Jamaica Kincaid

Kincaid’s choice to separate pieces of advice by semicolons instead of full-stop periods lends the piece a sense of urgency, almost as if the mother is trying to impart all of her knowledge to her daughter as quickly as possible. However, this often makes the mother’s words come across tersely, and the their relationship seems strained at best. The daughter is allowed very little input overall; one of her sentences comes across defensively, as she denies her mother’s accusations that she is singing provocative music in Sunday school, and the other is posed as an innocent question which receives an aggressive answer. The mother’s main concern seems to be that her daughter is turning into a “slut”, and because of this apparent fear, she can be argumentative and tense towards her daughter. However, near the end of the piece, some of the advice seems to take a softer turn. The mother gives her daughter advice about love, and says, “don’t feel too bad about giving up” (1), which is much gentler than many previous sentiments. She even gives advice about “how to spit up in the air if you feel like it” (1) and how to move away; this reads much more like play than work, and almost gives a sense of playfulness between the mother and daughter, practicing a useless but entertaining trick. However, by the end, the mood turns again, as the girl’s innocent question provokes an angry answer: “you mean to say that after all you are really going to be the kind of woman who the baker won’t let near the bread?” (1). While there may have been some progress in the mother-daughter relationship, it is ultimately returned to the same frustrated and almost resentful

The next stand out examples are revealed in lines such as “and this way they won't recognize immediately the slut I have warned you against becoming” and “this is how to make a good medicine to throw away a child before it even becomes a child.” So the mother is saying that she knows that the girl is being sexually promiscuous and that such an inclination is shameful; the latter references abortion and allows the daughter only one choice as to the fate of the fetus she carries disregarding the daughter's own feelings and choices as relevant issues, instead holding society's ideals as the only respectable choices the daughter can make. The final lines of the story take a more condescending tone when the girl says “but what if the baker wont let me feel the bread?” (Kincaid 157) and the mother retorts “ you mean to tell me that after all you are really going to be the kind of women who the baker wont let near the bread?” as if to say that after that whole lecture the daughter is still going to continue down her path of promiscutity and become an outcast of society for doing what is not socially

In the short story “Girl”, by Jamaica Kincaid is told from the perspective of two different people. There is a bonding relationship that is happening between the two people in this short story. The mother seems to be the main character in this essay uses a very strict tone to her daughter. The daughter is being told about how to do things in her life the correct way. The daughter barely speaks during this essay, she is doing more analyzing than arguing with her mother. When the mother gives the daughter advise she was trying to give her words of wisdom. But, at the same time, some of the ideas the mother gave to her child was offensive like “slut”. The mother has different perspectives throughout this essay with a lot of different

The narration of the mother lecturing her daughter with commanding diction leads to the theme of women conforming to domesticity and if they don’t conform then they will lead a life of promiscuity that will affect the way people perceive them. Women in the past believed that a woman’s role was that of a domesticated housewife. The narration of the third point of view in this story and the commanding diction of it places an importance in the reinforcement of this idea, that if a woman doesn’t follow social norms, she will eventually turn to a “slut” one that her family will be ashamed of. She must set the table for lunch and for breakfast that is “how to behave in the presence of men who don’t know [her] very well, and that it the way they won’t recognize immediately the slut that [the mother has] warned her against becoming.”(Kincaid 485) through her commanding diction, the mother is telling her daughter how to set a table, how to cook, she

Despite being looked at in a certain way, Women are being portrayed as “going exactly where their mothers and grandmothers have already ‘been’: into sexual bondage at the hands of a male ‘Friend’” (Christle 1). This is showing how even though women are changing the way society works, some people still want it to be the same. In the story Connie’s mom wanted Connie to be like her and her sister, just the average, not overly pretty looking lady. Some people think that “women have been silenced,” (Spelman and Lugones 574) but Connie had other ideas, she wanted to be different from them. She was constantly looking at herself in the mirror and thinking about what others were thinking about her. When she went out, she would always wear nice clothes that would get her noticed. Looking through a feminist lens one can conclude that Connie’s family sees women now as they always were.

In Kincaid’s, “Girl”, the protagonist is the young daughter of a single mother. This “girl” is constantly being badgered by the mother to act like a proper young lady. It is quoted, “on Sundays try to walk like a lady and not like the slut you are so bent on becoming” (Kincaid, 10). In saying this, the mother is automatically assuming that her daughter is going down a promiscuous route and has little hope of becoming a respectable woman. Being that the daughter is still young, what the mother said seems to be a bit harsh. By calling the daughter a “slut”, she might be making her daughter feel worthless and not feel as though she is able to change into a suitable young lady.

