endured. “Morrison revises the conventional slave narrative by insisting on the primacy of sexual assault over other experiences of brutality” (Barnett 420). For telling Mrs. Garner what they had done, she was badly beaten by them, leaving a “chokecherry tree” (16) on her back. But that was not the overriding issue.

Read More

More about Toni Morrison Home Trauma

Related Topics

Open Document