Essay on Chinese and American Ghosts (Woman Warrior)

Despite her mother using the term "ghost" to be vaguely insulting, it does not seem that way when Kingston uses this term for people. For example is in the chapter A Song for a Barbarian Reed Pipe. She labels her Negro friends as "black ghosts." When she labels gives them this name, it is not as if she is using this term in a derogatory manner. Since her mother has always referred to strangers as ghosts, she has picked up the same habit. In this context, it is as if she refers to her friends in an affectionate manner when she calls them "ghosts."

Dr. Gabor Mate, a Hungarian born Canadian physician, who is also a neurologist, psychiatrist, and psychologist, but who specializes in the study and treatment of addiction, reveals revolutionary evidence pertaining to addiction. In Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, Dr. Mate worked with patients suffering chronic drug addiction for 12 years. With 20 years of experience as a family practitioner, Dr. Mate is a renowned speaker and teacher throughout North America; sharing his extensive knowledge with diverse audiences including health care professionals and educators (Mate, About Dr. Mate, 2016). The Realm of Hungry Ghosts, Dr. Mate’s most recent best-selling book, illuminates the origins and causes of addiction. As Co-founder of Compassion for Addiction (a non-profit organization), Dr. Gabor Mate encourages a greater understanding; “addiction is the attempt of affected human beings to escape a profound discomfort with themselves and their world” (Mate, Compassion4Addiction, 2015). Drawing on cutting-edge science, Dr. Mate presents the world with a shocking discovery: “The source of addiction is not to be found in genes, but in the early childhood environment.” Therefore, Dr. Mate simply “calls for a more compassionate approach toward the addict.” (Mate, 2016) As cutting-edge science concludes addiction to be a mental health issue, rather than criminal behavior, the American legal system demonstrates a devastating disservice to its own society.

The big ghost is one of the first ghosts that we are introduced to first, he feels as if he is less sinful than the person who was the murderer. He is separated from God because of his self righteousness, the big ghost says to the murderer, “And what I don’t see is why I should be put below a murderer like you.’ The big ghost feels as if, “I’m not making pals with a murderer, let alone taking lessons from him. Made

     The focus of our group project is on Chinese Americans. We studied various aspects of their lives and the preservation of their culture in America. The Chinese American population is continually growing. In fact, in 1990, they were the largest group of Asians in the United States (Min 58). But living in America and adjusting to a new way of life is not easy. Many Chinese Americans have faced and continue to face much conflict between their Chinese and American identities. But many times, as they adapt to this new life, they are also able to preserve their Chinese culture and identity through various ways. We studied these things through the viewing of a movie called Joy Luck Club,

Ng stood as the Asian American viewpoint, Cisneros as the Mexican American, and Esquivel solely the Hispanic. These writers offer an alternative definition for how societies portray ghosts. Movies and novels in the Western society depict these entities as horrors and unnatural forces representing the devil and satanic worship, a few examples of the movies are: Sinister, The Conjuring, The Shining, and The Others. These three writers questioned everything. Not everyone holds the same definition of ghosts, but the most autonomic response in the Western culture, are the creatures depicted on Halloween. The ghosts that appeared in these novels are the authors way of commenting upon the conversation regarding the purpose of ghosts. Their stories have several things in common: the ghost characters in each novel (focusing on Lydia from Everything I Never Told You and the two other ghost characters from the other novels) are all female, they serve the purpose of warning, and appear almost as if they were summoned from another character(s) in distress. Each author implemented the ghosts in different ways, Cisneros used a ghost who strengthen her familial relationships after death. Ng made use of metaphorical ghosts, and Esquivel used a ghost with strained familial relationships both while living and dead to make her point stronger. Interestingly, each author kept the ghosts primarily among family

Ghosts can be created through several methods from mentality to death. The narrator in the story Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston has her own ghosts, as do I. Her ghosts are generated through the past before and after her birth, while my ghosts are simply people from my past, such as Andrew and Jordan. Maxine's and my ghosts share numerous similarities and differences, such as mysteriousness, regrets, and broken hearts/dreams, but they are ours to conquer. "I am telling on her...." (pg. 16) as Maxine and I can agree, we are revealing the ghosts to the world.

