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Connectivity and its discontents summary
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The bond that exists among different generations is a permanent relation that can’t ever be destroyed. There is a certain metaphysical connection that holds us all together. Our past ancestors greatly determine our personalities, appearances, opinions; they influence our very existence. Some people feel very proud of their culture and ancestors, while others are ashamed of past generations and try to hide their relation with them. However, the connectivity between all generations remains the same for all, because the people before us shape our world and who we are. From older generations we learn the most important things in life, like the true value of family. This strong relation between generations is displayed in “The Treasure of Lemon Brown” by Walter Dean Myers and “The Medicine Bag” by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve. Both stories have central characters that initially reject their relatives because they are ashamed or upset with them only to discover how vital their relations with them actually are. Many things bring us closer to previous and future generations, such as lessons and memories.
Lessons given by one generation to the next are a huge factor in connecting generations. Lessons are what shape our thoughts and opinions. As Margaret Thatcher said, “Watch your thoughts for they become words. Watch your words for they become actions. Watch your actions for they become habits. Watch your habits, for they become your character. And watch your character, for it becomes your destiny! What we think we become.” In other words, the lessons passed on from generation to generation often determine who we are. In “The Medicine Bag” Martin is initially embarrassed by his grandfather. When his grandpa pays him family a visit, Martin ...
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...Lemon Brown’s memories of his son and of his harmonica that he shares with Greg connect multiple generations. Also, after he heard about Lemon Brown’s memories Greg’s perspective about his father changes. Memories bring both Martin and Greg closer to previous generations, and they bring the past and present together.
There is and always will be a connection between generations, and it can never be broken. The lessons given by past relatives will always influence our ideas, actions, and history. Ultimately, they will impact future generations as well. Memories will always serve as a bridge between the past and present. Shared memories ensure that the past is never forgotten, and that the past is always a part of our lives in the present. The lessons and memories passed on from generation to generation permanently connect all past, present, and future generations.
In Thomas King's short story "Borders," a Blackfoot mother struggles with maintaining her cultural heritage under the pressure of two dominating nations. Storytelling is important, both for the mother and for the dominant White society. Stories are used to maintain and pass on cultural information and customs from one generation to another. Furthermore, stories can be used both positively and negatively. They can trap individuals into certain ways of thinking, but they can also act as catalysts that drive social change within society.
In a world where survival is the most important aspect of everyday life, it becomes common knowledge that your family alone will not be enough to save you from the death and destruction. By looking at the parallels within people’s relationships in Octavia Butler’s Parable of Talents, you can see that the chosen communities and families are stronger than the blood ones; this is important because the worlds depicted in dystopian novels are closer than generally thought so it is necessary to prepare oneself to create these chosen bonds. The three strongest relationships that parallel this claim are: Olamina and Larkin verses Olamina and Earthseed, Olamina and Marc verses Marc and Christian America, and finally, Larkin and Marc verses Larkin and
So all the memories everyone had from the past has now created a world that is today, enjoyable. “Call me the Giver.” (Lowry 110). Quoted by the only old man who holds all the memories from years and years of the past to give to the new Receiver, which is Jonas. It is not just the happiness of past memories holding on throughout lives. But pain is the biggest part of memory that anyone will have to endure. It is not just the mental pain we suffer through, it also could have a pain in the physical body and mind that the elderly man had to be tortured with throughout his life. Lois Lowry is a powerful writer inflicting and teaching in the minds of all and how most important and delicate memory is in the novel, The Giver, and how it must not be forgotten or fade away as it will determine your future and fill the gaps of mistakes individuals have
“I’m never going to act like my mother!” These words are increasingly common and yet unavoidable. Why is it that as children, we are able to point out every flaw in our parents, but as we grow up, we recognize that we are repeating the same mistakes we observed? The answer is generational curses: un-cleansed iniquities that increase in strength from one generation to the next, affecting the members of that family and all who come into relationship with that family (Hickey 13). Marilyn Hickey, a Christian author, explains how this biblically rooted cycle is never ending when she says, “Each generation adds to the overall iniquity, further weakening the resistance of the next generation to sin” (21, 22). In other words, if your parents mess up you are now susceptible to making the same mistakes, and are most likely going to pass those mistakes to your children. In The Absolute True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Sherman Alexie shows the beauty of hope in the presence of a generational curse. Even though the elders are the ones who produce the curses, they are also the ones who attempt to break Junior from their bond forming mistakes. The curses that Arnold’s elders imprint on him lead him to break out of his cultural bonds and improve himself as a developing young man.
All through time, successive generations have rebelled against the values and traditions of their elders. In all countries, including China, new generations have sought to find a different path than that of their past leaders. Traditional values become outdated and are replaced with what the younger society deems as significant. Family concentrates on this very subject. In the novel, three brothers struggle against the outdated Confucian values of their elders. Alike in their dislike of the traditional Confucian system of their grandfather, yet very different in their interactions with him and others, begin to reach beyond the ancient values of Confucianism and strive for a breath of freedom. Their struggles against the old values lead to pain, suffering and eventually achievement for the three of them, however at a harsh price for two brothers.
