Themes In Out Of The Dust By Karen Hesse

Emelie Carranza, period 6 Eng 10, Ms. Reid 7 October 2014 ORP 1 Dialectical Journal MLA Citation: Kingsolver, Barbara. The Bean Trees. New York: Harper & Row, 1988. Print.

Have you ever wondered about giving up your family because their annoying, or you want to “fit in”? Well in these two stories I chose they explain how giving up your family can potentially be dangerous.

The Dare by Roger Hoffman is a short story that conveys feelings and emotions of a seventh grade boy who had undertaken an extremely risky adventure. The essay is written by the author in his adulthood, but, nevertheless, he still manages to create this essay as if he is still in his childhood. Hoffman uses stylistic devices like metaphor, imagery, simile, and personification to create meaning in the short story, The Dare.

In today’s society, family is often attempted to be organized within a social structure. Within this structure family typically is consisted of mom, dad, daughter, and son. However, many families do not fit into this configuration. These families may include same sex couples, separated or divorced families, extended families, or even blended families. Even though these families may be happy and healthy, to many they are not considered real families. Going along with the topic of imperfect families, both Barbara Kingsolver and Richard Rodriguez try to break down the traditional family structure through their writing. While Kingsolver’s “Stone Soup” and Rodriguez’s “Family Values” explore the ideas of different family structures and traditional American values, “Stone Soup” breaks down what an actual family is like while “Family Values” expresses the value of family in different cultures.

Out of the Past is definitely an interesting movie with a lot of things to talk about. I will touch briefly upon two main things I have noticed during the screen: the film noire genre and the image of the femme fatale.

For such a small word, “Family,” can mean so much. In a dictionary one may read family as people with common ancestors, but a true family is people who stick together and support one another at any cost. Both books, Night by Elie Wiesel, and, Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand display the theme of family relationships throughout the story.

Meg Jay talks about a client named Emma that is struggling with her identity and feels alone because she does not have a family. Families matter because they provide a sense of security and belonging, without a family people feel lost and unimportant. Not being part of a family can have negative implications on a person’s health such as depression. Having a family to go to can reduce the stress we face in relationships, school, and work. Families are important because they provide an unconditional love that is not found in other relationships.

Many times people are asked to think about what is important to them. A person may say their home, car, children, material items and some may even say family. In the book Little Women (1868-1869) written by Louisa May Alcott illustrates several family values. The story of the March family starts out during the civil war in New England. The family is left to survive on their own because their father went to protect his country. During the years of life the March children, Margaret (Meg), Josephine (Jo), Beth and Amy, had to face the fact that they were very poor, and couldn't have everything that they fancied. As the family stayed home and awaited the return of their father they received "fatherly" support from an old neighbor Mr.

Family is important in every culture, it shapes people and makes them who they are.

An unknown author once said, "Families are like fudge—mostly sweet with a few nuts. My family is the most important aspect to my life. No matter how much they sometimes pester or annoy me I still love them. I do not think people can live through life without the support of family. My family mostly supports me throughout all my actions, and they make me laugh. I do not really think I resemble either my mom or dad. They both had very difficult lives growing up, and I do not think I will ever experience that. Before there was me, there were my parents whose struggle against communism led them to the United States to find the life they deserved.

Mount Everest is 29,092 feet tall. Imagine climbing this mountain with little to no experience. Would you survive? In the nonfiction novel Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, Krakauer and his recruited crews try climbing this mountain. With many deaths along the way to the top, readers are quick to blame characters in the book. However, character stands out from the rest: Krakauer. In the book Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, Krakauer is the most responsible for the other character’s deaths because he recruited and dragged along inexperienced mountain climbers, pushed them harder than they should’ve been pushed, and watched them suffer.

For the first 10 years, Billie’s childhood was very difficult for her. She was always left in the care of other people, her mom was always in and

Characters are used to help develop a theme and create a more relatable story. In the book, “Out of the Dust” by Karen Hesse, Billie Jo and her father stay strong through the dust bowl and the death of their family members. Billie Jo and daddy, from “Out of the Dust”, helped to develop the theme that when you’re at the end of the rope, tie a knot and hold on because of how they persevere through their hardships. Daddy shows persistence in how he never lets his sadness overcome him. First, even though his wife was gone, he never stopped digging the pond.

(MIP-1) The characters in this novel value their objects and focus on the superficial. (SIP-A) Everyone highly values all of their possessions. (STEWE-1) In real life, most people highly value their families. People like Mildred also value their families, except the fact that they are not humans. Instead their families are the items they own. Montag and Mildred get into an argument where he talks about books and parlor walls and how there is no one there but them. Mildred disagrees to this point and says “‘Now’, said Mildred, ‘my ‘family’ is people. They tell me things; I laugh, they laugh! And the colors!”’(69). She is convinced that her house and surroundings are her family because she thinks they have the characteristics of a person. When in reality, she has just gotten used to them and addicted to them which makes her more comforted by the parlor walls instead of her husband

Lorraine Hansberry’s novel, A Raisin in the Sun, revolves around a middle-class African-American family, struggling during World War II. By reading about the Younger’s true to life experiences, one learns many important life lessons. One of the aforementioned would be that a person should always put family’s needs before their own. There are many examples of this throughout the novel. Just a few of these would be the example of Ruth and her unborn baby, Walter regaining the respect of his family, and Mama and her unselfish ways.