Family, and its definition, is universal, it describes a union, particularly with parents and children. One could define Family as a group of people who are related to each other, a person’s children, and a group of related people who lived in the past. In reality, Family has a profound meaning, unique to every household and family. On a personal note, family is defined as a foundation of love, support, and strength. In Stone Soup, Barbara Kingsolver interprets family as a foundation of love. In the beginning of Kingsolver’s essay shares an anecdote that takes place at a children’s soccer game. Andy, Kingsolver’s best friend’s son, has a cheering section and an undeniable love for Andy. She notices the family leap to their feet and hug each other for the child. The child’s family includes his mother, and her friends, his brother, his father and stepmother, a stepbrother and stepsister and a grandparent. Kingsolver’s essay, in a like manner, explicates that a family has a foundation of love. Secondly, In Stone Soup, reveals values of support embedded into Kingsolver’s essay. In her essay, Andy receives support from his family to his school activities. The family is there for Andy through moral and school support. By the same token, her essay illustrated that a family has a foundation of support. In a different selection, A Tale …show more content…
of Two Divorces, Anne Roiphe reveals her feelings of being a child of divorced. She goes into detail on how Roiphe and her mother withstands the damage that comes to her family and they had to acquire an abundance of strength to continue in their lives. On page 185 Roiphe says, “ At the dinner table, as the food was being served, my father would comment that he did not like the way my mother wore the barrette in her hair. He would say that she was stupid.” With regards to this, Roiphe’s mother acquired strength to last in her marriage for her daughter. Similarly, her essay elucidates that a family has a foundation of strength. As a final point, families have different structures and devised under different circumstances.
There are different components that tie into a family. In a family, there is many forms of love. There is love of children, family, spouse, grandparents, etc. When family members go through changes in life, the family is always there to support. There is financial support, moral support, emotional support, etc. Strength in a family is defined as the courage to continue through the hardships in life. Strength helps grow a strong bond within the family. To conclude, love, strength, and strength are concepts that build the definition of
family.
In the story “Neighbors”, a man and a woman’s true nature is revealed when nobody is watching. Bill and Arlene Miller are introduced as a normal, “happy,” middle class married couple, but they feel less important than their friends Harriet and Jim Stone, who live in the apartment across the hall. The Miller’s perceive the Stone’s to have a better and more eventful life. The Stones get to travel often because o Jim’s job, leaving their ca and plants n the care of the Millers. When the Stones leave on their vacation, the two families seem like good friends, but the depth of the Miller’s jealousy is revealed as a kind of obsession with the Stones’ everyday life.
If I were asked who the most precious people in my life are, I would undoubtedly answer: my family. They were the people whom I could lean on to matter what happens. Nonetheless, after overhearing my mother demanded a divorce, I could not love her as much as how I loved her once because she had crushed my belief on how perfect life was when I had a family. I felt as if she did not love me anymore. Poets like Philip Levine and Robert Hayden understand this feeling and depict it in their poems “What Work Is” and “Those Winter Sundays.” These poems convey how it feels like to not feel love from the family that should have loved us more than anything in the world. Yet, they also convey the reconciliation that these family members finally reach because the speakers can eventually see love, the fundamental component of every family in the world, which is always presence, indeed. Just like I finally comprehended the reason behind my mother’s decision was to protect me from living in poverty after my father lost his job.
Love is the thing that holds a family together, without it the world would be a very lonely place. Hardships, misfortune, and trouble are all challenges people go through in life. With the support of family and love, it makes it possible to navigate through this mine field. In The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls makes several connections to loving family unconditionally. In the book, there is evidence of the kids being neglected and brought up in tough living situations. There are many conditions where the kids should not forgive the parents, but the kids turn towards a positive viewpoint, look for the bright sides of things, and love their parents no matter what. With the parents knowledge of their children’s ability to forgive
...e another for support because of the parent/child role reversal in the home. The most mature and responsible people in the family were the children. However many times the children were left to their own devices to manage their lives, the children always welcomed Rex and Rose Mary back into their open hearts. This can be explained in part by a hidden rule of poverty being that people are possessions. In Ruby Payne’s A Framework for Understanding Poverty, she explains, “In poverty people are possessions, and people can rely only on each other” (Payne, p. 23). The Walls children relied on their parents to hold the family together, if only in a physical sense. Jeanette and her siblings forgave their irresponsible parents repeatedly. This teaches an important message to readers: by forgiving others you free yourself of festering anger, bitterness, and judgments.
During the Great Depression, there was a massive migration from rural areas to more populated areas. During this era the Joad family decided to migrate from Oklahoma to California in search of work. As the Joad family traveled to California, the Grandfather dies. During this rough time, Ma helps comfort Grandma over her husband’s death. Ma knew that if Grandma was understanding and accepting of Grandpa’s death, the family would use that courage and her example to get through the mourning period faster. “She seemed to know, to accept, to welcome her position, the citadel of the family, the strong place that could not be taken. And since Tom and the children could not know hurt or fear unless she acknowledged hurt and fear, she has practiced denying them in herself. And since, when a joyful thing happened, they looked to see whether joy was on her, it was her habit to build up laughter out of inadequate materials” ( Steinbeck 48). The mourning period went by quickly because Ma showed strength in herself and in the family.
