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Analysis of the story girl by jamaica kincaid
Analysis of the story girl by jamaica kincaid
Gender and roles of women in literature
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A Struggle for Identity
Jamaica Kincaid’s “Girl” appears to be a mother’s set of instructions to her daughter on how to live in the postcolonial Caribbean. But while Kincaid’s work is about a mother and daughter’s relationship, it is also about the power dynamics between the island of Antigua and Britain, which colonized the island and instructed the people to act more European. There are many similarities between the subservient way the daughter is instructed to act and the way that Britain changed Antigua’s identity through colonialism. Just as the mother controls the daughter, the relationship between the oppressor and the oppressed that is explored in Jamaica Kincaid’s “Girl” is a reflection on the ways in which colonialism affected Antigua.
While the comparison between sexism and colonialism is not made explicit, the theme of uneven power dynamics becomes increasingly clear throughout Kincaid’s
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The mother’s instructions to her daughter reflect the ways in which Britain demanded Antigua to act more European. While “Girl” was first published in 1978, the text remains relevant as Antigua continues to suffer the lasting effects of British rule. Kincaid describes her writing as an attempt to understand her origins, saying, “you struggle to make sense of the external from the things that have made you what you are and the things that you have been told are you: my history of colonialism, my history of slavery, and imagining if that hadn't happened what I would have been” (Vorda and Kincaid, 9). She uses her combination of prose and poetry as a tool of making sense of the pain and a way of telling her personal truths. By writing about the experience of being a girl in the postcolonial Caribbean, she is able to recover her identity and tell Antigua’s story from the perspective of the
In “Girl,” Jamaica Kincaid’s use of repetitive syntax and intense diction help to underscore the harsh confines within which women are expected to exist. The entire essay is told from the point of view of a mother lecturing her daughter about how to be a proper lady. The speaker shifts seamlessly between domestic chores—”This is how you sweep a house”—and larger lessons: “This is how you smile to someone you don’t like too much; this is how you smile to someone you don’t like at all…” (Kincaid 1). The way in which the speaker bombards the girl overwhelms the reader, too. Every aspect of her life is managed, to the point where all of the lessons she receives throughout her girlhood blur together as one run-on sentence.
In 1492, Christopher Columbus in his quest to validate his claim that the world was round and that it should belong to his Spanish patrons, the king and queen of Spain, set sail on his ship Santa Maria. He soon discovered the “New World”, which was new to him, but not to the Antiguans who lived there. Cultural imperialism was one of the most prominent means Western countries like Spain and Britain used to colonize other parts of the world at the beginning of the fifteenth century. The Cambridge dictionary defines cultural imperialism as one “culture of a large and powerful country, organization, etc. having a great influence on other less powerful country.”
History can significantly influence the ways in which a place, along with its community, evolves. Now considered postcolonial, not only are Hawaii and Antigua heavily defined by their colonial pasts, but they are also systematically forced into enduring the consequences of their unfavorable histories. Through their unconventionally enlightening essays, Jamaica Kincaid and Juliana Spahr offer compelling insights into how the same idea that exists as a tourist’s perception of paradise also exists as an unprofitable reality for the natives who are trapped in their pasts yet ironically labeled as independent. The lasting impacts of colonialism on the history of Antigua and Hawaii can be noted through their lasting subservience to their colonizing
...her and daughter goes deeper than the surface, where mother daughter banter seems normal in this day and age. In actuality, during this oppressive state between Britain and the Caribbean, the mother favored British lifestyle and all that was affiliated with it, yet in opposition, the girl was anti- imperialism, therefore causing conflict among each other. In what seems to be a sort of monologue, “Girl” goes onto contain a theme involving political overtones less apparent and contrary to that of “A&P.”
Through the use of emotional arguments and social appeal the author, Kincaid, gets the feeling across that she was a victim of England. To get you to feel like the victim she uses lots of metaphors. In the first paragraph she uses the one, “England was a special jewel all right and only special people got to wear it”(p.61). It is right here that the author sets the tone of the essay. She gives you the idea that she was not special enough to put on this gem of England. In doing this she makes a social appeal to anyone looking for a view of colonization. In using descriptive language she make you feel sorry for her in the how she had to “Draw a map of England”(p.63), at the end of every test.
“Girl” written by Jamaica Kincaid is essentially a set of instructions given by an adult, who is assumed to be the mother of the girl, who is laying out the rules of womanhood, in Caribbean society, as expected by the daughter’s gender. These instructions set out by the mother are related to topics including household chores, manners, cooking, social conduct, and relationships. The reader may see these instructions as demanding, but these are a mother’s attempt, out of care for the daughter, to help the daughter to grow up properly. The daughter does not appear to have yet reached adolescence, however, her mother believes that her current behavior will lead her to a life of promiscuity. The mother postulates that her daughter can be saved from a life of promiscuity and ruin by having domestic knowledge that would, in turn also, empower her as a productive member in their community and the head of her future household. This is because the mother assumes that a woman’s reputation and respectability predisposes the quality of a woman’s life in the community.
