The Idea Of Symbolic Complexes

Journalists and other nonfiction writers alike occasionally provide accounts of real life traditions and events that occur in various cultures. These important events are often emphasized by underlining them through sequential and descriptive structure, along with direct quotations from the participants of the event. In the news article, “Quinceanera Birthday Bash Preserves Tradition, Marks Passage to Womanhood”, author Natalie St. John uses the aforementioned to highlight and depict the details of a quinceañera and its significance in the Mexican culture and community.

In a future that seems so barbaric and unbelievable, many aspects of our society today can be seen. American families work so that they may purchase lawn ornaments which hang from a rack and are perceived as a very beautiful display. These decorations, called SGs or Semplica Girls, are shipped in from the poorest countries in the world. These lawn ornaments exhibited as a sign of wealth are living women working a physically demanding job in order to get minimal compensation that can be put towards providing their family with a better life. In his short story “The Semplica Girl Diaries,” George Saunders uses symbolism to show that the tiny wire that connects Americans to immigrant workers is invisible to some but painful to most.

In The Blind Side, Michael was raised in the projects of Memphis, Tennessee. One evening after a basketball game Leigh Anne Touhy notices Michael walking down the road, shivering in the cold. After having her husband stop the car to speak to him, she had learned Michael had planned to sleep at the school gym after everyone else had left. Leigh Anne offered Michael a warm place to sleep at her and her family’s home. This moment between these two was Michael’s first real feeling of family. This sparked the relationship that would give him a reason to keep living and gave him something to live for. Leigh Anne continued to include Michael in family gatherings which only enhanced the motherly feeling Michael got from her.

She recalls her mother being ashamed of her “food that looked and smelled so ethnic” (75) for lunch at school. Her mother wished to have had a different lunch, a lunch that looked similar to the other kids from her class. Morales’ mother desires to be part of a different culture due to the embarrassment she has on her own; thus, showing her willingness to hide her culture and she does so by eating her lunch in the school bathroom. In contrast, Morales is proud of her roots and her traditions. Although the burrito may be associated with “the food of workers,” because it was “convenient for the fields or the factory” (75) to Morales it reflects aspects of her identity such as humility and pride.

For example, the first chapters of the memoir are predominately about Grande and her siblings’ experience living with their Abuelita Evila in Mexico. Numerous times throughout these stories, the children were grieving and felt abandoned by their parents, and their grandmother held great resentment towards them. A consequence of this was the siblings losing a part of their childhood, and forced to become adults at a young age. When looking at these accounts, it is important to view this story through the lens of American culture. Grande details her living situations, a house with no running water, scorpions in the room, and only a mattress to share amongst the three siblings. This was in the 1980’s, and in the United States, houses without basic amenities were mostly unheard of. This enforces the appeal to the audience’s pathos and aids them to understand why some people are so willing the make the journey to the United States. (Grande 14, 61)

Everyday thousands of senior citizens and people with Alzheimer’s disease or dementia suffer from abuse by a caregiver. Most of the abuse is in the form of emotional or physical abuse, but there are also a number of different types of abuse including financial abuse. The abuse can either take place in a medical setting such as a nursing home or hospital, or it can also be done by the victim’s own family members. These senior citizens are mostly targeted due to the fact that they are mentally incapacitated; they do not have a very strong short term memory, and sometimes they do not have the ability to talk to another individual about how their caregiver has been abusing them.

In “Antojos”, Alvarez shows a strong sense of characterization to portray real life experiences. For instance, “‘What exactly does it mean, antojo?’ Yolanda asked. Her aunts were proven right: After so many years away, their niece was losing her Spanish” (259). In this short story, the main character, Yolanda, doesn’t feel that she fits into the place she grew up in. Her aunts see that she is losing her native tongue. This shows that Yolanda is distanced from her heritage, and has a sense of lost identity. Her experience of feeling set apart from her native life incorporates the emotions of illegal immigrants that have had to adapt to a different life setting. Alvarez herself writes, “This was what she had been missing without really knowing that she was missing it all these years. She had never felt at home in the States, never…” (262). Yolanda misses her homeland where she was surrounded by her culture, and her native language. She feels like she has lost that part of her identity -where she originated from. This incorporates the emotions of how all illegal immigrants must feel. There is a sense of relation between the experiences of the strong character, Yolanda, and illegal immigrants who have felt a similar