In the book Stones by William Bell it is tells a story on prejudice, the supernatural, history, it’s continuous cycle of racism, and labelling. One of the most underlying themes in the novel is Parent-Youth Relationships. Majority of the book touches base on the two main characters; Garnet Havelock and Raphella Skye’s dysfunction within both their families, the main relationships are Garnet & his Mom, Garnet & his Dad, and Raphella and her Mom. The relationship between Garnet and his Mom is offbeat because they are neither close and neither distant from each other, they have each other best interest but aren’t best friends. Garnet and
Each family is affected by society's decisions and expectations. In some households, love is portrayed through materialistic items. This is best shown through Pichert and Anderson’s “The House”. Mark is skipping school with his friend because his “Mom is never home on Thursday” (Pichert and Anderson). Already showing that Mark's relationship with his parents isn't as strong as it should be. Giving Mark the need to brag “...that he could get spending money whenever he needed it since he’d discovered that his Dad kept a lot in the desk drawer.” (Pichert
Certain times a person doesn’t see the love expressed by a father, thus staying ungrateful and insouciant toward them. Some eventually grow to see the many sacrifices made, but others become filled with hatred. Feeling trapped or ashamed the narrators rely heavily on memories of their childhoods with their fathers. While “Those Winter Sundays” (Hayden 318) and “Daddy” (Plath 345-47) explore the theme of familial love by utilizing a melodic rhythm, they use dissimilar literary devices and figurative language to reveal different personas of the poets.
In Yoko Ogawa’s The Housekeeper and the Professor, The Housekeeper and the Professor maintain a familial yet fluid relationship. The Housekeeper benefits from this relationship because in the Professor, she finds the patient, wise father she never had but has always needed. The Professor benefits from this relationship because he, much like a young child needs a supportive and present mother, needs the Housekeeper to look after him and protect him from the world outside his home. Ultimately, this relationship changes both the characters’ narratives by mending the brokenness in their lives and providing the love and emotional nourishment they need. Through her novel, Ogawa suggests that a family has no absolute form, and that the most unlikely
Family, a word that so many people know, but only few people understand it. I understand family as being someone in the household, spouse, parents, and children. What does family means to some people? Some people may say friendships, love, and happiness, and others may say pain, anger, and separation. To me, family means, love, friendship, togetherness, and support. My husband, mother, sister, aunt, children and cousins all provide me with some type of support and guidance. Family is your support system. Support gives you satisfaction and the belief of being valued. It gives you the power to stand up against the challenges of the world.
Different people have different views about what family really is. The Oxford dictionary defines family as “a group consisting of two parents and their children all living together as a unit”. In my view, a family is a collective number of people related by blood.
“A family can be defined as a set of people related by blood, marriage or in some other agreed upon relationship, or adoption, who share primary responsibility for reproduction and caring for member of society". (Schaefer, 2009, p. 288) This leads to a wide open range of interpretation on the exact definition of how a family is truly made up. Depending on your culture, religion, or geographical location a family may represent and be comprised of many different ideals and social norms. There are many theoretical perspectives that have their own interpretations on the subject of what a family is and how it is perceived. I will attempt to expound on three of these perspectives; Functionalism, Conflict, and Interactionalism.
The word “family” is a word that is loosely defined in today’s society. The U.S Census Bureau defines family as, “…two or more persons who share a household and who are related by blood, marriage, or adoption.” (Lamanna and Reidmann, pg. 5, pg. 259). There are two types of family: family of orientation and family of procreation. A family of orientation is the family that has raised the individual. The family of procreation is the family that is formed by marriage and by having children. Having a family is very important for a person’s development in society. Usually, a family shares the same value and is there for support when it is needed (Cowan).
The relationship and love you have with your family is one of the most important things you can have because family is always there for you no matter what situation you are in, even when you are at your worse they do the best they possibly can to help you and get you back on your feet. Sometimes they don’t show all their love towards you but that doesn’t mean they don’t love you and aren’t there to support you. This is what we have have experienced with our own families as well as with the stories To Kill a MockingBird and A Visit to Grandmother's.
My family is my strength and my weakness. While reading the Glass Castle, a memoir by Jeannette Walls, I found a strong recurring theme of the importance of family and the destruction of family. Jeannette Walls had a family who could not take care of her and held her from her greatest potential; however, she has repeatedly said she was grateful and loved her family. Initially, I could not believe how she could love her destructive parents the way she did, but the more I thought of it, I saw her perspective in my own life. My family who I dearly love tore me to pieces through a divorce. I would not be who I am today without my parents and what they have taught me, but my biggest hardship in life came from them. After reading the Glass Castle, I can relate Jeannette’s struggling family who was falling apart yet still undoubtedly loving and caring through my experiences in the divorce of my parents.