Footnote to Youth

The poem "A Song of Changgan" is very poignant, as it starts with a bashful girl who does not even smile around her husband and ends with her almost heartbroken, as her husband is far away. The poem shows the different stages of the relationship of the speaker and her husband, and it is an excellent example of long-distance relationships before modern communication systems.

     Childhood is a time where children learn about the world around themselves. They see and experience many factors that influence their everyday lives, which help them grow stronger when they become adults. In 'Girl'; by Jamaica Kincaid and 'The Lesson'; by Toni Cade Bambara the characters within the stories learn valuable lesson with help them grow to become better individuals. In 'The Lesson'; the character of Sugar undergoes a realization that society does not treat everyone equally, that not every individual has the same opportunity and equality that they should have. In 'Girl'; the main character learns that she must be perceived as a woman and not as a slut, her mother brings to her

Li-Young Lee in this poem concentrated on memories that provide both joy and sadness as they allow us to recall the happy or sad moments with our loved ones as we prepare ourselves for future. Lee examine his emotional relationship to his father in the past with hoping that remembering all those moments will help him integrate those memories with his father into his own life. “Windblown, a rain-soaked bough shakes, showering the man and the boy. They shiver in delight, and the father lifts from his son’s cheek one green leaf fallen like a kiss.” Lee uses images in this poem to show the readers his idea about the memory rather than telling all at once because he thought this way has more emotional impact because

Through the mother, we see that dreaming may lead to a painful disappointment. The mother has an unrealistic image of her and her future husband as an idyllic, respectable and happy couple, which is not true in reality. “… avoiding the riotous amusements being beneath the dignity of so dignified couple”. She is trying to make an image of herself as an intelligent, domestic and interesting woman, which shows

China and Jeremy with a dream so big and suddenly this huge occurrence disaster in their life made the choice they regret for years to come. “I want to see our daughter’s grave.” That froze him inside. He tried to picture her—her now, China, the love of his life—and he couldn’t. What did she look like? What was her face like, her nose, her hair, her eyes and breasts and the slit between her legs? He drew a blank. There was no way to summon her the way she used to be or even the way she was in court, because all he could remember was the thing that had come out of her, four limbs and the equipment of a female, shoulders rigid and eyes shut tight, as if she were a mummy in a tomb. Jeremy nor China did not want the outcome of the situation. It was unexpected result of in fact this two couple never thought this could happen to them. The fact that they held in their mind a bright future both going to college and finishing what they started at high school, they did not have any alternatives beside

In her text Tseng uses the formal element of the text effectively to communicate her experience regarding ‘home’. Each stanza of her poem is formed with 2 lines: 1 print, and 1 italics. Tseng goes back and forth between the print text and the italics to communicate how she communicates her home to others, and how she remembers her own home. Through this action she seems to counteract her perception of her home between how she tells others and how she remembers. Tseng starts off the poem with a line that seems to give no importance to her birthplace, “My birthplace is incidental.”(Tseng) She then continues under in italics and state, “Never forget your Mother Country”(Tseng) which hints her true feelings towards her birthplace and reveals a sense of nostalgia. Throughout the poem she accepts the stereotypes that americans, and outsiders place on the chinese in print text. She simplifies her journey to United States, and life in United States and then she continues to reveal the truth behind the first statement. The poem is a constant battle between the facade she puts on, and the actual author behind the facade. In her poem she talks of her experiences and homeplaces as if they are of no importance in the print text, but you can see that in the italicized text that they are the foundation of who she is today. In the last three stanza of her poem Tseng discards the Print text and stresses her true experience of her hardships, and the journey. In these last texts she creates a very vivid images of couple of her nights on the boat that she was on to get to United States. The last lines of the poem shows that her journey was truly a life or death

The Young Lords started off as a gang in Chicago, until they transformed into a community based outreach program. All of the people that were in charge where teens and young adults. The young lords did what they thought was best on their part as well as for their community. Yes, on the path of doing the right thing they did break some rules and made noise to get their message across to the public. The group originally wanted to become their own claim and cry for independence. When in reality the group just wanted to pull away from the United States, but could not. In their 13 point program they wanted self-determination for their people (Puerto Ricans). They oppose on the Amerikkkan military, meaning that they do not want their young men to be involved in any war that the United States may go into. They did not just want self-determination for their own, but for other Latino groups and they asked for the liberation of the third world people and countries. They also asked to have a proper education and with that they wanted their education to have their own culture and the Spanish language. The young lords stood for their people and other people of color. They knew that unity with themselves and others was important in order for them to make any

