Mauritian Creole Essays

  • Mauritius: A Multicultural Island

    860 Words  | 2 Pages

    neighbor Madagascar, and China. Under its European colonization, the Chinese came to start businesses while Africans as well as Indians were brought to support the labor forces of the newly forming island nation. Mauritius’s Creole population is quite large, with Indo-Mauritians forming 70% of the islands 1.2 million people population (Mauritius Views). Mauritius is a rather peaceful island, with no recorded racial or ethnic caused conflict in over ... ... middle of paper ... ...rather relaxed

  • Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    1261 Words  | 3 Pages

    never get what she wanted, which in turn caused her to take her own life. In the Creole culture, outward affection and expression were a common thing. Edna, being brought up in Kentucky, "was at first a little confused. . .by the Creole's gentle caress. She was not accustomed to an outward and spoken expression of affection, either in herself or in others," (Chopin 22). Robert knew that Edna was not of Creole background and that she might not take his flirting as simply that. Yet, he still

  • Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    1023 Words  | 3 Pages

    Kate Chopin's The Awakening Kate Chopin's novella The Awakening tells the story of Edna Pontellier, a woman who throughout the novella tries to find herself. Edna begins the story in the role of the typical mother-woman distinctive of Creole society but as the novelette furthers so does the distance she puts between herself and society. Edna's search for independence and a way to stray from society's rules and ways of life is depicted through symbolism with birds, clothing, and Edna's process of

  • Jamaican Patois

    4714 Words  | 10 Pages

    Jamaican Patois, otherwise known as Patwa, Afro. Jamaican, just plain Jamaican or, Creole, is a language that has been until quite recently referred to as"ungrammatical English."(Adams, 199 1, p . I 1) Creole languages are actually not unique to Jamaica, they are found on every continent although their speakers often do not realize what they are. The rest of the terms refer strictly to Jamaican Creole. Creoles are languages that usually form as the result of some human upheaval which makes it

  • Nancy Walker's Critique Feminist of Naturalist

    978 Words  | 2 Pages

    Naturalist], Walker states that Edna's downward spiraling life is caused by her inability to free herself from her Creole culture. Although it is true that the novel appears to embrace this idea, there are a multitude of moments where Chopin allows Edna to appear as a character who makes decisions for herself. In doing this, Chopin effectively illustrates a flaw in Walkers theory on Creole culture and naturalism, and reveals Edna's awkward and uncomfortable feelings towards a culture said to immense

  • The Life and Literary Work of Kate Chopin

    739 Words  | 2 Pages

    works of the late nineteenth century remain rare jewels and priceless gifts to the literary world today. Born Katherine O’Flaherty on February 8, 1851, in St. Louis, Chopin was the daughter of a prominent Irish merchant and an aristocratic French-Creole mother. Chopin’s roots in, and familiarity with, two distinctly different cultures were important on both a personal and creative level throughout her life. As a member of a slave-owning family and an elite social circle, Chopin was exposed to people

  • The History of the American Bottom

    3563 Words  | 8 Pages

    Bottom. They were a unique and special tribe, who were complex politically, religiously, and socially. They were also an independent people until French colonizers came to settle in the area. The French Creoles became the dominant population in the region, effecting trade and implementing French Creole culture in the region. The French would not be the last group trying to develop and profit from the American Bottom. When the United States gained control of the territory, it changed even further and

  • Colonialism in the Caribbean

    1562 Words  | 4 Pages

    as a Socio-Cultural Area addresses the current cultural Caribbean with an eye on the past. For example, when discussing the emergence of creole culture Mintz specifically points out that this was almost exclusive to the islands colonized by the Spanish. According to Mintz, the Hispanic Caribbean was "settled by Europeans who had come to stay and to become "creoles"; nowhere and at no time in the Hispanic islands did African slaves ever outnumber freeman of European origin" (Mintz 28). Therefore, contemporary

  • Controversial Views in Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    1210 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Controversial Views in Kate Chopin's The Awakening Kate Chopin's The Awakening is truly a novel that stands out from the rest. From the moment it was published, it has been caused women to examine their beliefs. The fact that The Awakening was shunned when first published, yet now taught in classrooms across the country is proof that The Awakening is full of rebellious and controversial ideas. One of the main themes explored in The Awakening is that of a woman's place in society. In that

  • Theme of Isolation in The Awakening

    785 Words  | 2 Pages

    and physical passion. The first form of self-expression Edna learns is the emotional language spoken by the Creole women. These "mother-women" of Grand Isle freely use language to express their frank emotions and illustrate the stories of their every-day lives. Edna is initially shocked by "their entire absence of prudery" but she later finds it liberating (Chopin 686). Her Creole friend Adele Ratignolle is the most influential in Edna's verbal liberation. They spend a day at the beach together

  • growaw Growth of Edna Pontellier in Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    648 Words  | 2 Pages

    she marries Leonce Pontellier, a Catholic and a Creole, and moves to Louisiana with him, her surroundings change a great deal. This makes her feel extremely uncomfortable and confused; she feels as though she has lost her identity along with a great deal of her happiness. In order to regain this identity and to try to find out who she truly is, Edna tries her hardest to conform to the Creole society. Though Edna tries extremely hard to accept this Creole society as her own and to become part of it in

  • What Are the Origins of Lunacy?

