Tess's Culture

Culture is found throughout the entirety of “In the Time of Butterflies” written by Julia Alvarez. There are points of conflict due to culture and one's personal beliefs. There are also ways that people are connected through their culture and beliefs. There are cultures found both, within the families and across the country. Widely accepted cultures and ones that are not as popular. Culture that is taken away and replaced with a different one. Culture is a very broad term in a book like “In the Time of Butterflies” because of all the different types of culture there is.

Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'urbervilles In Thomas Hardy's novel, "Tess of the D'urbervilles" the settings and surroundings of Talbothays Dairy and Flint Comb - Ash represent both the good and evil in Tess's life. Throughout the novel Tess is faced with absolute happiness and also total misery. As she moves from location to location the setting of these different places reflect her different emotions. Hardy also uses nature to help the reader identify with Tess's feelings.

Culture: Culture refers to values, languages, symbols, norms, beliefs, expectations that members of a group possess and the good things they produce and use in their life. Culture is the thing that all the members of a group or society follow.

Both her community and Angel strongly criticize Tess for her rape, which was not her sin but Alec's. She is seen as someone to be criticized and cast aside because of a terrible thing was done to her, rather than something she did herself. Her final execution draws attention to the feeling that (community of people/all good people in the world), situation/event, and some external force, whether Thomas Tough and strong or a god, have been working against her the whole time as the narrator, he also manages to appear as her only advocate against an unjust world. Tess's hardships are described as mere sport for the “President of the Immortals,” which contrasts with the Christian idea of a God who has a benevolent plan for everyone, and connects with the notes of paganism throughout the novel. Hardy points out and emphasizes the multiple unhappy coincidences that take place, like Tess overhearing Angel's brothers instead of meeting his father. The story keeps asking the age-old question “why do bad things happen to good people?” Hardy even muses over the possibility that Tess's sufferings are a punishment for her ancestors' crimes, or else that some murderous strain is in her blood, foreshadowed by the d'Urberville coach.

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines culture as “the beliefs, customs, and arts of a particular society, group or place.” These different cultures are viewed several different ways around the world, and these views sometimes lead to misconceptions and stereotypes. Two novels, Persepolis, By Marjane Satrapi, and Things Fall Apart, By Chinua Achebe, take their works and shatter the stereotypical views of their cultures (Native Africans and Iranians) made by the western world. They show you that what you always hear about one culture or individual may not always be accurate, and the only way to learn about one’s culture is to learn the facts.

Culture by definition is the identity or feeling of belonging to a group. It is part of a person's self-conception and self-perception and is related to nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, generation, locality or any type of social group that has its own distinct culture. To me that definition couldn't be more spot on but let's go more in depth over the past few months in my English class we have been trying to learn what our culture is and what part culture plays in our daily lives so in this essay I will be sharing with you what I think culture is what it means to me and how I think it impacts our way of living and the way we look at each other as human beings and how we treat each other and how all this makes up my culture

The mere thought that life was random and doesn’t always turn out how you want was particularly offensive to people in the Victorian era who believed that there was a divine God that controlled everything. The idea that Hardy thought Tess to be a “pure woman” even after she had gotten pregnant before marriage and committed murder, was also unheard of in the Victorian era. After the death of Prince Tess feels guilty and responsible for the event, which ironically she had no control over, “she regarded herself in the light of a murderess” but her guilt leaves her more inclined to her parent’s wishes.

Her problems start with her “cousin” Alec, who after seeing Tess’s beauty, tries to cohort her having sex, which she refuses. After she continued resistance for three months, Alec claims that she has “trifled with [his] feelings, eluded [him], and snubbed [him]” (Hardy 1891, p. 102) in regards to his advances. In the story, however, Tess has never accepted his advances, she has continued to tell him, no, but she always ends up apologising or it (which he gets angry from). Alec believes that she owes him something and Tess, in turn, feels bad for not accepting this because it makes him feel “hurt.” It is this set by society that the woman is meant to succumb to a man. Even when she marries when Tess tells her husband Angel that she had relations (though it is her being raped by Alec) in response to Angel telling her about his relations. She felt relieved saying to him, “now YOU can forgive ME!” (p. 331), which he denies her; Angel does not forgive her as she has forgiven him. She is held to a double standard because she is a woman. The males in her life dictate who she is and where her story goes; the men are free, but Tess is held in place. They are dominating in her society, a masculine trait, and one that leads to Tess killing

This pessimism and fatality that reverberates throughout the novel are evident in “It was to be". Tess goes from a place to another through the story. The narrator comments through the story to prove that Tess is innocent, no matter what he does several excuses that justify for her behaviour. One of the first excuses the author uses is the fate, explaining she was born already with bad fate, as proved in chapter XI at the end of the seduction scene where Hardy excuses her behaviour with her fate, insisting that she is a pure and innocent girl, even when she was raped, had a baby that afterward died, and after killing Alec.

Tess’s mental and emotional deterioration began from the moment Alec raped her and society’s morals did not help Tess’s recovering. Since a woman’s virginity is considered her purity, Tess is viewed as an impure woman, making her life harder. In the Victorian Era, people stressed social and sexual restraint. “The people who had turned their heads turned them again as the service proceeded; and at last observing her they whispered to each other. She knew what their whispers were about, grew sick at heart, and felt that she could come to church no more”.

A culture can be defined as a way of life of a group of people- their behaviors, beliefs, values that are passed along by communication and imitation from one generation to the next. It also includes the customs, arts, literature, morals/values and traditions of a particular society or group (Virginia Encyclopedia). Culture can also be considered as a way of thinking, behaving, or working that exists in places or organizations. This topic is of huge importance to our society mainly in the state of

The term culture is described as ‘a verb’. However it is explained that culture is difficult to define as it can be associated in different ways by different people. Some people think of culture as a thing while others term it as a set of beliefs,

45) So, the family sends their eldest daughter, Tess to see if the d'Urberville family would help them, with side hopes of Tess possibly marrying a gentleman and restoring their family's status.

In Tess of the D’Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy distinguishes Tess Durbeyfield as a girl in the midst of her physical development whom society mistakes for a matured woman and as a girl constantly remorseful over the traumas she endures. For instance, after falling asleep while driving a carriage, it crashes–resulting in the death of her family’s horse and the tainting of a white road by blood. Even though her family does not blame her for the accident, Tess still feels remorseful. After the Durbeyfields coerce Tess to work and reside at the D’Urberville estate, Alec D’Urberville takes advantage of her, seizing her societally pure virginity–perhaps blinded by her physically mature appearance. In both of these instances, Tess lacks agency. Finally,

“Both my parents think that after college I will come back and take over Mother’s fabric store, but they have no idea.” (Lines 96-97) Not only is her life of an unexciting character, she even feels like she is predestined to live this life until the end of her days. But like most teenagers would not do, she does not agree. Tess dreams of a life less structured, more exotic and dangerous. But there is nothing strange about the way Tess feels, her problems are ordinary teenage dilemmas additionally supported by her boring and restricted life, and acting becomes her way of escaping her everyday life.