The Bean Trees Analysis

First of all, why did Esperanza Ortega move to America in the first place?Well, her Papa had died from bandites, so Tio Luis (Papa’s brother,) proposes to mama, and burns the house, so they are forced to move to America to escape him!Since Esperanza was an immigrant,

Esperanza is introduced in The Bean Trees, as a Guatemalan refugee who lives at Jesus is Lord Used Tires with her husband, Estevan. Her brother, husband, and close friends are members of an underground teacher’s union in Guatemala City. One night, a police raid that storms through the streets looking for members of the teacher’s union kills her brothers and friends. Esperanza makes the choice to refuse to give the names of the seventeen teacher’s union members because she knew that this information would lead to their death. The police punish her for this choice and kidnap her daughter, Ismene. She ends up departing Guatemala for the United States because her life is danger, leaving Ismene behind. The decision to save the lives of many, and thereby putting her and her daughter’s life at risk is one that causes unfathomable and lingering pain.

The first part of the movie was titled the father’s name of the main characters. The father was killed by armies because he and other men were trying to make a protest or rebellion. Before dying, the father told Enrique how he would be a successful man without being “arm” of the riches. This wisdom word kept Enrique hold his dream about going to the north, where most people in that little village believed that they would get a freedom of everything and live in a modern world without slavery. Afterward, the mother was abducted by soldiers and the siblings must live in hiding to not get caught. The orphans decided to go to the north with the hope of a freedom land in the north was really existing even for minor Indian like them. This part of the film showed that even in the 80s, there still naïve and traditional citizens that living poorly even though Guatemala already proclaimed its independence in 1820s. This is one of the reasons that young people preferred to move from developing country and immigrate to developed country to chase their dreams and treated fairly like another human being. Other reasons why people immigrate were a lack of access to services like hospital or education, slavery, or poverty their old country. These reasons made the immigrants to expect improvements in income and living conditions in the designated country.

Tired of being treated terribly by employers and an oppressive government, the family discusses the possibility of going to a promised land called El Norte, where all people, even the poor, own their own cars and toilets. Because of Arturo’s attempts to form a labor union among the workers, he and the other organizers were attacked and murdered later that night by government troops. It is important to note that premise of the film takes place during the Guatemalan Civil War, in which various leftist rebel groups, mostly made up of poor indigenous rural farmers, fought against the corrupt (and US backed) Guatemalan dictatorship after years of genocide and oppression of the indigenous people. After nearly escaping death and abduction 24 hours later, Rosa and Enrique realize that everything and everyone they loved has been taken by military troops, and if they did not escape immediately they would fall to the same fate of their

The first challenge Esperanza faced as an immigrant was Marta and her friends trying to get workers to go on a strike. “What about us?” said Esperanza, her eyes riveted on the strikers and shoved them back toward the houses.”(p.g 205) The guards were trying to stop the strikers, because they did not like the fact that they were trying to invade their camps. Then Marta stomps back of toward camp and Esperanza asks.”Why is she so angry?”(p.g 133) She is mad because she wants to go on a strike because she does not like their living and working conditions. This is just one of the many problems Esperanza faced as an immigrant.

In The Bean Trees, Taylor is consistently faced with a lack of choice. She decides to leave home, but on her way she stops at a bar and a woman puts a child in her car and leaves before Taylor can stop her. When she gets to a motel “[she] pulled off the pants and the diapers there were more bruises. Bruises and worse.” (31) The child abandoned had been sexually molested, making raising her a much harder burden since the child had experienced “a kind of misery [Taylor] could not imagine.” (31) Yet although the child, who Taylor names Turtle, is “just somebody [she] got stuck with” (70), she cares for her and she becomes like her own child. However, finding work and raising a child isn’t easy and “[she] was starting to go a little bit crazy. This is how it is when all the money you have can fit in one pocket, and you have no job, and no prospects.” (66) Taylor also realizes “that [her] whole life had been running along on dumb luck and [she] hadn’t even noticed.” She hadn’t been making any choices, just running with whatever life threw her way. Taylor finally realizes her luck has run out when she learns “[i]f a child has no legal guardian she becomes a ward of the state.” Turtle was not legally adopted by Taylor and therefore she could be taken away. Taylor now has the choice to either fight for Turtle or give up, but Taylor is convinced she doesn’t have a choice at all. Her friend Lou Ann calls her out on this, claiming “there’s got to be some way around them taking her, and

The unaccepting nature of US citizens is one flaw in the idea of America’s wide open golden doors. The blame and stereotypes added to an immigrant’s burden prevents them from ever feeling welcome and eliminating the gap between immigrants and Americans born in the US.

