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Baby No Eyes By Patricia Grace

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Baby No-Eyes: Kura Some of us go through tough experiences as children. In Patricia Grace’s novel Baby No-Eyes under the chapter of Kura, the reader gets to see how Gran Kura’s traumatic experience as a child is finally revealed after being held secret for sixty years. Throughout Kura, the reader is able to witness the many challenges that the characters face. These challenges range from the cultural situation in which the children live to the personal challenges that Kura herself faces when given the responsibility of taking care of her little cousin, Riripeti. The school that Kura, Riripeti, and the rest of the children attend is one that has been colonized by the English. At this school, the children’s native language of Maori, is banned on all school grounds; English, being the only acceptable language to be spoken. The Maori children are forced to forget their native Maori identity, learn and accept their given English names and ultimately assimilate under the current English ruling. Throughout several excerpts of the chapter, the reader is able to see clearly expressed distaste for the Maori language. An example of this would be such as when on page 157 when a grandfather is speaking to a child named Waana in the Maori language. The headmaster of the school is quoted with saying, “I’d like to remind you Mr.Williams that I don’t allow any of that language in my school or in these school grounds . . . Off you go and take your language with you. We’re not having any

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