Today and always, family dynamics have played a vital role in personality development. In the book Speak, there are several instances where the book’s main character Melinda is constantly ignored or disappointed. Melinda converses with her parents through sticky notes on the refrigerator. Holidays are never a big deal to her family and when they try to celebrate, it gets ruined. In addition to everything else, Melinda’s parents constantly argue. The book Speak really demonstrates what can happen to a person when they don’t have their family present to help them through a rough time. Melinda’s mother and father are constantly absent throughout the whole book. Communication is sparse as they only communicate through sticky notes on the counter. …show more content…
As a teenager, holidays are the highlight of the year. Holidays bring so many good things such as breaks from school and times spent with family. Every holiday that comes along in the book is either not celebrated or goes horribly wrong. At Thanksgiving time, Melinda’s mother is so wrapped up in preparing the store that she manages for Black Friday, that she completely forgets to thaw out the turkey. Her father decides to take over the task of cooking the feast. This was yet another fail, because her dad’s idea was to take the still frozen turkey outside and chop it with an axe. They both give up, order a pizza, and Melinda’s mother goes to work. Melinda’s feelings were shown through her turkey bone sculpture. Her sculpture was a symbol of her sadness and sorrow about the holiday gone wrong. Christmas was just another holiday to not look forward to. During Christmas, there was mostly nothing for Melinda to discuss with her family. It was just another failed holiday. Melinda is also saddened by the fact that her family never celebrates Easter. The lack of holiday celebration gives Melinda nothing to look forward to. Holidays are often the highlights of a person’s year, and Melinda doesn’t ever look forward to the
When people receive education, they will also be receiving the real life techniques like the ways how to communicate, and how to tackle with the possible problem in life. In school, we have our teachers teaching us all the textbook stuffs along with teaching us to be actively participating in extracurricular activities. The extracurricular activities such as participating in speech, debate, sports, and other school programs will activate the communication skills inside the children. In the same way, the author Wes’s parents also learnt the communication skills in school. Not only this, they have even learnt the ways how to tackle with the problems without being afraid of the consequences. When the author Wes got into depression when he was unable to perform well in school, that made him feel quitting to study from military school, her mother knew what she had to do as a responsible guardian, she acted very precisely, she did not use physical threats. Instead, she told him like, “‘I am so proud of you, and your father is proud of you, and we just want you to give this a shot. Too many people have sacrificed in order for you to be there.’”(95). Her mother knew the communication skills about how to persuade her son to do good, and most importantly she told that they are proud of the way he is. The way she communicate with her son, made him realise that to study diligently should be his first priority. Regard of
Conflict between the main characters in fictional stories can be so thick, you need a razor-sharp knife to cut it; that is definitely the case in the two literary texts I recently analyzed titled “Confetti Girl” by Diana Lopez and “Tortilla Sun” by Jennifer Cervantes. In the first text, tensions mount when a social butterfly of a teenage girl and her oblivious father lock horns over the subject of homework. In the second passage, drama runs high when a lonely child and her career-driven mother battle over the concept of spending the summer apart. Unfortunately, by the end of both excerpts, the relationships of these characters seem damaged beyond repair due to their differing points of view - the children end up locked behind their barrier-like
In Confetti Girl, the narrator and the father have different interests. The father has a great interest in the English Language, but his daughter does not. In Tortilla Sun, the narrator and her mother have have tension over Izzy’s mother going to Costa Rica. Parents and adolescents may not seem eye to eye on everything. Children and adolescents seem to have tension with their parents because they were born in different generations. Because they were born in different generations, parents may not have the same interests as their kids do. Children seem to argue a lot with their parents because they do not understand that their parents are doing what is best for
The essay opens with the assertion that Thanksgiving is not really a holiday because it possesses none of the characteristics of a real holiday. Arlen attacks the imagery of the holiday, the participants, the lack of presents, and the lack of costumary values. Next, the holiday is attacked because it occurs during the "nowhereness of the time of year." The season is characterized as bad in both the "cold and sobersides northern half of the country." Last, the writer moves us to "consider the meal itself." He attacks the starches, the "sacred turkey" and ritual of the carving itself. The author creates a bitter and nostalgic tone, the emotion of the first paragraph sets the tone for the rest of the essay. The tone is set by the specific details the author uses, as well as the diction Arlen expounds. Arlen leaves the reader asking, "Is nothing sacred or important to this man?”
