Legacies and Heritage Nikki Giovanni and Linda Hogan both wrote poems in the 1970s about their grandmothers that seem totally different to the unaware reader. In actuality, they are very similar. These two poems, Legacies and Heritage, express the poet’s value of knowledge passed down from grandmother to granddaughter, from generation to generation. Even though the poems are composed and read very differently, the underlying message conveyed is the same, and each are valid first-hand accounts of legacies and heritages. While Giovanni's Legacies is only about the grandmother, Hogan's Heritage describes, in addition to the grandmother's and her advice, the advice and appearances of other family members. Despite this, the grandmother remains the focus. In Giovanni's poem, the grandmother needs no introduction or background given for her. In Heritage, however, the mention of the other family members seems to set the stage for Hogan’s mystical grandmother. Linda Hogan is a woman of mixed background; she is part Chickasaw Indian, and part Caucasian. This seems to cause Hogan doubts about herself. This is illustrated in the line " It was the brown stain/ that covered my shirt, / my whiteness a shame." (Hogan 243) These doubts could possibly be the same dilemma that haunted Sylvia Plath. Plath also had a conflict in her background; her father was a Nazi and her mother was part Jewish. Hogan may feel a similar pain, because in antiquity, the whites new to this continent exploited and killed Indians. She probably feels self-loathing in response to being around her Indian relatives, due to her white background. Giovanni does not feel any internal conflict concerning her heritage, but she is conflicted when her grandmother asks... ... middle of paper ... ...eme. My grandmother taught me things, as did Giovanni's grandmother, as did Hogan's. All older generations strive to pass on their traditions and wisdom onto people who can still use them. In ancient mythology, the crone, or old woman, was a figure wise in lore, remedies and magic. So are the two women in these poems. Even the titles themselves are connected; heritage and legacy are synonyms of each other. And while these poems aren't mirror reflections of one other, they are different versions of the same narrative. Everyone has their own story of their grandmother to tell, but it will never be the same as the next person's. Two stories that seem so radically different from each other will be alternate versions of one description, just like the two works by Nikki Giovanni and Linda Hogan that pay homage to their grandmothers’ wisdom and knowledge.
Heritage is one of the most important factors that represents where a person came from. In “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, this short story characterizes not only the symbolism of heritage, but also separates the difference between what heritage really means and what it may be portrayed as. Throughout the story, it reveals an African-American family living in small home and struggling financially. Dee is a well-educated woman who struggles to understand her family's heritage because she is embarrassed of her mother and sister, Mama and Maggie. Unlike Dee, Mama and Maggie do not have an education, but they understand and appreciate their family's background. In “Everyday Use,” the quilts, handicrafts, and Dee’s transformation helps the reader interpret that Walker exposed symbolism of heritage in two distinctive point of views.
This quote describes how Louise Halfe uses all four common elements of native literature in her writings. I have chosen to discuss two of the elements she frequently uses, Spirituality and Orality in relation to three of her poems: My Ledders, She Told Me and The Heat of my Grandmothers.
Nikki Giovanni’s poem entitled “Nikki-Rosa,” depicts a personal reflection of Giovanni’s life growing up. The poem concentrates on the fact that people have different childhood memories depending on their social status’. Giovanni reconstructs her most powerful memories and creates an identity of what the black population stands for. She establishes the different ways in which black families were rich, which did not necessarily include an abundance of wealth. In addition to, she compared these non-monetary riches to the memories of those who were raised with a silver spoon.
I believe the opening text of “Old Mortality” illustrates both the conflicting views of different generations/values and ideals as well as the attempt to understand and resolve each other’s opposite. The first paragraph gives the reader a description of Aunt Amy. It is difficult to distinguish who the narrator of the text is at this particular point. It is neither Miranda or Maria nor the Grandmother. It would appear to be an omniscient narrator of no relation to the characters. Yet, the narrator displays the affect of both the young girls’ feelings and thoughts about Aunt Amy’s picture as well as the Grandmother’s perception of Amy.