It is said that a girl can often develop some of her mother's characteristics. Although, in their works, Kincaid, Hong Kingston and Davenport depict their protagonists searching for their own identities, yet being influenced in different ways by their mothers. Jamaica Kincaid's poem Girl, is about a young woman coming-of-age receiving helpful advice from her mother. In this poem, Kincaid addresses several issues where a mother's influence is beneficial to a young woman's character. The mother, or speaker, in Girl, offers advice to her daughter- advice that she otherwise would not learn without being told or shown. The mother advises the daughter about everyday tasks, and how to go about them properly (in her opinion).
The story “Girl” takes the form of a series of lessons; the point of the lessons, according to the mother, is to teach her daughter to behave and act properly. Kincaid’s complicated relationship with her mother comes out in the mother-daughter dynamic in the story. The mother mentions practical and helpful advice that will help her daughter keep a house of her own someday and also how to have a life of her own. It can be argued that in Jamaica Kincaid’s short story “Girl” that the mother is loving towards her daughter because the mother is taking time to teaching her daughter how to be a woman, and because she wants to protect her in the future from society’s judgment.
...xtent will this essay bring about a change in Antigua? The Antiguan scene can only be modified by the government choosing to run the country in a more manner that will benefit everyone associated with Antigua, especially its natives. The native’s behaviours are related to their jealousy of tourists, and of the tourist’s ability to escape their own hometown to take a vacation. While a tourist can relate to the idea that the exhaustion felt after a vacation comes from dealing with the invisible animosity in the air between the natives and themselves, having this knowledge is almost as good as not having it, because there is nothing that the tourist, or the reader, can really DO about it! If Kincaid’s purpose is solely to make tourists aware of their actions, she has succeeded. If Kincaid’s purpose is to help Antigua, she may not have succeeded to the same magnitude.
The short story, Girl, by Jamaica Kincaid, can very easily be related directly to the author’s own life. Kincaid had a close relationship with her mother until her three younger brothers were born. After the birth of her brothers, three major values of her mother became apparent to Kincaid. In turn, Kincaid used the three values of her mother to write the short story, Girl. Specifically, these values led to three themes being formed throughout the story. It appears in the short story that the mother was simply looking out for her daughter; however, in all reality, the mother is worried about so much more. Kincaid uses the themes of negativity towards female sexuality, social norms and stereotypes, and the significant
Jamaica Kincaid's story “Girl" permits perusers a look into the strict, requesting way in which guardians raised their kids very nearly twenty years back. Through Kincaid's watchful organizing of "Girl" perusers catch the directing tone of the story. The connection between the mother and the young lady additionally stinks of strengthening and separation, as best observed through the young lady's brief discourse in the story. Most critical, "Girl" indicates perusers how specific the lessons educated to the children two decades prior. Jamaica Kincaid indicates us numerous things in the short story named "Girl.
In Jamaica Kincaid’s , On Seeing England for the First Time, she presents the audience with the implied idea that imperialism and colonization disrupt a land’s established culture, and is disadvantageous for the colonized land 2. Kincaid’s work is directed towards colonizers, specifically the English. She would like them to know the permanent marks England has left on her, because of colonization. Additionally, she aims to open their eyes to the difficulties of colonization. 3.
Yet, “Girl” focuses on the ways of life for females in a specific culture (Post-Colonial West Indies/Antigua), rather than the universal. Resulting, in a further push towards the Post-Modern, and simply accepts the unpleasantness of the girl’s reality, the way that it is. “Girl” takes deconstruction to a further level than Modernism, by defamiliarizing what readers expect from a text and creating a new and peculiar hybrid found in Post-Modernism. Initially, it both looks and sounds like an unusual poem (no periods/chaotic pace) that has a fast lyrical feel. Yet, “Girl” can also be read as a short story, perhaps a poem-short story hybrid.
The madness hidden within this story is that as a society we tell our young girls what is betrayed as beautiful, and well mannered. Society teaches our women that expressing your thoughts is somehow insubordance. The textbook writes that because Kincaid was a girl, her family placed no value on the academic gifts she expressed interest in; to that she quotes “No one expected anything from me at all” (Kincaid 1144). Jamaica Kincaid used the story of “Girl” as a platform to explain to young women that they do not have submit to a generalized oppression of her
Jamaica Kincaid’s “Girl” shows in society how a woman should be placed and what it means to be a woman. A women doesn’t question her partner, instead she is subservient to him. A woman’s duties include staying at home taking care of the children and cooking; while the man works and brings home the money. A feministic approach to Kincaid’s “Girl” points to the idea of the stereotypes that women can only be what they do in the home, they should only be pure and virtuous, and their main focus should be satisfying their husband.