Parents always want what is best for their children, regardless of culture or ethnicity. In The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan, and in “Life With Father” by Itabari Njeri, the parents express their parental methods upon their daughters. Children will all react differently to their parent’s methods, as do Waverly, June, and Itabari, but they still share a common resentment for their parents. It is shown in the two stories how parental methods expressed to children can be misinterpreted, thus influencing the child’s behavior.
Throughout the book, Melinda has problems with her family. For example, the problems with her family is that they barely see each other and the mom gets robbed frequently.Furthermore, she has problems with her friends. The problems with her friends is that friends she thought she had she really didn't have and they threw her to the floor like a hot pop tart. Throughout the book, Melinda has problems with her family.
Family plays a significant role in an individual’s life. It is through the family that children first learn to socialize with others. Through this socialization, the children’s self-worth, behavior, attitude and values are shaped. De Massis, Sharma, Chua, Chrisman and Elgar believe that family members who have close interaction may face challenges arising from said closeness (20). Despite these challenges, most family members are able to overcome them and become each other’s strength. On the other hand, there are also parents who do not have a good relationship with their children. The perfect example of this instance is The Tragedy of Hamlet by William Shakespeare. In line with this
When growing up, a child’s relationship with their mother is a major part of development. Sometimes, that bondage between our parents can start to split based on different opinions and perspectives. In Amy Chua’s Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mom, she describes her relationship with her daughter as a calm and loving conversation, while in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club, she describes her relationship with her mother as bitter and hostile.
...parents were much more successful in the working world encouraged him to complete many daily activities such as choir and piano lessons. His parents engaged him in conversations that promoted reasoning and negotiation and they showed interest in his daily life. Harold’s mother joked around with the children, simply asking them questions about television, but never engaged them in conversations that drew them out. She wasn’t aware of Harold’s education habits and was oblivious to his dropping grades because of his missing assignments. Instead of telling one of the children to seek help for a bullying problem she told them to simply beat up the child that was bothering them until they stopped. Alex’s parents on the other hand were very involved in his schooling and in turn he scored very well in his classes. Like Lareau suspected, growing up
Parent/Child relationships are very hard to establish among individuals. This particular relationship is very important for the child from birth because it helps the child to be able to understand moral and values of life that should be taught by the parent(s). In the short story “Teenage Wasteland”, Daisy (mother) fails to provide the proper love and care that should be given to her children. Daisy is an unfit parent that allows herself to manipulated by lacking self confidence, communication, and patience.
Basically at the summer party before school started Melinda was raped. She was also drunk when it happened. Everyone at the party thought she called the cops to ruin the party, but she actually called the cops to report what happened to her. My opinion has changed about Melinda. Now I feel like Melinda is just being judged based on what they think happened instead of what actually happened. Melinda had a legit reason to call the cops and people are juding her without knowing the
Adolescence is a time of growth and development. It is during this period of life that influences and decisions will alter an individual’s future. This results in disequilibrium of the family system and family processes due to changes over the course of adolescence. The family systems approach dissects the details of family life from the perspective that families are composed of dyadic subsystems which greatly influences one another. Additionally, this approach states that when an individual family member undergoes a dramatic life-changing event, or when a dyadic relationships altered, the entire family system enters a state of disequilibrium until an adjustment is made. Throughout my virtual teen’s life, there was many ways in which the family
This talks about how family is agent of socialization through childhood, race and class. How this relates to my social group is that my parents have always taught me and my siblings that in order to achieve success you must work hard by studying and doing well in school. It also plays a role in my social group because my family come from Nigeria, where parents strive for their children to be successful and to have a good education. Even though we are of the lower middle class, my parents still expect for us to be successful in life, because they do not want us to have the type of lives that they
Literary analysis essay: “What part of ourselves don’t change as we get older? And also, how does family play a role in defining someone who is different”
The holiday season is one of the best times of the year for me. It is a time when all the family comes together and shares in the festive spirit of the season. The one thing I enjoy the most, is waking up to the aroma of the different foods my mother is preparing. Although I have been awaken by the smell of food many times before, this time the distinctive savory smell indicates to me that the holiday is here. Realizing that the holiday is now upon us, it is this time of the year when the roaring dragon inside of my father comes out breathing his flames of despair. Not knowing how hot his flames are going to be, I cry to myself, what terrible disappointing embarrassing statement is he going to make this year?