    1174 Words  | 3 Pages

    Sargasso Sea." Critica 2.2 (Fall 1990): 193-206. Erwin, Lee. "'Like in a Looking Glass': History and Narrative in Wide Sargasso Sea." Novel 22.2 (1989): 207-16 Gregg, Veronica Marie. Jean Rhys' Historical Imagination: Reading and Writing the Creole. : North Carolina Press, 1995. Rhys, Jean. Wide Sargasso Sea, A Norton Critical Edition. (background and criticism), ed. By Judith L. Raiskin New York: W.W. Norton, 1999. Thomas, Sue. The Worlding of Jean Rhys. Westport, Conn. : Greenwood

  • feminaw Suicide as the Only Alternative for Edna Pontellier in The Awakening

    945 Words  | 2 Pages

    Edna Pontellier could not have what she wanted.  There are many arguments about Edna being selfish for ending her life and leaving her children behind.  "Edna does indeed dread 'being reduced to her biological function, 'but this is what the Creole culture does to women , as Priscilla Leder suggests" (Simons).   She could not offer the love that children deserve from a parent.  I do not feel that she was selfish, she did not love her children the way a mother-woman would.  A mother-woman is

  • A Dream Deferred

    1100 Words  | 3 Pages

    Orleans, she watches as her mother is humiliated by a train's white, racist conductor; she watches the indignity of her mother's having to squat in an open field to urinate while white train passengers gaze; and she watches her mother's shame at her own Creole mother's libidinous lifestyle. Her mother's submissiveness and humiliation evokes a fear, an anger, and an energy in Nel. Her emotions intensify as she makes a declaration to never be her mother, to never compromise her individuality, "I'm me. I'm

  • Charlotte Bronte's Jane eyre and Jean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea

    3360 Words  | 7 Pages

    able to personally define, with any certainty, where one is culturally or geographically located. For Jean Rhys, Jane Eyre depicted representations of a Creole woman and West Indian history which she knew to be inaccurate. ?Bertha Mason is mad; and she came from a mad family; idiots and maniacs through three generations. Her mother, the Creole, was both a madwoman and a drunkard!? She is further described as having a ?discoloured face?, ?a savage face? with ?fearful blackened inflation? of the

  • Sexual Fulfillment in Chopin's Awakening

    886 Words  | 2 Pages

    feels the urge to cast off the veil society burdens her with and live as she chooses to. The driving factor behind her desire to awaken is her lack of sexual fulfillment. She lives her life following conduct becoming of a woman who marries into the Creole elite of New Orleans. While her husband, Léonce, adores her, she does not truly love him and their relationship appears platonic. Robert, a young paramour, woos Edna and she finds herself with wants and desires. Edna later experiments with a known

  • Comparison between Adele Ratignolle and Mademoiselle Reisz

    717 Words  | 2 Pages

    Awakening, Chopin creates two opposing forces Adele Ratignolle and Mademoiselle Reisz for her best friends that not only contrast each other but also represent different genres of women in Creole society. Adele Rataignolle serves as not only the epitome of the nineteenth-century woman but as Chopin's model of the perfect Creole "mother-woman". Adele's gold spun hair, sapphire blue eyes, and crimson lips made her strikingly beautiful even though she was beginning to grow a bit stout. A devoted wife and mother

  • Kate Chopin's Writing

    2343 Words  | 5 Pages

    Interviews). Kate Chopin published At Fault, her first novel, in 1890 and The Awakening, her last novel, in 1898 (Guilds 924). During these years Chopin wrote numerous other works and most, like At Fault and The Awakening, centered around upper-middle class Creole or French women involved in womanly uncertainties; such as, extramarital affairs, acceptable behavior in society for females, duties as a wife, responsibilities as a mother, and religious beliefs. Chopin was an extraordinary woman, and no indication

  • Use of Nature in Chopin's Awakening and Langston Hughes' Poems

    2013 Words  | 5 Pages

    powerful symbol that represents the struggle of the human soul towards freedom, the anguish of that struggle, and the joy when that freedom is finally reached. In The Awakening, the protagonist Edna Pontellier undergoes a metamorphosis. She lives in Creole society, a society that restricts sexuality, especially for women of the time. Edna is bound by the confines of a loveless marriage, unfulfilled, unhappy, and closed in like a caged bird. During her summer at Grand Isle she is confronted with herself

  • Comparing Edna Pontellier and Adele in Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    846 Words  | 2 Pages

    in The Awakening In The Awakening by Kate Chopin, the setting is in the late 1800s on Grand Isle in Louisiana. The main character of the story is Edna Pontellier who is not a Creole. Other important characters are Adele Ratignolle, Mr. Ratgnolle, Robert Lebrun, and Leonce Pontellier who are all Creole's. In the Creole society the men are dominant. Seldom do the Creole's accept outsiders to their social circle, and women are expected to provide well-kept homes and have many children. Edna and Adele