The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down Essay

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The statement, “A story must be exceptional enough to justify its telling; it must have something more unusual to relate than the ordinary experience of every average man and woman”, said by Thomas Hardy, perfectly correlates to the story, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman due to the unusual immigration story of a hmong family and the ups and downs of medical history. This story focuses in on a hmong family and their journey trying to cure their daughter Lia from epilepsy and a “dab”(demon/evil spirit). The statement “A story must be exceptional enough to justify its telling; it must have something more unusual to relate than the ordinary experience of every average man and woman”, said by Thomas Hardy, supports this …show more content…

Within the story, it was stated many times that if Lia’s parents could not give her the care she needs and follow directions given by the doctors then she would be removed and put into a foster home. Later on, Lia was moved into a foster home in which she received what the doctors thought was the proper medical treatment, while Foua and Nao Kao were still fighting to get Lia back, because they did not know the medication procedure and after they did, they realized a decreases in Lia’s awareness, so discontinued the medications. This fits the unusual and not normal experience of a story because most people understand and can follow directions they were given. But cultural differences led the Lee family to believe that the amount of drugs being put into a small childs system was taking over her body and would make her worse than she already

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