Since the Grand Canyon has transitioned into a picturesque element over time, people often forget to examine the beauty of it for their own selves. Since they are unable to think for themselves, Percy goes on to saying, “Why it is almost impossible to gaze directly at the Grand Canyon, the thing as it is, has been appropriated by the symbolic complex, which has already been formed in the sightseer’s mind…Seeing the canyon is made even more difficult by what the sightseer does when the moment arrives, when sovereign knower confronts the thing to be known” (482). Percy makes evident of the problem with the symbolic complex. The symbolic complex is what is preventing people from thoroughly seeing the complete picture. The Grand Canyon is another prime example that if people were more interested in educating themselves before jumping into preconceptions, then it would be easier to appreciate the full

It was a wonderful eye-opening experience to interview Carmen Anton, a Spanish immigrant for this project. I learned so many things about how she arrived in American as a small child with only her sister by her side and her strive to become American. The emotional struggles of Carmen and her sister, Elena, were real and I didn’t realize it was that emotionally draining to come to a new country. Her experience showed me how hard it is to fit into a new society knowing absolutely nothing about the world she was dropped into. The fact that she flew here with her younger sister and then live for three months without her parents to guide her in this unfamiliar setting, shows me how strong and brave Carmen was at the young age of eight. When she first came, she assumed it would be like

In Chapter 12 from HTRLLP, the author describes in detail the usage of symbolism in different types of literature. Developing the information happens

Currently Sandra Cisneros resides in San Antonio in a purple house and she describes herself as “nobody’s mother” and “nobody’s wife.” Both Frida Kahlo’s and Cynthia Y. Hernandez’s works convey the idea of having one’s culture limit one’s freedom and individuality. Cisneros and Esperanza are both victims of this idea and realize that the only way to live one’s life freely is to defy the roles and limitations created by one’s culture.

As a woman, Angela Vicario is the epitome of a traditional Colombian woman. A traditional Colombian woman is expected to be virgins when they get married; but Vicario defys this social custom causing Vicario to get “softly pushed his wife into [her house] without speaking,” (46). These details emphasize the idea that women are given different standards than men. The details help highlight Marquez’s criticism of how the traditional Colombian woman is treated as and thought of as. From a very young age Vicario and her sisters were taught “how to do screen embroidery, sew by machine, weave bone lace, wash and iron, make artificial flowers and fancy candy, and write engagement announcements,” (31). These skills were taught to better prepare the girls for marriage; displaying the difference in gender roles. Marquez uses parallel structure to emphasize the amount of skills one has to learn before they can be considered as good and pure. Many years after Bayardo San Román returns Vicario she still does “machine embroidery with her friends just as before she had made cloth tulips and paper birds, but when her mother went to bed she would stay in her room until dawn writing letters with no future,” (93). The diction of the words “no future” and “still” suggest that Vicario’s life is stuck in

Ilucion Carlin who also goes by Carmen is a middle-class, nineteen-year-old student and employee I work with at kohls. She is a second generation American with a prominent Mexican background. Ilucion’s parents came to the United States from Mexico looking for a new start and a better education, her father came to the United States at the age of 16 and attended high school in the U.S to receive his diploma. While her mother came to the United States at the age of 19 looking to go to college, however, became pregnant and did not further her education. Since they came from Mexico, they brought along with them the culture and traditions, and it has been an integrative part of her growing up, and help her become who she is today. I choose to interview Ilucion because of her

Sandra Cisneros’ short story, “Never Marry a Mexican”, indirectly underlines her perspective, her interpretation, judgement, and critical evaluation of her subject, the work and its title. This perspective is evident in her use of literary devices, diction, and language structure in her narrative. The purpose of the use of these elements in the way that she does is ultimately linked to understanding her viewpoint on the subject. The author’s perspective is embedded in the meaning of the story and its theme. Her interpretations are valid, and justified in detail throughout the story to add color and vibrancy to her characters. Her judgment is lightly touched upon but only clearly and directly given at the end of the story, to allow the

Symbolic interactionists view social media is a representation of society all in all. First of all, similar to society, social media platforms have their own normative culture which is shaped by everyday interaction. Social media has made sharing cultural capital between individuals very effortless. Within seconds, individuals are able to communicate their beliefs and values towards certain aspects of society through