Preview

My Tongue Is Divided Into Two By Naomi Shahab Summary

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
574 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
My Tongue Is Divided Into Two By Naomi Shahab Summary
Immigrants have been going through rough times for many years. It comes down to the point where it’s just shocking. Like in the poem “My Uncles’ Favorite Coffee Shop” by Naomi Shahab, and “My Tongue Is Divided into Two” by Quique Aviles, there are two people who are immigrants and that go through rough times trying to fit in with the world. Even though it is in two different perspectives you can tell that life for them as an immigrant isn’t to flattering and is very difficult. To begin with, “My Uncles’ Favorite Coffee Shop” by Naomi Shahab has two perspectives, an uncle and a niece, it really shows you how a man had moved from his own country to America. And how it has favorite coffee shop. This man has found a way to show the positive side

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    In the story “Four Stations in His Circle”, Austin Clarke reveals the negative influences that immigration can have on people through characterization of the main character, symbols such as the house that Jefferson dreams to buy and the time and place where the story takes place. The author demonstrates how immigration can transform someone to the point that they abandon their old culture, family and friends and remain only with their loneliness and selfishness.…

    • 678 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    There is a lot that we can learn from people who have experienced history. Bella Spewack, specifically, is a great example of the struggle immigrants endured while trying to survive in America after immigration. Today, it is beneficial to learn about the personal views of people who lived in the past so we can gain a better understanding of how communities today were developed. Reading “Streets”, you can understand what the post immigration life was like in New York in the early years of Bella’s life. Bella included a lot of details in her memoir that allows the reader to understand how difficult life was for an immigrant. Even though “Streets” was written from the perspective of Bella, we can still rely on her opinions to give us an understanding of the difficulty immigrants faced while starting a new life.…

    • 1358 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    House of Sand and Fog

    • 498 Words
    • 2 Pages

    In the movie “House of Sand and Fog,” we are given a glimpse into the immigrant experience, and we are asked to question what we would be willing to sacrifice in pursuit of our dreams. The ownership of a house is the conflict at the heart of the story, but the house means different things to the people involved. For Behrani, the Iranian immigrant who purchased the house, the house represents his piece of the “American Dream,” and ownership of the house would restore his honor and help to fulfill his hopes and dreams of making a good life for his family in America; for Kathy, the desperately depressed addict who was evicted from the house, it is almost a life raft keeping her afloat, and the last connection she has to her past life and happier, more stable times. Director Vadim Perelman says (in the DVD production notes), “It is a story about loneliness and of being cast out… about being an immigrant in a new country and, with regard to Kathy, about feeling like an immigrant in your own country.” What struck me as particularly meaningful is that, although these two people seem very different, their actions come from very similar feelings of shame. Both are misunderstood by the society around them, either because of the stigma of being an alcoholic and homeless, or because of the prejudice that most immigrants experience. Both are flawed people, but both are trying to do what they feel is the right thing to turn their lives around. They do not understand each other, neither their language nor their culture, and it is interesting to see that each thinks the other is “beneath” them. As Behrani tells his son, “Americans, they do not deserve what they have… We are not like them.” He sees Kathy as a lazy American, and she sees Behrani as an undeserving “foreigner” who “stole” her house. What is most disheartening is that neither seems willing to see the other person’s point of view.…

    • 498 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    Most immigrants are viewed as invaders of the United States and immigration is not a well understood topic. Barbara Kingsolver’s novel, The Bean Trees, shows multiple perspectives of people who experience i mmigration. In the novel, immigration was a topic that was initially unknown by the protagonist, Taylor. As the story progresses, Taylor meets multiple people that are involved in the many facets of issues facing illegal immigrants. This pulls Taylor into another side of immigration and as readers follow, it makes them question if it is better to follow the law or do what is right . The Bean Trees suggests there is more than one side of the story to immigration and immigrants. Through the use of elements of fiction, Kingsolver suggests some immigration policies are unfair, immigration can cause people to live in fear and become socially reclusive, and that stereotypes are not always accurate.…

    • 1310 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The text emphasizes the hardships that immigrants often have to endure when going into a new country in the search of a better life or the American dream as many call it. The text potentially symbolizes America’s people as well as its culture because America has and is still today very diverse due to the wide variety of races, religions, and cultures that immigrants introduce when they come here. America can be seen as a melting pot because the different nationalities, cultures, and ethnicities of immigrants eventually “melt” together to create a common culture although several immigrants choose to retain their culture no matter what. The majority if not all immigrants leave behind everything they know and love to try and get a better life in a new country where there are more opportunities. America has always been a popular choice for immigrants as it has a plentiful of resources to offer such as employment, freedom of religion, and better education programs. Immigrants often choose to leave their home country because they have a family to sustain and their home country is simply not adequate for their necessities. In My Ántonia Willa Cather really focuses on the struggles that immigrants face upon arriving to their new country. People often think it is easy for immigrants to simply leave and go into other countries but Willa proves that it is quite the opposite. Immigrants do not immediately get a better life upon arriving to a new country which is depressing but it is the truth. Immigrants still have to face new problems that come with the change of countries. The problems that immigrants face in the new countries can sometimes be worse than the problems they faced at home which can be really discouraging. Willa Cather portrays the hardships that many immigrants struggle through the story of the Shimerdas, “tony was barefooted, and she shivered in her cotton dress and was…

