The Impact of Found Families One common aspect of coming-of-age stories in the media is the presence of found families. The two texts A Long Way Gone and Spiderman: Into the Spider-verse contribute ideas of found family in their own unique ways. In A Long Way Gone, Ishmael Beah’s life is turned upside down when Sierra Leone goes into revolution, leaving him to survive, along with his new friends that he meets along the way. A pop culture context used to support this claim is Spiderman: Into the Spider-verse, the story of Miles Morales, a teenager who gets turned into Spiderman and must learn to control his powers with the help of his found family to defeat Kingpin. A family can be started for personal needs, but can grow further into fulfilling …show more content…
This new family will also grow together and create bonds that will help them maintain their morality and esteem and hold an everlasting relationship over time. While alone in the jungle, Beah states, “The most difficult part of being in the forest was the loneliness. It became unbearable each day” (Beah 52). Beah’s main enemy throughout his time in the jungle is himself. He finds food and water throughout his time and knows how to keep himself out of danger by using the trees to his advantage. With that, he is unable to sustain his mental identity and needs company to keep himself safe, not just from the lurking rebels, but also from his own insanity. Later, after finding a group of boys his age, the novel says, “[Beah and his found family] couldn’t walk well, so [they] just hobbled around the hut and made fun of each other to avoid boredom” (Beah 62). With his new found family, Beah can maintain his mental stability and esteem. By connecting through survival, they are able to build …show more content…
City and A Long Way Gone: Violence’s Impact on Youth It is a well-known fact that a child’s environment is one of the most influential factors in their mental development in the early stages of their life and one that is heavily discussed in both Ishmael Beah’s memoir, A Long Way Gone, and Kendrick Lamar’s song, M.A.A.D. City. The. Typically, children raised in safe, loving homes develop differently than those raised in unsafe and violent environments, which creates a huge impact on how they interact with individuals and the world around them later on. Surroundings are arguably one of the most significant components in both mental and physical growth and development, so those who do not grow up in ideal circumstances often experience long-lasting detrimental impacts on various aspects of their mental condition. Despite taking place on opposite sides of the world, Beah and Lamar both explore the idea of how violent communities strip children of their innocence as a result of constant exposure and desensitization to crime and death, using personal anecdotes to meaningfully convey the extent of the impact. In Sierra Leone, Ishmael Beah witnessed firsthand the impacts of civil war in his country. The conflict that he initially thought to be distant quickly spread to his home, where he found himself face-to-face with widespread starvation and death. Beah rapidly went from living peacefully, going to school, playing soccer, and listening to rap music to being
going fine, her father owning two fishing boats, and they lived in a large house
On February 1942, President Roosevelt issued an executive order, which was 9066 stating that Japanese Americans to evacuate their homes and live in an internment camp. This autobiographical called, “Farewell to Manzanar” by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston and James D. Houston. Jeanne wanted to write this book to give details on her experience during World War II internment camps. “It is a story, or a web of stories my own, my father’s, my family’s -- tracing a few paths that led up to and away from the experience of the internment” (pg XI). Mrs. Houston had other books beside this particular book, some of the others were called, “Don't Cry, It’s Only Thunder” and “The Legend of Fire Horse Woman”. One of Jeanne Houston quotes is, “ The reason I want
The book “A Long Way From Chicago” is an adventurous and funny story. The story takes place at Joey Dowdel’s Grandmothers farm house in the country. Joey and his sister Mary Alice were sent to their Grandma’s house during the summer because their parents had to go to Canada for their work. At first, Joey felt uncomfortable with his Grandmother because he had never met her before but eventually he got to know her and they became close friends.
In his personal memoir titled “A long way Gone” Ishmael Beah incorporated the concept of family into his personal story. Traveling in a world of his own Beah encountered different events where his approach to family evolved. From losing his important primary family, and establishing close relationships with individuals he met along his journey. Hope, revenge, trust & love were three important key stages discovered as his definition and approach to family changed.
Bayou Farewell is an eye-opening book that spells out the trouble of the eroding wetlands of South Louisiana. Many Americans have no idea what is happening to the wetlands of Louisiana so this book teaches everything about it. I felt like this was a very educational and emotional book but it showed just how people are being affected by this horrific problem. Mike Tidwell did an amazing job writing this book; I learned so much from it.
This novel is a story of a Chicano family. Sofi, her husband Domingo together with their four daughters – Esperanza, Fe, Caridad, and Loca live in the little town of Tome, New Mexico. The story focuses on the struggles of Sofi, the death of her daughters and the problems of their town. Sofi endures all the hardships and problems that come her way. Her marriage is deteriorating; her daughters are dying one by one. But, she endures it all and comes out stronger and more enlightened than ever. Sofi is a woman that never gives up no matter how poorly life treats her. The author- Ana Castillo mixes religion, super natural occurrences, sex, laughter and heartbreak in this novel. The novel is tragic, with no happy ending but at the same time funny and inspiring. It is full of the victory of the human spirit. The names of Sofi’s first three daughters denote the three major Christian ideals (Hope, Faith and Charity).
