A Passage To India by E.M. Forster

Sherman Alexie is a Native American man who is well known for his novels and short stories based on his experiences as a member of many different Native American tribes. In his short story “Indian Education”, Alexie details the struggles with bullying and discrimination one Native American boy went through during his time in school. Although “Indian Education” is written differently from other short stories it still conveys a solid theme and has a well written plot. Alexie’s style is also a benefit to the reader as they make their way through grade school with the main character, Victor.

Projections that have been made about how today’s society and culture will look in the coming years, decades, and centuries, all have yet to be seen in how valid they are. If you look in any sort of media: television, social media, or radio/music, you will see people giving their interpretations of what will become of our world down the road. Yet, few people look to see how our the current state of culture and society reflect the projections made by people in previous years, decades, and centuries. In looking at the visions of the future presented by both novelas, The Time Machine by H.G. Wells, and The Machine Stops by E.M. Forster, each story presents aspects of society that prominently appear today. Written during the Industrial Revolution, a time where technology and human innovation was at one of its highest points in recent history, both stories explore the possible effects of the machinery that was becoming evermore present. Both authors present aspects such as omnipotent technology, decaying human independence, and destruction of real communication, to create the artistic statement that complacency is rising within the human race, and that complacency will eventually lead to the fall of mankind. In both stories, the authors speak against human complacency and deference to technology, warning that it will lead to the creation of weaker people and society that will ultimately destroy the human race, yet that complacency is present in today’s culture and due to the

The reader gets a rare and exotic understanding of a totally foreign and ancient culture experiencing the growing pains of colonial expansion during the British domination

For this month’s book report I read a book called ‘The Indian in the Cupboard’ by Lynne Reid Banks. This book was about a boy named Omri and his small Indian toy.

She explains her thesis by stating “Others who write stories of migration often talk of arrival at a new place as a loss of communal memory and the erosion of an original culture. I want to talk of arrival as a gain,” (360). The key points of the text include Mukherjee describing her transition between Calcutta and the United States, and what it means to be and American and how culture influences that aspect. The information in the text is significant; the people of America are a part of a melting pot, sometimes it is hard for them to find the distinction between American culture and their own. The information in Mukherjee’s story is clear and specific, unbiased, and is relevant to the purpose of the story. I believe Mukherjee has achieved her purpose of informing her audience about cultural differences; she presents certain strengths and weaknesses within the text.

The next idea that Sherman Alexie answers is what is like to be an Indian Man in the short story “An Indian Education” it seems as if to be an Indian man is to be caught between two worlds and sometimes picking one over the other. For example, the passage on page 176 states the following: “But on the day I leaned through the basement window of the HUD house and kissed the white girl, I felt the good-byes I was saying to my entire tribe” (176). For the narrator of that section he felt like had to give up the Indian part of him because of kissing the white. He felt he disappointed his people and they would never for give him for it. He felt as if his tribe would see him as ‘sell out’. There is also a question of did he view himself the same way. The narrator continues state “After that, no one spoke to me for another five hundred years” (177). Sherman Alexie allow the narrator to end that section with a Hyperbole for added meaning. While we know the narrator was not alive for five hundred years, but it could have felt that way for him. He could have thought that everyone hated him or saw him in a negative light. “Amusement” has great examples of how the main character thinks what is like to be an Indian Man.

A breath of fresh air is the first book written by Amulya Malladi. In 1984, when she was nine years old, her father was posted in the city of Bhopal. On the third of December, 1983 the city suffered The Bhopal Gas Tragedy that killed many people. When this gas tragedy occurred, she along with her family was staying at the Army Center which was a few kilometers away from the plant. Due to the wind that blew in a direction opposite to theirs, they remained unaffected by the gas leak. In the last half of the year 1984, she faced the Assassination of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi that led the country’s division in the name of religion and made her come to terms with the finality of death.

Kim gives a vivid picture of the complexities in India under British rule. It shows the life of the bazaar mystics, of the natives, of the British military. There is a great deal of action and movement, for Kipling's vast canvas painted in full detail. The dialogue in the novel makes use of Indian phrases translated by the author, they give the flavor of native speech in India. They are also touches of the native behavior and shrewdness.

This story starts off in the streets of England. The main character is named Samuel Collier. He's caught when he tries to steal his mothers locket from a pawn shop. The person who catches him brings him to the ship yard to join the expedition to America. His capturer says to Captain John Smith that he is a hard worker so he would be good to take on the trip.

A person’s heritage and cultural identity may be lost when moving to a new country where the culture is different and other cultures are not easily accepted. In the short story “Hindus”, Bharati Mukherjee uses setting, characters and the plot to discuss what it is like to lose your cultural identity while being a visible minority in America. Mukherjee uses the plot to describe the events that take place in the main characters life that lead her to realize how different the culture and life is in the America’s. She also uses the characters as a way of demonstrating how moving away from one’s culture and heritage can change a person’s perspective and ways of thinking. Mukerjee also uses setting in her story to identity the physical differences in culture between living in India and America. Alike the setting and characters, the plot helps describe the loss of culture with a sequence of events.

In first few scenes of the film, the man who befriended Ashoke Ganguli in the train said words that marked in Ashoke’s mind after the dreadful accident. The man asked Ashoke if he ever had the chance to see the world, referring to England and America. He also mentioned his travel in England and pertained to it as dreamlike experience, away from the unclean landscape of India. Then, he advised Ashoke that he must go out of Indian and conquer the world while he’s still young. After his survival from the accident, Ashoke went to America, following the man’s advice. The scene in the train affirms to the binary schema between Indians and Americans, their perception of higher value of “the one” over “the other”.

Mukherjee uses contrasting diction to emphasize the difference of experiences the sisters had on immigration and the sacrifices they had along the way when faced with the American culture. For example, Mukherjee’s use of “maintain” and “self-invention” are contradictory to each other, but in the context “maintain” refers to her sister Mira and “self-invention” is directed to Mukherjee herself. In Mira’s case, she is very attached to her Indian culture and stresses about not letting the American culture take that away from her. The author’s purpose was to highlight the tenacious mentality Mira has on her culture. In contrast, Mukherjee's use of “self-invention” regards to her loosening her strict hold of Indian culture; the exact opposite

Impact of British Colonization Exposed in A Small Place, A Passage to India, and Robinson Crusoe

A Passage To India by E. M. Forster is a rich, postcolonial novel delving into the possibility of sustaining a personal friendship between an English person and an "Indian" person. This topic is being discussed in the beginning of the novel at the home of Hamidullah, "... they were discussing as to whether or no(t) it is possible to be friends with an Englishman. Mahmoud Ali argued that it was not, Hamidullah disagreed, but with so many reservations..." (Forster 7) Aziz, who the novel centers around, has the disposition to just shut them out and ignore them and all will be jolly. Of course, later, we find Aziz does not shut them out and rather

E.M. Forster’s classic novel “A Passage to India” tells the story of a young doctor, Dr. Aziz, and his interactions with the British citizens who are residing in India during the time of the British Raj. Throughout the novel, the reader gets many different viewpoints on the people and the culture of India during this point in history. The reader sees through the eyes of the Indian people primarily through the character of Dr. Aziz, and the perceptions of the British through the characters of Mr. Fielding, Adela Quested, and Mrs. Moore. Through the different characters, and their differing viewpoints, the reader can see that Forster was creating a work that expressed a criticism that he held of the behavior of the British towards their Indian subjects.