    • 1088 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Julia Alvarez and Cathy Song both convey the life of an immigrant and how they are a symbol of their cultures when discovering a new lifestyle in the United States. Even though both poems being set in the past, they have stories that the reader can relate to today. Whilst the authors portray the search for identity, they articulate the reason to leave their home, write in different formats, but have similar themes.…

    • 816 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    It is arguable weather an individual’s interaction with others and the world around them either enriches or limits their experience of belonging. In Peter Skrzynechi’s anthology “Immigrant Chronicle” this statement is explored via two of his poems, “Migrant Hostel” and “In the Folk Museum”. Clint Eastwood’s 2008 film Gran Torino also demonstrates similar themes and concepts. However both these texts are relevant and illustrate how one’s interaction can strengthen or alienate their experience of acceptance and identity. Through connections with people, place and community, shared interactions and events these concepts are revealed.…

    • 747 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Most people may have some form of language barrier, no matter what background they came from. Difference are what define the world around us. Whether a soft contrast of two colors or a comparison of nations, the diversity shapes our identities. In “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” by Gloria Anzaldúa and “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, both have similar subject as they both discussed how different forms of the same language are recognized in society. They emphasize the fact that a person can unconsciously develop different ideas through a language and categorizes an individual by the way they speak. How can identity be molded by language? Language is part of one’s identity.…

    • 833 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Innocent Bystander

    • 725 Words
    • 3 Pages

    In the novel "The Tortilla Curtain", by T.C Boyle, it tells a story about two completely different families; one family who is quite wealthy and the other who had illegally crossed the border and is barely making ends meet. In the story, a young lady by the name of America is taken to California by her husband, only to be victimized. Although she may not be the only victim in the book, she has been through a great ordeal of pain and suffering. America is a victim of immigration, racism, the American dream, and bad luck.…

    • 725 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The understandings and diversities of each immigrant and their experiences underlies in a range of issues they encounter such as rights, freedoms, beliefs, power, entrapment etc… All of which are a common understanding when used in comparison towards the migrants lives using the poignant aspect of imagery and journey’s within the poem “Immigrants at Central Station, 1951”. The experiences and perceptive in this poem help perceive an understanding of the immigrants experiences towards the new world of which displays the integrity, emotion and suffering towards the new world and we as the readers are engaged into these aspects of life through trains, time, control and journeys.…

    • 804 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Jurgis Rudkus was one fo these dissapointed immigrants. A sweeper in slaughter house, he experienced the horrendous conditions which laborers encountered Along with these nightmarish working conditions, they worked for nominal wages, inflexible and long hours, in an atmosphere where worker safety had no persuasion. Early on, there was no one for these immigrants to turn to, so many suffered immensely. Jurgis would later learn of worker unions and other groups to support the labor force, but the early years of his Americanized life were filled, with sliced fingers, unemployment and overall a depressing and painful "new start".…

    • 447 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In response to “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” by Gloria Anzaldua, she describes her childhood along with the struggles of adjusting to the many different types of languages that her culture provides. She begins her experiences with a dentist appointment she had as a child and how the doctor was struggling to control her tongue while he cleaned her roots. That experience made her curious as to how one actually tames a wild tongue. Growing up in the American public school system, she would often be punished for speaking her native language. Often teachers would tell her to learn English or “go back to Mexico”. The struggles didn’t stop there, Gloria also had a little bit of an attitude towards her mother which included, talking back and having…

    • 484 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Essay 1

    • 700 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Everyone in this life has a need of survive. As an immigrant, is very difficult to come to a new country and start a new life from the beginning. In the essay “The Back of the Bus” written by Mary Mebane talks about a bus ride from North Carolina to South Carolina when the segregation laws were still in place. Mebane wrote this piece because she “wanted to show what it was like to live under legal segregation before the civil rights act of 1964” (Mebane, 167). On the other hand, the essay “Like Mexicans” written by Gary Soto, the author expresses how is to growing up in the ‘barrio’ and makes a comparison between two different cultures. Even though: “The Back of the Bus” and “Like Mexicans” are although different because of segregation and differences of cultures, they share the same struggles through racism, stereotype and having no choice.…

    • 700 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Sympathy For Immigrants

    • 105 Words
    • 1 Page

    Leaving everything behind in hopes of a new start is the purpose of every immigrants arriving to America. Despite leaving all their troubles behinds, immigrants still have to face other problems when assimilating in America. Sympathy for the immigrants can arise from the readers because of the difficulties they encountered, but it is suppressed because Doctorow composed the future of the new immigrants through the present time of the old immigrants. Doctorow implies that the harsh treatment towards the new immigrants from the old immigrants will be the same repetitive cycle; new immigrants are resented and then they will resent the new group of…

    • 105 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    An author is similar to a magician. They must put together certain pieces in order for the act to work. They have a secret that is not known to the audience, but the very few who bother to look deeper. Behind an act, is always a meaning. In many card tricks, one deceives the person similarly how an author inserts plot twists, and irony into their stories. The beginning and ending are of the utmost importance in both cases. An author, especially, must know where to put emphasis in order to make the story flow. I believe How to Tame a Wild Tongue showcases a rich blend between tone, symbolism and metaphors. Gloria Anzaldua is able to raise awareness to the issues at hand while keeping her emotions at bay.…

    • 1479 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays