Textual Analysis Of Girl

In the text, “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid, the mother is speaking and the daughter is briefly heard. Evidence in the text that proves the mother is speaking includes the speaker talking about household chores (cooking, cleaning and sewing) and tricks to doing those house hold chores faster or more efficiently. For example, the speaking says, “this is how you iron your fathers khaki shirt so that it doesn’t have a crease”. The speaker mentions how to iron a father shirt, this is a chore a mother would teach a daughter to do. The speaker also tells the daughter how to act like a lady and gives her life advice on how to be a respectable wife, like not squatting

The Lost Girl is a beautiful, humble picture story book created by Ambelin Kwaymullina and illustrated by Leanne Tobin. Kwaymullina, the author, is from the Palyku people for the Pilbar region of Western Australia and is an Aboriginal legal academic. Tobin is a decentant of the Dharug, the traditional Aboriginal people of Greater Western Sydney (Kitson, 2014). Both creators have actively employed their prior knowledge, values, beliefs and culture to put together this engaging and informative picture story book, perfect for young children. Tobin uses vivid colours to represent the red sandy appearance of the Australian dessert outback and the native flora, in an effort to craft a naturistic melody. Kwaymullina writes of sequenced events

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

Have you ever wished that someone had given you a guide on how live the right way? Jamaica Kincaid does just that in her short story, Girl. The narrative is presented as a set of life instructions to a girl by her mother to live properly in Antigua in the 1980’s. While the setting of the story is not expressly stated by the author in the narrative, the reader is able to understand the culture for which Girl was written.

In Jamaica Kincaid’s short story “Girl,” the narration of a mother lecturing her daughter with sharp, commanding diction and unusual syntax, both affect the evolution of a scornful tone, that her daughter’s behavior will eventually lead her to a life of promiscuity that will affect the way people perceive her and respect her within her social circle. As well as the fact that it emphasizes expectations for young women to conform to a certain feminine ideal of domesticity as a social norm during this time and the danger of female sexuality.

“Girl” is a short story in which the author, Jamaica Kincaid, unofficially presents the stereotypes of girls in the mid 1900s. Kincaid includes two major characters in the story “Girl”, they are the mother and the girl. Although the daughter only asks two questions in this story, she is the major character. The mother feels like her daughter is going in the wrong direction and not making the best decisions in her life. The whole story is basically the mother telling her daughter what affects her decisions will have in the future. The mother believes that because her daughter isn’t sitting, talking, cleaning, walking or singing correctly it will lead her to a path of destruction. “Girl” is a reflection of female sexuality, the power of family, and how family can help overcome future dangers.

In the short story, “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid, you hear about the many words of wisdom, or advice that a mother is attempting to pass on to her daughter. The condescending tone of the story is portrayed by the use of semi colons, showing a steady stream of advice and preaching of the mother onto the daughter. The story follows an almost poetic or lyrical style of writing that flows from basic advice like how to sweep a corner to advice like how to handle a man bullying you or how to have an abortion. Although a lot of the advice given to the daughter may be useful in her life and in the culture they live in, it is delivered in a way that seems very callous, and is said with a stern tone, much like a dictator. The daughter in the story tries to speak up only twice throughout the entire thig, only to be completely unheard as the mother continues her chant. The only time the mother’s advice is repeating is when she refers to her daughter as a slut, or her inevitable “becoming of a slut”, which occurs four times throughout the work. The story is written with no real chronological timeline and does not have the traditional beginning, middle, and ending.

For a reader in 2017 “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid might seems very surreal and harsh as a story; mostly because of the very grating and mean language that is used when the mother is talking. The mother’s heartless language makes is really uncomfortable even though at the end of the day, she speaks nothing but love into her daughter’s life. She is giving her daughter social and family teachings, sharing with her the cultural and social values that will help her girl to have a peaceful and respected household and a happy life.

This week’s reflection is on a book titled Girls Like Us and it is authored by Rachel Lloyd. The cover also says “fighting for a world where girls not for sale”. After reading that title I had a feeling this book was going to be about girls being prostituted at a young age and after reading prologue I sadly realized I was right in my prediction.

In both stories “Girl” and “Story of an hour” there is use of gender that describes a typically unfair direction of the role of a women, yet the use of gender is describe differently. The use of gender in the “Story of an hour” is mainly about how the wife of a husband who dies in the train crash is going to deal with life without her husband and if she will be able to handle it emotionally. While the story “Girl” deals with a mom that tells her daughter to be well mannered fit in socially with society. The role of women in both stories is to be well mannered and considerate with high standards of behavior. For instance, in the story the women tell the daughter “ on Sunday try to a walk like a lady” (123). A lady is what the mom wants her to become because she is afraid of her becoming unfit for society. Ladies are expected to be very polite and speak in good manners in order to fit the ideal women. In the “Story of an Hour” there is a specific way her family wants her to handle her husband death. The facts Mrs. Malland was told about the tragedy at a certain times makes me believe that writer wants us to believe that women have harder time dealing with her marriage life.

For centuries, women have had the role of being the perfect and typical house wife; needs to stay home and watch the children, cook for husbands, tend to the laundry and chores around the house. In her short story “Girl”, Jamaica Kincaid provides a long one sentence short story about a mother giving specific instructions to her daughter but with one question towards the end, with the daughter’s mother telling her daughter if she had done all the instructions to become a so called “perfect” woman, every man would want her. Kincaid’s structuring in “Girl,” captures a demanding and commanding tone. This short story relates to feminist perspectives. The mother expects a great deal from her daughter to have a certain potential and she does not hesitate to let her daughter understand that. As a matter of fact, the story is about two pages long, made into one long sentence - almost the whole time the mother is giving her daughter directions to follow - conveys a message to the reader that the mother demands and expects great potential in her daughter. The daughter is forced to listen and learn from what her mother is telling her to do to become the perfect housewife. Throughout the story, Kincaid uses the symbols of the house and clothing, benna and food to represent the meanings of becoming a young girl to a woman and being treated like one in society. Women are portrayed to appeal to a man to become the ideal woman in society, while men can do anything they please.

In order to properly view a story from a feminist perspective, it is important that the reader fully understands what the feminist perspective entails. “There are many feminist perspectives, and each perspective uses different approaches to analyze and interpret texts. One is that gender is “socially constructed” and another is that power is distributed unequally on the basis of sex, race, and ethnicity, religion, national origin, age, ability, sexuality, and economic class status” (South University Online, 2011, para. 1). The story “Girl” is an outline of the things young girls

We live in a society where the similarities between female and males are seen at birth. It begins innocently with the toddlers; girls get pink while boys get blue. The gap between boys and girls develops with time and becomes increasingly apparent. There are still gender stereotypes today, but it is not as bad as it was in the past. Jamaica Kincaid’s short story “Girl” perfectly portrays gender stereotypes. It represents gender concepts as cultural constructs in the period it was written. These conceptions are comparable to current stereotypes about gender. The book gives us a list of commands from a mother to a daughter. Men in the society are dominant to the women, and the set of rules is a product of patriarchy whereby the mother and daughter appear as subordinates to the men in their lives. The article makes one aware of the prevailing masculine hierarchy that exists in a family, and how it creates firm gender roles for females in the society.

Roy Conli once said “When you're telling a story, the best stories, every character has an arc. Every one. And that arc is usually about finding yourself, or about at least finding something about yourself that you didn't know.” This is a prevalent theme in many examples of Young Adult Literature (YAL or YA). Three books that demonstrate the critical transformation between childhood and adulthood by exploring difficult social issues, finding personal identity, and letting go are a Monster Calls by Patrick Ness, The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton, and Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson.

In the story Girl, The author Jamaica Kincaid uses point if view to show how the mother teaches her daughter how to be the proper or perfect woman for a man. She also uses” This is how”shows how the mother teaches the daughter how to be sophisticated.