The novel “Looking for Alibrandi” is a realistic portrayal of teenagers’ lives in the contemporary Australia. The author Melina Marchetta has portrayed her teenager characters in ways, which engage with the contemporary Australian teenagers. In this critical response, it will examine different kinds of relationships of the teenagers in this novel, the friendship, love relationship, and expectations from the family.
The friendship been portrayed in this novel is a realistic portrayal of the teenagers’ lives in contemporary Australia. The central character Josie and her friends Sera, Anna and Lee are the example of realistic friendship. They are very good friends with each other, although there were a few minor arguments between Josie and Sera because of the different concepts they have, but they still managed to get along pretty well. They have done some crazy things together; they went to visited a famous band’s lead singer at the Sebel Town House during the school annual walk-a-thon, because they thought that singer was the most gorgeous guy in the world. This is very realistic with Australian teenagers; teenage girls always fancy towards their favourite idol or the hot-looking guys. Their friendship is very trustworthy and protective. “We tend to mother her a lot, and if we’re ever in a risky situation, like being squashed at a concert or terrorized by the students of Cook High, Anna’s the first person we try to protect.” (P19) This quote shows that they always try to protect Anna because they know she is a very nervous person. There are many Australian teenagers who like to hang out with their own groups of friends and help their friends if needed, just like Josie’s group in this novel.
The love relationship in this novel is realistic compared with contemporary Australian teenagers. Josie’s relationship with Jacob Coote is a good example. Josie has really fallen in love with Jacob because it was her first true love. She has really enjoyed the moment she spends with Jacob. They have kissed, hugged, shared their feelings and almost have sex as well. Like many teenagers during their relationship they have lots of arguments with each other, because of the totally different cultural background and totally different views they have towards life. “This is why it’ll never work between us, Jacob. We live two different lives and you can’t understand that. Why can’t you understand my life? Things aren’t as easy as they are for you.
In the classical short story 'Among the Mourners', written by Ellen Gilchrist, a thirteen year old female deals with 'difficult' times. Aurora, the protagonist, is an average teenager who is faced with emotions of mortification and lust. 'Among the Mourners' conveys Aurora's feelings through the wake her parents have at her house, her new boyfriend, Giorgio, and her parent's marriage. Many times Aurora seems to be being over-dramatic through actions towards her family and boyfriend. Also, Aurora has the predisposition to tell lies, extend the truth, or even make her own belief up about a particular event. Finally, like any adolescent boy or girl, Aurora is boy crazy. Therefore, Aurora is a typical teenager because she is over-dramatic, stretches the truth, and is boy crazy.
Literary works are the products of the society in which they are created and therefore display dominant societal values unless the text producer deliberately challenges these values. These works of literature communicate these dominant values and reinforce tropes in our society. One such trope, as communicated in Peter Goldsworthy’s Maestro is that of the larrikin – a hooligan, a trope which conjures up a mental image of disdain for authority, propriety and the conservative norms of bourgeois Australia. The consumption of texts produced in Australia by Australians helps reinforce our cultural norms and values, and aids us in recognising ourselves as Australians. This is done through characterisation, with the characters embodying many ‘Australian’ attributes, and the establishment of setting.
Living in a multicultural Australian community in the nineties where the enforcement of opposing cultures, beliefs and opinions is expected and the pressures of expectations are abundant would not be easy. This is especially obvious if the ‘victim’ is emotionally unhinged (or at least slightly ajar) and looking for stability through constants, including their heritage and who they actually are.
Thesis: The children's mother is a lonesome young woman with out love and affection from her closest family, and the only one who talks to her with respect is the Misfit.
Aiming at elder teenagers who are facing or have experienced the process of entering adulthood, the cartoonist Daniel Clowes illustrates the twisting feeling between resistances and attempts during the transition toward adulthood in his successful graphic novel Ghost World. In the story, the author characterizes the two protagonists Enid Coleslaw and Rebecca Doppelmeyer as rebellious and cynical; they aimlessly wander around the town and "their main activity, though, is mocking -- with a callow conviction worthy of Holden Caulfield -- the phoniness and hypocrisy that surrounds them. (Scott). By portraying the entering adulthood melodrama based on his own experience, the rhetorician illustrates contemporary teenagers' angst and confusion triggered by both the changes they have to face and the pressure of mainstream culture. Moreover, the graphic medium and comic genre sufficiently reaches targeted teenager readers: the adoption of dark green which represents the somber atmosphere and mass media's penetration, the intentionally portrayed ostensible figures which implies teenagers' constant judgment toward external world, and the direct language(sometimes impolite) language which specifically aims to teenagers in real world who use the same kind language; all of them serve as effective components of the melancholy but realistic atmosphere through the whole story. Thus, by illustrating the protagonist's twisting inner feeling between the attempt to suit in and the resistance toward the constantly changing external world and unknown adulthood, author Daniel Clowes constructs an entering adulthood melodrama with the help of graphic novel components, which provokes readers to consider teenage angst and the fear during coming of age time,...
