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Introduction on adolescence
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In the story “Where are you going, Where have you been?” by Joyce Carol Oates, the main character, Connie, experiences life not having an actively participating mother or father. Most adolescents struggle with the transition from teen-age years to adulthood. For many, this is where the parents step in. Parents are meant to support and help an adolescent when needed, especially during this difficult transition; however, this is not always true. In Connie’s case, her parents allowed her to make the change alone and endure hard times. As a result, she lacked the values needed to survive. Such values are used to equip a young person for the real world and the tragedies that come with it. As seen in “Where are you going, Where have you been?”, Connie was a victim of poor guidance and empty judgment. The dysfunctional family’s behavior was reflected in Connie. Her mother envied her, and her father was not an active figure in her life. Connie 's …show more content…
When approached by Arnold Friend at first, she was skeptical but was still charmed by him. As she began to feel uneasy, Connie could have used her intuition to realize that he was trouble. Once she had been engaged by Arnold, her life was over. The influences on Connie and her lack of instilled reasoning led to her down fall. Her family’s fragmented nature was echoed in her actions; consequently, she was unable to communicate with her parents, and she was never was able to learn anything of significance. She felt abandoned and rejected, because no one took the initiative to teach her how to make good decisions. Connie was unable to mature until she was faced with death and self sacrifice. In the end, her situation made it difficult for her to think and reason beyond the position she was in. By not being able apply insight, she fell into Arnold Friends lure. Misguidance by the parents strongly contributed to Connie’s
due to her family leaving to attend a barbeque. Like Chet, Connie also has to rely on herself to overcome her obstacles, such as the threatening Arnold Friend. Stegner and Oates both use this plot point in order to establish that their characters cannot rely on their family for help or protection, which emphasizes their transition to adulthood. In Stegner’s depiction, the purpose seems to be the successful overcoming of obstacles that a child, specifically a boy, has to go through in order to become a man.
Arnold Friend takes advantage of Connie’s teenage innocence for something of a much more sinister purpose. Connie thought she had it all figured out until Arnold Friend came into her life and up her driveway on one summer, Sunday afternoon and made her realize how big and scary the world can be. Arnold embodies everything that Connie has dreamed about in a boy, but is in the most malevolent form of Connie’s dream boy. She always wanted to get away from her family because she has always felt as if she didn’t belong and Arnold can make this possible just in the most predatory way. She always thought sex would be sweet (and consensual) and that she would be in charge of how it progressed, Arnold strips her of the authority she’s held in any other encounter with a boy. The moral of the story is always be careful what you wish
Joyce Carol Oates’s short story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” clearly illustrates the loss of innocence adolescents experience as they seek maturity, represented by Connie's dangerous encounter with Arnold Friend. Connie symbolizes the many teens that seek independence from their family in pursuit of maturity. Connie’s great desire to grow up is apparent from the beginning of the story, as she experiments with her sexuality. However, it is clear that Connie is not interested in pursuing a relationship, but relishes the maturity she feels after being with the opposite sex. After following a boy to his car, she was “gleaming with a joy that had nothing to do with Eddie or even this place” (2). This suggests that Connie's exploits
...tomy between reality and dreams quite well throughout her piece. She provides the reader with two ways to experience the story: either as reality or as reality that turns into a nightmare. This dichotomy that Oates creates “allows the reader to escape this story, and allows this story to end” (Hurley 374). The end of the story shows Connie entering the new world of experience, and Oates wants the reader to sense her fear. Oates intricately provides the reader with clues that help see why Connie’s experience with Arnold is just a nightmare. She also allows the reader to see how this nightmare is meant to scare Connie into making the realization that her decisions have consequences. I hope that anyone reading this learns from Connie that not everything we do is good for us, and we have to think about the consequences of our actions, whether good or bad, before we act.
Connie's personality also had two sides to it. The side she displayed at home is mocking and sneering, and the side she displayed in public made her look trashy. It seemed that she didn't know who she was or what she wanted to be. All she let us know is that she wanted "the caress of love," she wanted someone to be "sweet, gentle, the way it was in movies and promised in songs" (Oates 980). This could have been why she did not put up much of a fight at the end and walked straight into Arnold's arms. It seemed almost like this was what she wanted and what she had been dreaming about.
