Belonging Trial Paper
gi“An individuals interaction with others and the world around them can enrich or limit their experience of belonging”
Discuss this view with detailed reference to your prescribed text and ONE other related text of your own choosing.
An individual may interact with others or the world around them, and as a result one may feel their experience of belonging has been deepened or has been restricted. Both these outlooks are highly evident in The Joy Luck Club, author Amy Tan and in Memoirs of a Geisha director Steven Spielberg. Both texts highlight the notion of the inability to belong to place and culture and thus not being able to belong to self causing the protagonist to feel limited in their belonging experience, and the trials and tribulations implemented to overcome this to consequently feel a sense of belonging, which furthermore allows the protagonists belonging experience to be enriched.
Belonging to culture and place is often the most complex battle; the inability to be compatible with ones ethnicity and area of habitual residence causes the belonging experience to be limited. This is highlighted in The Joy Luck Club, where June struggles to communicate with her mother, disassociating herself from her upbringing. The rhetorical question “these kinds of explanations made me feel my mother and I spoke two different languages, which we did. I talked to her in English, she answered back in Chinese” emphasizes the juxtaposing ideas of two different languages. This clearly depicts the lack of understanding and the cultural barrier, separating mother and daughter.
Furthermore, as she comes to the realization of her connection to Chinese culture. The use of irony “but today I realize what it means to be Chinese. I am 36 years old. My mother is dead and I am on a train… I am going to China” exhibits her attempts to rekindle her ties with her culture. There is a sense of isolation evident as her mother was her last correlation to her heritage and in order
Discuss this view with detailed reference to your prescribed text and ONE other related text of your own choosing.
An individual may interact with others or the world around them, and as a result one may feel their experience of belonging has been deepened or has been restricted. Both these outlooks are highly evident in The Joy Luck Club, author Amy Tan and in Memoirs of a Geisha director Steven Spielberg. Both texts highlight the notion of the inability to belong to place and culture and thus not being able to belong to self causing the protagonist to feel limited in their belonging experience, and the trials and tribulations implemented to overcome this to consequently feel a sense of belonging, which furthermore allows the protagonists belonging experience to be enriched.
Belonging to culture and place is often the most complex battle; the inability to be compatible with ones ethnicity and area of habitual residence causes the belonging experience to be limited. This is highlighted in The Joy Luck Club, where June struggles to communicate with her mother, disassociating herself from her upbringing. The rhetorical question “these kinds of explanations made me feel my mother and I spoke two different languages, which we did. I talked to her in English, she answered back in Chinese” emphasizes the juxtaposing ideas of two different languages. This clearly depicts the lack of understanding and the cultural barrier, separating mother and daughter.
Furthermore, as she comes to the realization of her connection to Chinese culture. The use of irony “but today I realize what it means to be Chinese. I am 36 years old. My mother is dead and I am on a train… I am going to China” exhibits her attempts to rekindle her ties with her culture. There is a sense of isolation evident as her mother was her last correlation to her heritage and in order