This relates to the human rights issue of immigrants due to enrique’s mom heading for the states to better her life. She was a maid , so therefore she didn’t really make that much money. She hoped for a better life and she thought she would be able to do this by moving to the states. In her eyes the only way to do this was heading for america.

Everyone in life wants a better life for themselves and their next generations. Many people in different countries are migrating to The United States for one or two main goals. Those two goals are a better opportunity for employment and education. Which in turn, accomplishing either one of these goals will provide a higher quality of life and a sense of importance for themselves and their family. However, Americans view the immigrants differently from what they are. Some Americans view the immigrants with different stereotypes such as being lazy system abusers, dangerous criminals, and job thieves, just to name a few. However, these stereotypes are not true and does not represent the majority of immigrant. In actuality, immigrants are very disciplined, hard workers whom are also highly motivated opportunity chasers, where in these ways they should and need to be viewed by Americans.

All around the world the United States of America is viewed as a place of freedom and equal opportunity for all people who settle in the country. Immigrants, especially from second or third world countries, view America as a chance for them to start over and a live the lavish lifestyles they are accustomed to hearing. However, this belief that everyone in the United States lives how they want to and has equal opportunity is false. Immigrants from countries all over the world face many different issues as they settle in the United States. Although these problems may vary, the message is the same; the American dream is a lot more difficult to achieve than previously thought. Although every immigrant is different in the problems

When they lived in Guatemala, there was a raid on their village. During the raid, their daughter Ismene was taken as well as, Estevan's brother and two friends were killed. Both of them were devastated by the losses so they ran away and started over in America. For safety reasons, Estevan and Esperanza were going to move farther away from the border. Taylor told them that she would drive them because she needs to go there to find Turtles relatives. Taylor was risking her life to for them to start a better one of their own. Estevan and Esperanza said they would help Taylor adopt Turtle as her legal daughter. During the adoption process Esperanza help turtle and cried because it was the last time she would see her. This gave her the closure that she never really got with Ismene so now she can move. Moving to different places was a big part of Estevan and Esperanza’s

Throughout The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver, Marietta “Missy” Greer goes through many changes. For example, she changes her name to Taylor, adopts a child, and experiences life-changing events. When she left Pittman County, she probably did not expect to have a family that she avoided having in the beginning. Taylor left her home in Kentucky because she did not want to end up like all the other girls who did not finish school, got married early, and did not have much to look forward to in life. Taylor wanted a better life for herself so she left and made a new life in Tucson, Arizona. Some significant items that changed Taylor’s life along the way were Lou Ann’s ad in the newspaper, a photo of her with Estevan after Esperanza’s suicide attempt, and Turtle’s custody documents. These items are very meaningful because they play an important role in Taylor’s new life

Each year, thousands of Central American immigrants embark on a dangerous journey from Mexico to the United States. Many of these migrants include young children searching for their mothers who abandoned them. In Enrique’s Journey, former Los Angeles Times reporter, Sonia Nazario, recounts the compelling story of Enrique, a young Honduran boy desperate to reunite with his mother. Thanks to her thorough reporting, Nazario gives readers a vivid and detailed account of the hardships faced by these migrant children.

Written by Barbara Kingsolver, The Bean Trees contains characters who demonstrate how living creatures are able to find methods of growing and transforming, despite unusual arrangements or lifestyle. Throughout the novel, in the chapters “The One to Get Away” and “Dream Angels” the use of motifs are greatly emphasized. Rebirth is one of the two important motifs, as the pattern of life and death is repeated in the novel. Frequently, this theme is connected with dualities: when one member of a pair passes, the other gains life force. Newt Hardbine represents as some sort of double for Taylor, in the chapter

When most people think about immigration to the United States, they think of the U.S. as being the “land of opportunity,” where they will be able to make all of their dreams come true. For some people, immigration made their lives richer and more fulfilled. This however, was not always the case. A place that is supposed to be a “Golden Land” (Marcus 116) did not always welcome people with open arms. Even after people became legal citizens of the United States, often times the natural born Americans did not treat the immigrants as equals but rather as outsiders who were beneath them in some way. In some situations, people’s lives were made worse by coming to the “land of opportunity.” Often times people were living no better than they