Coming-of-age stories commonly record the transitions—sometimes abrupt, or even violent—from youth to maturity, from innocence to experience of its protagonist, whether male or female. Greasy Lake by T.Coraghessan Boyle and Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? by Joyce Carol Oates are great examples of traditional coming-of-age stories. The roots of the coming-of-age narrative theme are tracked in the male protagonist’s perspective for Boyle’s short story, while the Oates’ story captures the coming-of-age theme from Connie; a female protagonist’s perspective. In both short stories, the authors fulfill the expectations of a coming-of-age genre when they take us through the journey of rebellion and self realization, as the
Arnold Friend’s layers of deception. Connie’s blindness is the pretext of her loss of innocence
An unstable home filled with broken relationships is like a shattered glass it can never be the same again because the damage is already done. Author Joyce Carol Oates portrays this in her short story “Where are you going. Where have you been?” The main character of the short story feeds off her broken home. Her family household situation motivates her to be a rebel. She ends up making so decisions that will change her life in a negative way.
”Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been?” is a short story written by Joyce Carol Oates, which explores the life of a teenage girl named Connie. One of the issues this story divulges is the various stresses of adolescence. Connie, like so many others, is pressured to conform according to different social pressures, which displays the lack of respect female adolescents face. The music culture, young men, and family infringe upon young female minds to persuade them to look or act in certain ways, showing a disrespect for these girls. While some perhaps intend their influence for good, when put into practice, the outcome often has a negative effect. Moreover, this can lead young women to confusion and a lack of self-respect, which proves
Connie was tired of the life she was living and, she was ready to make decisions for herself and to deal with the consequences for them. She knew that if her parents found out about her going to the diner that she would be in trouble. Connie did not care about the consequences for her actions. She felt like it was time to grow up and be a woman. She wanted to start to experiment with her sexuality. Connie wanted boys to start to notice her and talk to her. Connie thinks that guys could be her savior by helping deliver her from the pressure and anxieties from her sister and mother. Her going out on her own makes her realize that she does not have to please anyone, only herself. When Connie and her friend went to the diner she met this guy Arnold. Obviously being with Eddie for three hours in a dark alley and diner was not the best first move for her. This is the one decision that will change her life forever. This was probably the first guy that gave Connie some attention. So obviously she is going to soak him up and just...
“Stop gawking at yourself. Who are you? You think you’re so pretty?” ‘Where are you going, where have you been?’ is a short story about a girl named Connie. Connie is a 15 year old girl who to her mother appears vain. Her mother was once pretty and over the years lost her looks so she attacked her daughter. Connie represents the girls of society which seem to be entering womanhood. In “Where are you going, Where have you been?” Joyce Carol Oath uses literary devices to develop both the theme and tone.
In her famous short story, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been,” Joyce Carol Oates shows the transition from childhood to adulthood through her character Connie. Each person experiences this transition in their own way and time. For some it is leaving home for the first time to go to college, for others it might be having to step up to a leadership position. No matter what, this transition affects everyone; it just happens to everyone differently. Oates describes Connie's unfortunate coming of age in a much more violent and unexpected way than the typical coming of age story for a fifteen year old girl.
Connie’s clothes and infatuation with her own beauty symbolize her lack of maturity or knowing her true self, which in the end enables her to be manipulated by Arnold Friend. Connie was enamored with her own beauty; in the beginning of the story Oates states that Connie “knew
As I began reading “Where are you going, where have you been?” by Joyce Carol Oates I found myself relating the experiences of Connie, the girl in the story, to my own personal experiences. She spoke of going to a friend’s house and having her friend’s father drive them to the shopping mall so that they could walk around and socialize or go see a movie. I found that this related very closely with my own experiences of being fifteen years old because it was always someone else’s parents driving my friends and I to the movies or to the mall.
Parent/Child relationships are very hard to establish among individuals. This particular relationship is very important for the child from birth because it helps the child to be able to understand moral and values of life that should be taught by the parent(s). In the short story “Teenage Wasteland”, Daisy (mother) fails to provide the proper love and care that should be given to her children. Daisy is an unfit parent that allows herself to manipulated by lacking self confidence, communication, and patience.