“The Perpetual Adolescent” is an observational piece by Joseph Epstein. He suggests that modern adult acts much more childish than the previous generations of middle aged people. A big part of acting like a younger person is dressing like a younger person. According to Epstein, the dressed down adult is the immature adult, which in turn leads to many adults trying to copy the modern and hip youth culture. This in turn created more relaxed environments across all career fields, leaving less “true” adults. He feels that American now want to stay young forever instead of maturing into the adults of their parent's generations. Epstein believes that this mentality is flawed, leaving the people in positions of power striving

There are No Children Here; by Alex Kotlowitz is a story about two brothers and their mother, Pharaoh, Lafayette and LaJoe Rivers and them growing up in the late 1980's in the (HHH) Henry Horner Homes, a housing project in Chicago. In the story the boys try to retain their youthfulness while they see constant gang violence, death of people close to them and their brother is in jail and their dad is struggling with drug addiction.

The relationship between a father and his son is an essential and unique one, creating both memories and chances for many life lessons., it is quite common for a son to follow in his father’s footsteps. In the poem, “a story” by Li-Young lee, the poet uses point of view, structure, as well as diction to display the complexity of the relationship between a father and his son caused by the maturing of the son and the father’s fear of losing his son.

Childhood is a time where children learn about the world around themselves. They see and experience many factors that influence their everyday lives, which help them grow stronger when they become adults. In “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid and “The Lesson” by Toni Cade Bambara the characters within the stories learn valuable lesson with help them grow to become better individuals. In “The Lesson” the character of Sugar undergoes a realization that society does not treat everyone equally, that not every individual has the same opportunity and equality that they should have. In “Girl” the main character learns that she must be perceived as a woman and not as a slut, her

The king at last remembered Talia and went back to her house to see if the lovely lady was perhaps still asleep. Driven by lust, he told his wife he was going hunting. Once he entered Talia’s house, he saw the girl and the two toddlers and told her who he was and what had happened. As they continued speaking to one another, their friendship and love grew. When it was time for him to leave again, he promised her he would come back soon and knew he was madly in love. He dreamt of the girl and of his children often and called their names in his sleep. The queen was enraged by hearing him call out these strange names and became suspicious. She told the king’s secretary to look for Sun. Moon and Talia. If he would betray his king, he would get all the money he wanted, but if he didn’t, she would have him killed. The poor man decided that his life was more valuable than his loyalty and so he told the queen what the king had told him in confidence.

Ninh’s novel jumps between flashbacks of the war and Kien’s love affairs, in particular one with his childhood sweetheart Phuong. Ninh uses the reoccurring theme of Kien’s love, or loss of love, as a metaphor for the impact the war had on the Vietnamese people. The original title of the novel is actually The Destiny of Love. Kien likens the war to a soldiers love saying, “The sorrow of war inside a soldier’s heart was in a strange way similar to the sorrow of love. It was a kind of nostalgia…It was a sadness, a missing, a pain which could send one soaring back into the past” (Ninh, 94). Kien does find himself often reminiscing of his young innocent love with Phuong. The end of the novel focuses

Since these wives were basically prostitutes under the guise of marriage, many people ignored the “taboo” and “deviant” nature of this version sex industry because it was difficult to understand. Vu Trong Phung not only clarified the structure of these marriages but also brought to light the dangers to the women. While highlighting the dangers, he also criticizes his own culture for essentially providing no other options for these women and then shunning them when they had enough (14). He even further objected to the condemnation of prostitutes by equivocating marrying for anything other than love was like receiving a life-long prostitute (14). By having these eccentric stories and radical beliefs, Vu Trong Phung was able to call attention to a subject no one wanted to talk about – let alone read

The intricate nature of youth means that while some argue it is a universal stage of life, it is seen by many as a formation of sociocultural elements. Social construction can be defined as something that has been shaped by the values, interests or practices of a culture or society and this is evident in the youth demographic through its revolution in recent years. The markings of youth are social in formulation; highlighting the way in which young people have been influenced by differing trends and movements. Youth is a transitional phase, its age bracket extending and blurring; transcending global divides and traditions. Thus, it is the social context that surrounds youth which suggests that it is not a universal stage of life. Ultimately, the idea of youth when viewed in a historical and cultural context as well as in relation to other socially influenced concepts such as adulthood, can be observed as a social construction.