White Tigers From The Woman Warrior Essay

In the book Warriors Don't Cry by Melba Pattillo Beals, the author describes what her reactions and feelings are to the racial hatred and discrimination she and eight other African-American teenagers received in Little Rock, Arkansas during the desegregation period in 1957. She tells the story of the nine students from the time she turned sixteen years old and began keeping a diary until her final days at Central High School in Little Rock. The story begins by Melba talking about the anger, hatred, and sadness that is brought up upon her first return to Central High for a reunion with her eight other classmates. As she walks through the halls and rooms of the old school, she recalls the

The book is called Warriors: A Dangerous Path, written by Erin Hunter, a peudonym for Cherith Baldry and Kate Cary. I chose this book, because my friend told me it was really a good book to read and I also thought the book cover looked cool. The most interesting thing to me in the whole book was when the cats teamed up with each other. The story takes place in a made-up forest and farmland that is based on New Forest in Southern England. There are four groups of feral cats involved in the story. The four groups called clans are RiverClan, ThunderClan, WindClan and ShadowClan. The four Clans are rivals of each other with each one having their own territory to hunt prey and to protect them from other Clans. The names of the main characters

These expectations increased when she was in the presence of “great power, [her] mother talking story” (20). In one particular situation, the narrator recalls her mother singing about Fa Mu Lan, the woman warrior. Although her mother expected her daughter to become a wife or a slave, the narrator had a different idea; she would “grow up a woman warrior” (20). As a young girl, she said that she “couldn’t tell where the stories left off and the dreams began” (19). This is the case in “White Tigers.” The narrator’s dream-state takes readers into the mind of a girl who attempts to please her mother and entire family by becoming a woman warrior. This is possibly an attempt to subside much of the harsh ridicule she receives from her mother due to cultural differences. Although this is a key factor in her early childhood, she learns to block out these criticisms as she grows older.

In The Woman Warrior, Maxine Hong Kingston blurs fiction and reality using a poetic, singsong writing style, blending sentences together using sentence structure and diction. She also relies heavily on symbols to reveal inner conflict that she had while growing up Chinese American, trying to determine what was authentically Chinese and what was illusion.

The Brown vs. Board of Education Doctrine states, “ We conclude in the field of Education the doctrine of “separate but equal” has no place separate educational facilities are inherently unequal. Therefore, we hold the plaintiffs and others similarly situated for whom the actions have been brought are, by reason of the segregation complained of, deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment. THIS REQUIRED THE DESEGREGATION OF SCHOOLS ACROSS AMERICA.

The empowerment and the continual push for equal status for women has become widely popular and successful in recent history. Women have stepped out of traditional roles of the housewife, the mother and the submissive doormat to more assertive natures. Many controversial issues surround women’s crusade of freedoms including the widely debated right to choose what she does with her body, referring to an abortion. In 1927 Ernest Hemingway wrote a short story titled, “Hills Like White Elephants” that expressed a feminist movement focusing on this issue. Through the character’s development and ability to come to her own decision despite her boyfriend’s constant pressure suggests a shift towards a powerful feminist theme in a society dominated by men. The story, “Hills Like White Elephants,” reflects how men and women are compared with power and dominance regarding their stereotypical behavior in relation to gender norms; however, this story portrays how a woman steps out of the expectations and takes a stance for what she wants.

Throughout the novel The Woman Warrior, by Maxine Hong Kingston, the past is incorporated into the present through talk-stories combined into each chapter. Kingston uses talk-stories, to examine the intermingling of Chinese myths and lived experiences. These stories influence the life of the narrator as the past is constantly spoken about from the time she is young until the novel ends and she becomes an adult. Kingston incorporates two cultures. She is not a direct recipient of Chinese culture, but she has her own sense of talk-story, that she learns from her mother, which tells the old Chinese stories with a sense of myth, in a new American way. This is a way of weaving two cultures together, bringing the Chinese past into her present American life.

Cleaver, E. “The White Race and Its Heroes.” in Souls on Ice, 65-83. New York: Dell Press, 1968.

Maxine Kingston in “The Women Warrior” presents a traditional Chinese society that anticipates women not to decide what is best for them all by themselves. Kingston creates a woman who goes beyond this ritual culture constraint and who take up

The theme of “voiceless woman” throughout the book “the woman warrior” is of great importance. Maxine Kingston narrates several stories in which gives clear examples on how woman in her family are diminished and silenced by Chinese culture. The author not only provides a voice for herself but also for other women in her family and in her community that did not had the opportunity to speak out and tell their stories.

Maxine Hong Kingston's autobiography, The Woman Warrior, features a young Chinese-American constantly searching for "an unusual bird" that would serve as her impeccable guide on her quest for individuality (49). Instead of the flawless guide she seeks, Kingston develops under the influence of other teachers who either seem more fallible or less realistic. Dependent upon their guidance, she grows under the influence of American and Chinese schools and the role models of Brave Orchid, Fa Mu Lan, and Moon Orchid. Her education by these counselors consequently causes her to abandon her search for an escort, the bird to be found somewhere in the measureless sky,

Kingston begins The Woman Warrior by writing a story which started with her mother insisting that she “must not tell anyone...what I am about to tell you.” (Kingston 3). Kingston’s first written words are a defiance of this silencing. Silence is a motif that permeates the entirety of The Woman Warrior; Kingston

The second story, “White Tigers”, is a mythical tale of a female warrior who disguises herself as a male and fights in the place of the father. The story completely contradicts the conventional role of woman in Chinese society. It places a woman in a position of bravery and heroism, which are traditionally reserved for men.

A recurring theme in “The Tiger’s Bride” is that beauty can be bought or possessed by the wealthy. Beauty is bought through corrupt dealings at the card table. Carter shows that those with wealth have power and that wealth corrupts beauty. “The bourgeoisie has torn away from the family its sentimental veil, and has reduced the family relation to a mere money relation” (Marx, p16). This is certainly the case in “The Tiger’s Bride”. The heroine is forced to accept her father's feudal view 'that, if you have enough money, anything is possible' (p. 69). Her father risks and loses all that he claims to value. He neglects his parental obligations for a chance at a winning hand. He is careless with his possessions and allows greed and self-desire

For the poem “Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers” by Adrienne Rich, I choose the feminist approach for several reasons. The first reason is that the poem shows how many women were prevented of achieving more than just a “good wife” (which is not bad if the woman wants so). For example, the speaker says, “The massive weight of Uncle’s wedding band/ Sits heavily upon Aunt Jennifer’s hand” (7-8). This show how she is restrained in this marriage which is a load in her life. The next reason is the marriage is not how it appears to be on many circumstance. For instance, the speaker notes, “When Aunt is dead, her terrified hands will lie” (9). The idea of beautiful hands is a sign that a man or woman does need to work under extreme conditions, and thus, that person has a good life; however, the lie is that that person does not have that good life that others might perceive. The last reason is that the tigers in the poem play an important role because they are a symbolism of how women should be. In the line 3 and 12, the raconteur states “They do not fear the men beneath the tree” and “Will go on prancing, proud and unafraid”. It shows the idea that women should not be fear of men and they are also as capable as men to do whatever they propose to do. The question I hope to answer is why the author wrote the poem, and what was her purpose in doing so (what she wanted to change).