Decisions: Breaking Fate for a Better Life

982 Words2 Pages

Being a minority and trying to cope with the American way is a difficult obstacle to overcome. A minority comes from different cultures and lifestyles, especially the parents which means a young youth who is a minority has a specific lifestyle to live because the parents want their child to live similarly to tradition. However, there are young minorities who are trying to bridge their personal tradition and their own American tradition together to better their life. For instance, in the novel, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie, illustrates a young Native American youth, Junior, struggling with friends pressuring him to follow tradition instead of living a different life. Despite the struggles and pressures, he is pursuing his dream instead of following tradition. Therefore, an individual does not need to follow their community norms, instead he or she can follow their own aspiration, but the person will struggle against negativity pressure from their community and peers because the individual is living a different life. Despite the struggle the individual will encounter, he or she can change their community for the better because they have improve their own life.
Minority individuals who are raised in the United States live in community where norms are trying to be preserve; therefore, traditions are strictly enforce by peers, family, and friends because they believe it is the only way to live. In other words, minority youths are forced to learn their community’s norms in America because their own kind are afraid that the norms will be lost. For instance, Junior is a representative of a young minority youth force to practice the norms in his Native American reservation. In his reservation, the s...

... middle of paper ...

...t.
A lone person that differs from their community norms becomes hope after evolving as an individual. To prove the above claim, Junior who experiences two worlds have learn about the pros and cons of his two communities. He is educated through the American education and is able to teach his reservation peers. Furthermore, he have learned about the lifestyle Americans live and he can slowly help implement the tactics that works best to his family and community. Junior will slowly be able to create hope in his reservation and many youths will be able to continue the path of success. As a result, communities improvement come from individuals who thrive to make their lives healthier than before.

Works Cited

Alexie, Sherman, Ellen Forney, and Mechthild Hesse.
Sherman Alexie, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian. Stuttgart: Klett Sprachen, 2009. Print.

Open Document