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Orphan Train Chapter Summary

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In the novel, Orphan Train by Baker, she shows many sociological concepts, throughout the novel. The novel shows many encounters of socialization with the main two characters, Vivian and Molly. In chapter 5, Sociology: Exploring the Architecture of Everyday Life by David M. Newman, Newman explains how ourself is a product of socialization. Socialization is a process of learning, which one learns hot to act according to the rules and expectations of a particular culture (Newman 116). The agents of socialization can be family, friends, teammates, the media, religious institutions, and more. The agents influence an individual’s personality, behavior, and values, which help create one’s self. Today, symbols of identity are often used to help people …show more content…

The name changing and the several families affected Vivian’s identity, Niamh is a child from Ireland, Dorothy was a girl who was almost raped by her adoptive father, and Vivian was a happy child working with her new family. Here it is evident that Vivian has to almost reinvent herself every time she had a new family, and Newman would call that resocialization (Newman 121). Newman describes resocialization as, “a process of learning new norms, values, and expectations when an adult leaves an old role and begins to take a new role in their life” (Newman 121). Throughout the novel, Baker shows us Vivian has to take on different roles because when she was adopted by a new family. They changed her name and Vivian had to behave in a way the adoptive parents wanted her to behave. Vivian had to learn another family’s environment, which meant learning the expectations and norms of her new family. Vivian was a babysitter, domestic servant, and she also had to take on the role of a child who was dead. The parents couldn’t recover from their loss, instead they adopted her and named her Vivian like their dead

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