In Jamaica Kincaid’s story, Girl, a mother is talking to her daughter about all the proper things she must do to be considered a good girl to her family and to the public, and when she grows up, a proper lady. She must follow the rules that are given to her by her own mother and by society. The mother also teaches the daughter how to act when things don’t go her way. She is told that along with being a proper lady, she must also be able to get what she wants and be independent. This story was written in the late 1970’s and gender roles, for women, back then were not being “followed” because women wanted equal opportunities (Women In the Workforce). “Gender stereotypes are beliefs regarding the traits and behavioral characteristics given to individuals on the basis of their gender” (Deuhr). This essay will discuss the gender roles that were given to women in the story, during the late 70’s, and in today’s society.

The main tension in the story describes how the mother is depreciating her own daughter by calling her a slut just based on the way she is acting currently: “this is how to hem a dress when you see the hem coming down and so to prevent yourself from looking like the slut I know you are so bent on becoming” (320). The views of both characters create conflict because the young girl is being reprimanded for what she could do in the future and the mother is constantly barking out multiple directions. Also, Kincaid creates tension by seemingly dividing women into two divisions, imperfect and appropriate societally, to show that you must abide by the rules and ideas of society to be a ‘proper’

The mother believes that there are only two types of women in society; the respectable women and the “sluts”. It is generation traditions were the mother believes that a woman who has domestic knowledge will have a productive life, and receive respect from family and society. The mother mentions a numerous of instructions for her daughter to follow. Such as, wash clothes, cook, sweep, sew, and iron. She has an idea that becoming a household woman will bring power and prestige; she also believes that by keeping busy the women will keep away from temptation.

The mother knows that adolescence changes the thoughts of the child and wants to guide her to make positive choices. This is expressed when the mother tells the daughter, “on Sundays try to walk like a lady and not like the slut you are so bent on becoming” (Kincaid 96). This statement is shocking to the reader and is ironic because the mother says the daughter will become a slut but means that she will be viewed a sexual object by men. The mother’s intention is to bring the daughters physical changes to light, so that she can have a better understanding of the way society, especially males, will be viewing her. The changes that are happening to a young girl, will lead to the prospect of

It conveys the rules and advice a mother gave to her daughter while she was growing up. Although it seems like an actual conversation, it is what Daughter remembers Mother telling her. Thought the story Mother is constantly giving orders to Daughter about how to be a young lady, and how to conduct herself around different type of people. Very often Mother refers to Daughter's behavior as the way a slut would act. Despite Mother's constant dialogue, Daughter replies very seldom to defend the accusations Mother has made of her, creating conflict between the two.

Girl, a narrative written by Jamaica Kincaid, is a short story written in a dialogue style and stream of consciousness narration. The speaker is an authoritative female figure who teaches a girl about traditional living and the obligations of a girl to society. The narrative is basically one large sentence. Its ideas are separated by semicolons instead of the usual periods.

The narrator of the story was a girl who wanted to be able to do what boys did, she didn’t like staying in the house doing chores she wanted to be outside working with her dad. “The word girl had formerly seemed to me innocent and unburdened like the word child; now it appeared that it was no such thing. A girl was not, as I had supposed, simply what I was; it was what I had to become. It was a definition, always touched with emphasis, with reproach and disappointment.” In this line the narrator realizes that being a girl had a different meaning in the society where she lives. “My grandmother came to stay with us for a few weeks and I heard other things. "Girls don't slam doors like that." "Girls keep their knees together when they sit down." And worse still, when I asked some questions, "That's none of girls’ business." I continued to slam the doors and sit as awkwardly as possible, thinking that by such measures I kept myself free.” The narrator refused to become the stereotypical girl, but at the end she changes and becomes the stereotypical women that society

Jamaica Kincaid wrote a short story called “Girl” that had many influential meanings to it. She spoke with honesty and with a format that was eye opening and different from others. She made the girl come to life by allowing the mind to fill in the blanks for anything she left out. Kincaid also wrote in a way that made each time reading it, a new thing to infer or attach to as a reader. She allowed so much emotion to take place and grasped the reader’s attention by every sentence she wrote in such an organized matter. There were certain aspects of this short story that she used to make “Girl” come together such as, imagery, setting, and point of view.

This film is developed as a critique of women’s roles and expectations in a patriarchal society. These film stills are a satire of the set of instructions placed in front of the female population. These societal expectations, no matter how ridiculous, is meant to be fulfilled by not only young women but all women. This film shows how this young woman is growing up in the South, meant represent how a southern debutante is required to juggle multiple aspects of life to please the man in her life. More or less going from being her father’s daughter, then handed off to be her husband’s wife. This film is meant to be set in the fifties, when etiquette classes were still prevalent; and grooming, propriety, and traditional values were taught by books or by courses. There was a specific path for women to be educated, but confined to the life of a housewife. Thoughtless conformity is the driving force of these southern ideals, traditional roles to be maintained.