Growing up in America, the younger generation of course grew up with a more American lifestyle; “... but here [America] the children spoke English, which their parents didn’t seem to hear.” (Kingston 123). The lack of appreciation or understanding of traditional Chinese culture in Kingston’s regard can be credited to the fact she is both second generation and Chinese-American. Using ancient tales in a non-serious manner- for her own personal messages and to attract the attention of readers is not uncommon; “By the early twentieth century, the younger generation thought many of their family and Chinese traditions were old fashioned. As a result, many of the second generation found themselves struggling to blend the ideals and practices of two different worlds.” (-- 77). American and Chinese culture are largely unsimilar, so growing up in one or the other provides an unexplainable appreciation for that culture. Another example of the younger generation’s drift from traditional culture is a comic created by Gene Luen Yang which shows two, young students of an asian background. The one addresses the other in Chinese, asking a question in which the other responds with;

Ghosts - in any form - are far more prominent in Kingston's life than in ours. Perhaps this is because there are fantastic elements to the stories she tells, but it is difficult for we readers to separate fantasy and reality and we confuse the two. In some cases - such as with Brave Orchid's "Sitting Ghost", it never really becomes clear.

Knowing she cannot very well go up to her family members and ask explicitly about her aunt’s past, Kingston creates what she perceives as the way her aunt lived. Elaborate, complex sentences make up a fictitious life based solely on the Chinese tradition and how women were supposed to act. Knowing what her mother told her about her aunt, Kingston believes her aunt acted in a way entirely separate from the traditional way of living. Just as Kingston as a Chinese-American. These long sentences are used to go in depth for where tradition is dying in a person and

Maxine Kingston wrote The Woman Warrior: A Memoir of a Girlhood Amongst Ghosts as a non-fictional story that relates the common Chinese folktales (or “talk stories” as she calls them) she was familiar with from her youth combined with her own personal experiences as a Chinese-American. Each chapter is given to a separate woman who influenced Kingston’s life in a memorable way. The theme of silence and voice comes up frequently throughout the text, but is increasingly evident in the first page, as the novel opens up with the narrator speaking, “you must not tell anyone” (Kingston 1).

Her mother goes on saying, “...[They] began slaughtering our stock… the animals scream their deaths…Some of the faces stopped to peer at us… the hands flattened against the panes… and left red prints”(448). Kingston’s mother describes the cries of the animals as they die and how the villagers left blood handprints on the windows as they peered into it. Such ominous description of the raid would be effective in striking fear. The aunt committing adultery is a situation alone not at all acceptable in Kingston’s Chinese culture, but the consequences of her aunt’s mistake were blown out of proportion. Kingston begins to feel conflicted with her identity because in America, committing adultery does not create such calamity between the surrounding people but both her American and Chinese culture know that it is a shameful act. She feels confused because the act of adultery would be handled in a completely different way with different cultures.

Wilson brings forth many questions regarding ghosts, one importantly, “Where does the Ghost come from: Heaven, Hell, or Purgatory?” (53) II. Development a. Topic Sentence: The first section “Modern difficulties” slowly introduces Wilson’s main idea of his argument. i. Ghost is the hero of the play and that 550 out of 850 lies are concerned with him.

In the Elizabethan Era, the ghosts of the dead are regarded as a result of an abhorrent death of a person for the purpose of seeking vengeance (elizabethan-era). This can be corresponded with the initial act

As for the cultural explanation, many cultural factors in the context of exit caused the high academic achievement of Chinese Americans. First, the homeland cultures affect Chinese Americans a lot. For instance, from the Han Dynasty to the end of the Qing dynasty in the early 20th century, Chineses had to take the Chinese Civil Service Exam or Keju exam for the five studies: military strategy, civil law, revenue and taxation, agriculture, and geography. The exam was used to determine if a person was intellectually enough to become a government administrator or bureaucrat. Under the meritocracy system in China, the person who get the highest score in the exam would become an administrator or bureaucrat. Being an administrator or bureaucrat was

But not all spirits are roaming restlessly. In fact in Yu Kuang-hong’s article Making a Malefactor a Benefactor: Ghost Worship in Taiwan, he identifies “three major categories of supernatural spirits in Hokkien folk religion: gods, ancestors, and ghosts” (Kuang-hong, 1990, p. 39). Gods are believed to have once been mortals, and earned their status in the afterlife by their virtues in the previous one. Ancestors are passed family members who are regularly worshipped by their descendants. Ghosts are spirits disassociated with their relatives, and are believed to cause misfortune and illness. Unlike ancestors and gods who bring good fortune, “the living expect nothing from the ghosts, other than taking what is offered them, and merely want to be left alone” (Kuang-hong, 1990, p. 40). There are tales portraying the forms of ghosts in traditional folklore. As explained by The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Zen Buddhism by Helen Josephine Baroni, ghosts are described as “creatures with large bellies and needle-thin necks” and although they have “voracious appetites they cannot fill their bellies due to the narrowness of their throats” (Haroni, 2002, p. 106). This gruesome image is portrayed in Chinese myth because the ghosts are seen as being punished for their lack of virtue in their previous life. Their descendants have