The war in Sierra Leone lasted eleven years and resulted in mass murder, destruction, and mainly, loss of innocence. This war impacted nearly everyone in the country, however its specific damage on the children of Sierra Leone is a tragedy that haunts the victims to this day. The Rebels killed and tortured thousands of innocent people and destroyed villages throughout the country. Boys as young as twelve were forced to form an army and fight against the rebels. Ishmael Beah, a young boy living amongst this war, tells his story in the book A Long Way Gone. He explains the gory and disturbing details of his life as a boy soldier. As the young boys were brainwashed into killing, the women and young girls of the country were being raped,
On a lighter note, he explains his inspirations for his dream of making music in the song ‘Juicy.’ Biggie’s writing went in depth to show his audience where he came from and to also inspire other artists working their way up in the music industry. Lastly, Kendrick Lamar’s piece Good Kid m.A.A.d City is a coming of age story from the perspective of teenage Kendrick living in Compton, California. This album shows the dark side of Kendrick’s life, as well as his lighter moments of aspiration. There are vivid depictions of violence that he endured as a teen, as well as the influence of money and power.
This book is told from the diary of the main character, Sam Gribley. Sam is a boy full of determination. He didn’t give up and go home like everyone thought he would. He is strong of mind. After the first night in the freezing rain, with no fire and no food, he still went on. He is a born survivor. He lasted the winter, through storms, hunger, and loneliness, and came out on top even when everyone expected him to fail. “The land is no place for a Gribley” p. 9
Who is the birthday party a rite of passage for, the birthday boy or his mother?
In the beginning of Beah’s memoir, the tone was suspenseful. When Beah’s village was under attack by rebels, his family had to escape, while he was with his brother and friends in another city. During that time, he had to fend for himself and try to survive out in the open, without his parents, along with his brother and friends. Eventually, Beah was separated from his brother and friends and was all alone. “I walked for two days
The health behavior that I wished to improve on during this semester is to stop smoking. I picked up my first cigarette when I was eighteen and unfortunately I haven’t been able to put one down until I took this class. In my country a lot of people smoked cigarettes and I didn’t think that there was anything wrong with smoking or that smoking caused any harm to your body. In my country they don’t advertise cigarettes as being harmful like they do in America. When I moved here I noticed a lot of advertising against smoking cigarettes. In the advertisements on billboards and TV commercials there were women and men who had been affected by cigarette smoking. One advertisement had a woman who didn’t have toes because of smoking and a man didn’t have legs because of smoking. One person had died but had never smoked a day in his life he died from second hand smoke. After watching that it scared me and it made me think about my smoking and it made me want to attempt to quit smoking. When I saw my friends smoking and while I was smoking I thought of those people in the commercials and how easily me my friends could become just like those people in the commercials.
“Dead Men’s Path” by Chinua Achebe. In this short story “Dead Men’s Path,” Chinua Achebe gives the protagonist an exciting chance to fulfill his dream. Michael Obi was officially headmaster of Ndume Central School, which was backward in every sense. He had to turn the school into a progressive one, however the school received a bad report when the supervisor came to inspect.
The novel, Alone Together: Why We Expect More From Technology and Less From Each Other (2011) written by Sherry Turkle, presents many controversial views, and demonstrating numerous examples of how technology is replacing complex pieces and relationships in our life. The book is slightly divided into two parts with the first focused on social robots and their relationships with people. The second half is much different, focusing on the online world and it’s presence in society. Overall, Turkle makes many personally agreeable and disagreeable points in the book that bring it together as a whole.
Urvashi Butalia in her book, The Other Side of Silence, attempts to analyze the partition in Indian society, through an oral history of Indian experiences. The collection of traumatic events from those people who lived through the partition gives insight on how history has enveloped these silences decades later. Furthermore, the movie 1947 Earth reveals the bitterness of partition and its effect of violence on certain characters. The most intriguing character which elucidates the silence of the partition is the child, Lenny. Lenny in particular the narrator of the story, serves as a medium to the intangibility created by the partition. The intangibility being love and violence, how can people who grew up together to love each other hate one another amidst religion? This question is best depicted through the innocence of a child, Lenny. Through her interactions with her friends, the doll, and the Lahore Park, we see silence elucidated as comfort of not knowing, or the pain from the separation of comfort and silence from an unspoken truth.