The characters in his novel all coexist in a familial state, as characters displaced or abandoned find family in unlikely sources in their community. "Haruf's beautifully spare prose is the perfect vehicle for describing the poignancy of their lives, particularly the relationship of Victoria and the McPherson brothers with whom she goes to live. The sharing of these fractured lives in meaningful new family relationships after the old relationships are broken is the heart of this novel" (LaHood). Clearly values are a driving force for the novel as numerous different character's in Victoria's life, break up her family, and through this destruction a new family is born. Values of right and wrong, family values, expectation for the youth, are all clearly present in this novel. It is to the betterment of the reader that we analyze Victoria's life and the surrounding characters' impact on it, so as to draw comparisons to our lives and
... then meets Joy Duncan and Justine who just like him the way he is, they are not concerned with his social status, they like him because he is a kind, genuine boy. As the text goes on, we watch Carl and Justine?s relationship flourish into something bigger. This helps him with his self esteem. Justine shows him the true meaning of friendship and shows him that he is loved and worthwhile. There is also Carl?s relationship with Maddie. At the beginning of the story, Carl follows Maddie around because he notices her, she stuck out from a crowd. He then helped her on New Years Eve. Maddie was quite cruel to Carl but he never gave up and near to the end of the novel, they form a true friendship. Maddie, Carl and Justines friendship was very important because they all leaned on eachother through hard times, like the hard times Carl and Maddie were going through.
Connie, a stereotypical fifteen year old girl, views her life and her family with dissatisfaction. Jealous around her twenty-four year old sister, June, despite June’s outward plainness, and tense around her irksome mother, Connie escapes to the mall with her friends. She and her clique of friends feel like they own the place, and the rest of the world: “Everything about her had two sides to it, one for home and one for anywhere that was not home…” (1-2). The sense of freedom intoxicates them.
Cottino-Jones sums up love and the community in this story in her book. She says, "the lovers in this books are constantly faced with violence, death and isolation when their affairs come into conflict with society’s rigid behavior codes "(Cottino-Jones, 79). Lack of communication and social factors made everyone in the story unhappy or dead.
Movies often don’t grasp this concept of teenagers struggling to fit in with their own group of friends. Denby states “lost in the eternal swoon of late adolescence, they’re (teenagers) thinking about their identity, their friends, and their clothes” (426). The most important thing too many teenagers in high school are fitting in. They idolize the idea of having a group of friends who are well known around school that other looks up too. The movie Never Been Kissed shows how teenagers often try to hard to gain and maintain friends. The main character who is a newspaper reporter goes back to school pretending to be a high school student. She tries to befriend a group of good looking rich kids and tries her best to impress them and she embarrasses herself in the process. The movie shows of allot of the average teenagers basic
They are all middle to upper middle class Caucasian adolescents living in a suburban environment. Sam, Patrick, and the other 3 members of their clique are all seniors in high school and Charlie is only a freshman. Through the experiences of Charlie and his new friends, The Perks of Being a Wallflower provides excellent examples of cliques and crowds, dating scripts, the identity status model, externalizing problems, internalizing problems, and
Melinda’s life, dealing with the impact of her rape, revolves around increasing pressure and poor relationships. This produces further serious and significant dilemmas. Many teens internationally relate to Melinda, she is a flag a flag that represents the many young adults that encounter problems akin to Melinda. The dominant theme of adolescence in the book connects Melinda to the real world. The unfortunate circumstances shed light upon the many difficulties adolescents withstand. Melinda’s character is seen in many teens that confront rape, staying silent, and depression. If youth struggles to maintain a balance of emotions, because of abuse, will the future be the same?
“Choose your friends wisely,” my mother told me as a child. One’s friends are a reflection of who one is. Therefore, I value honesty, loyalty, and compassion in my friendships. These qualities are valued in Chaim Potok’s novel The Chosen. He develops the unlikely friendship between Reuven Malter and Danny Saunders, two teenage boys who live very different yet similar lives. Through their growth both individually and as friends, Potok conveys that honesty, loyalty, and compassion are qualities that should be valued in all relationships, especially friendships.
Ginger and Brigitte Fitzgerald share a close relationship that becomes challenged as the narrative progresses. Ginger, who is a year older, is the more dominant, while Brigitte takes a more subordinate role. Both girls are late bloomers, and in Freudian terms, their outlooks and relationship with one another can be seen as the result of an extension of their latency periods. The girls do not deal well with their transition into adolescence—they recognize the budding sexuality of their peers and are th...
Adolescence is the stage in life when you are no longer a child, but not yet an adult. There are many things that still need to be explored, learned and conquered. In the film Thirteen, the main character, Tracy Freeland, is just entering adolescence. While trying to conquer Erikson’s theory of Identity vs. Role confusion, Tracy is affected by many influences, including family and friends that hinder her development. Many concepts from what we have learned in class can be applied to this character from identity development, to depression, to adolescent sexuality and more. In this film Tracy is a prime example of an adolescent and much of what I have learned this year can be applied to her character.