In Sandra Cisnero’s poem, Abuelito Who?, Sandra talks about her grandfather and who he is to her and in her life.The Old Grandfather and Little grandson is a Russian Folktales that is retold by Leo Tolstoy is about a grandfather that is treated badly. After this event, his grandson tells his parents that he will treat them that way when they grow old. After this happens the parents are ashamed of themselves and start to treat the grandfather adequately. Both of these pieces of literature talk about grandchildren caring for their grandfather or grandmother. Numerous folktales, poems, and stories have characters, mood, and changes in character
Born on June 7, 1943, in Knoxville, Tennessee, Nikki Giovanni was originally named Yolande Cornelia Giovanni, Jr. Giovanni is an African-American woman that expresses her passion and ethical messages through her poetry. Throughout Giovanni’s life, she has moved around the United States numerous times, learning and adapting to new environments and new duties each time. Not all communities that she arrived at welcomed her with open arms.She inherited a powerful gratitude of her culture and heritage through her grandmother, which influenced her as a poet. As she got older she attended an all-black college, Fisk University. Her first published poetry was motivated by the assassinations of great activist like Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr.
Even as a child, Thelma Lucille Sayles, or Lucille Clifton, realized how notable African Americans were. However, throughout her lifetime, Clifton has encountered discrimination against her race on multiple occasions, but her poetry, for both adults and children, show resilience against any racist remarks made. With a heavy influence from growing up in an African-American household and experiencing the Civil Rights Movement, Lucille Clifton’s writings focus on the importance of African Americans, especially women, in communities (Hine 1-3).
Giovanni is characterized as a woman that is independent, optimistic and extremely self- expressive. She was against the idea of early marriage and relationships in general, she would rather concentrate on her writing and herself which was very different compared to society's standards during this time period. Some of her statement striked an interest in many feminist for example she once told an interviewer ,
The Grandmother is a bit of a traditionalist, and like a few of O’Connor’s characters is still living in “the old days” with outdated morals and beliefs, she truly believes the way she thinks and the things she says and does is the right and only way, when in reality that was not the case. She tends to make herself believe she is doing the right thing and being a good person when in actuality it can be quite the opposite. David Allen Cook says in hi...
In this poem, there is a young woman and her loving mother discussing their heritage through their matrilineal side. The poem itself begins with what she will inherit from each family member starting with her mother. After discussing what she will inherit from each of her family members, the final lines of the poem reflect back to her mother in which she gave her advice on constantly moving and never having a home to call hers. For example, the woman describes how her father will give her “his brown eyes” (Line 7) and how her mother advised her to eat raw deer (Line 40). Perhaps the reader is suggesting that she is the only survivor of a tragedy and it is her heritage that keeps her going to keep safe. In the first two lines of the poem, she explains how the young woman will be taking the lines of her mother’s (Lines 1-2). This demonstrates further that she is physically worried about her features and emotionally worried about taking on the lineage of her heritage. Later, she remembered the years of when her mother baked the most wonderful food and did not want to forget the “smell of baking bread [that warmed] fined hairs in my nostrils” (Lines 3-4). Perhaps the young woman implies that she is restrained through her heritage to effectively move forward and become who she would like to be. When reading this poem, Native American heritage is an apparent theme through the lifestyle examples, the fact lineage is passed through woman, and problems Native Americans had faced while trying to be conquested by Americans. Overall, this poem portrays a confined, young woman trying to overcome her current obstacles in life by accepting her heritage and pursuing through her
The author uses imagery, contrasting diction, tones, and symbols in the poem to show two very different sides of the parent-child relationship. The poem’s theme is that even though parents and teenagers may have their disagreements, there is still an underlying love that binds the family together and helps them bridge their gap that is between them.
Regretfully, though readers can see how Mama has had a difficult time in being a single mother and raising two daughters, Dee, the oldest daughter, refuses to acknowledge this. For she instead hold the misconception that heritage is simply material or rather artificial and does not lie in ones heart. However, from Mama’s narrations, readers are aware that this cultural tradition does lie within ones heart, especially those of Mama’s and Maggie’s, and that it is the pure foundation over any external definition.
They let the things that can separate them bring them closer to each other. This poem teaches its readers that love takes sacrifice. Towards the ending on the poem the poet expresses what she is feeling, “She smiled, stretched her arms to take to heart the eldest daughter of her youngest son a quarter century away.” (Ling, 142) The quote shows that the poet traveled halfway around the world to meet her grandmother that she couldn’t communicate with.To sum up the poem, “Grandma Ling,” both the poet and the grandmother take huge sacrifices to see each other. The whole poem represents that love takes
In the poem “Old Maids” by Sandra Cisneros, she tells us how she and her female cousins have reached thirty years of
When Bradstreet’s next grandchild, Anne, passed away, she was unable to resist it. She lost her control and become disappointed. She wrote a poem under “In Memory of My dear Grandchild Anne Bradstreet, Who Deceased June 20, 1669.”5 The poem starts with the speaker