Therefore, the younger generations obtain some sense of sympathy toward their ancestors and dreams that were to be fulfilled in The United States. American-born children, ostensibly, are liberated from their parents‟ past. Still, they are obsessed dramatically about their ancestral land. They are haunted by past, and the mystery associated with it; a mysterious past that existed only in the memories of their parents. Intelligently, Tan has used this strategy to narrate her stories. All of Tan‟s novels have parallel narratives, one related to the past which is retold by mothers, and in one case a step sister who has come back from China; and the other is associated with the present stories of daughters about the cultural conflicts and alienation, they feel regarding the ancestral heritage of their home which has been transmitted to them by means of past memories. The point is that storytelling plays an essential position in creation of a new, more Chinese identity, in contrast to the previous American one, McDaniels (2004) states that, Basically, both versions of the stories, mother‟s and daughter‟s are necessary for revealing the complete story, including the painful secrets, whether the pain is alleviated or just changes its context. Both mothers and daughters need to tell their versions and listen to the others‟ versions in order to have all the information necessary to arrange their
Any story that begins with a mother fantasizing about reuniting with her daughter on T. V talk show is going to have something to tell us about their family. Probably a lot to tell us in fact. As the narrator herself points out, though, there’s a lot that television wouldn’t be able to show the family members and their complex relationships to one another in this story. The conflict, in fact, concerns competing ideas about what tradition (or heritage) even means. In a classic rock song, the Rolling Stones sing, “you can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you might find you get what you need.” In this paper, I’m going to relate this quote to my own personal experiences. I’m going to closely analyze the two sisters, Maggie,
Throughout the centuries, regardless of race or age, there have been dilemmas that identify a family’s thru union. In “Hangzhou” (1925), author Lang Samantha Chang illustrates the story of a Japanese family whose mother is trapped in her beliefs. While Alice Walker in her story “Everyday Use” (1944) presents the readers with an African American family whose dilemma is mainly revolving around Dee’s ego, the narrator’s daughter. Although exibiting different ethnicity, the reader should meditate that both families commonly share the attachment of a legacy, a tradition and the adaptation to a new generation.
In John Connolly’s novel, The Book of Lost Things, he writes, “for in every adult there dwells the child that was, and in every child there lies the adult that will be”. Does one’s childhood truly have an effect on the person one someday becomes? In Jeannette Walls’ memoir The Glass Castle and Khaled Hosseini’s novel The Kite Runner, this question is tackled through the recounting of Jeannette and Amir’s childhoods from the perspectives of their older, more developed selves. In the novels, an emphasis is placed on the dynamics of the relationships Jeannette and Amir have with their fathers while growing up, and the effects that these relations have on the people they each become. The environment to which they are both exposed as children is also described, and proves to have an influence on the characteristics of Jeannette and Amir’s adult personalities. Finally, through the journeys of other people in Jeannette and Amir’s lives, it is demonstrated that the sustainment of traumatic experiences as a child also has a large influence on the development of one’s character while become an adult. Therefore, through the analysis of the effects of these factors on various characters’ development, it is proven that the experiences and realities that one endures as a child ultimately shape one’s identity in the future.
I have found my connection to my ancestors. It is neither language, nor country, nor family title. For more than three centuries, my predecessors have been striving, yearning, and devoting their lives in the hope of achieving something better for themselves and for future generations. To this day, it has not been realized. I plan to rectify that.
The genogram provided me an opportunity review my relationships with my immediate and extended families. The theory I would use with my family would be Reality Therapy because of the cognitive distortion we possessed going up in the household. Despite the negative cultural influences my parents were exposed to growing up. Corey (2015) discussed how individuals are not the cause for a particular family dysfunction. The cumulative effect of parents cultural experiences prohibited them from trusting Caucasians. My father was born in lady Island South Carolina and my mother was from Haskell Oklahoma a raised on a Native American reservation. Both were abandoned by their maternal parents. Both of their mothers died at a very young age. However, their father’s relationships were sporadic. I never met my dad’s father (Joe) and I visited my mother’s father (Calvin) a few times before his death.
The family's personal encounters with the destructive nature of the traditional family have forced them to think in modern ways so they will not follow the same destructive path that they've seen so many before them get lost on. In this new age struggle for happiness within the Kao family a cultural barrier is constructed between the modern youth and the traditional adults with Chueh-hsin teeter tottering on the edge, lost between them both. While the traditional family seems to be cracking and falling apart much like an iceberg in warm ocean waters, the bond between Chueh-min, Chueh-hui, Chin and their friends becomes as strong as the ocean itself.
Having inherited the myth of ugliness and unworthiness, the characters throughout the story, with the exception of the MacTeer family, will not only allow this to happen, but will instill this in their children to be passed on to the next generation. Beauty precedes love, the grownups seem to say, and only a few possess beauty, so they remain unloved and unworthy. Throughout the novel, the convictions of sons and daughters are the same as their fathers and mothers. Their failures and accomplishments are transferred to their children and to future generations.
This would in turn create a bond between parent and child, and such memories are shared
He was calling him upstairs to show him something. As he entered the room, Grandpa opened the door of his cupboard. There were uncountable boxes of gifts inside. “Is there somebody’s birthday today?” he asked. “No, I used to keep a present in this cupboard every year, on your birthday” Grandpa replied. “We celebrated your first birthday together, and after that I used to miss you a lot”, “As you are here now, I want you to take these gifts back to your house” He added further. He was speechless; he tightly hugged his Grandpa, with tears in his eyes. He was feeling ashamed of thinking that he will have an awful time there. He had no clue that every one of these years, he was actually ignoring the love and affection they had for him, not the “boring” relatives. According to Jane Howard, “Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need